Why Dominant Species is one of my all-time favorite games
Dominant Species is still one of my favorite games, ever since I first got to play it at a local boardgame con about 10 years ago. I don't remember if I already had this game on my radar, or if I was then seduced by the dark cover with all sorts of beasts on it - unaware of the impending doom of the sputtering volcano in the background. A player I (then) vaguely knew from the game club Meeples I had just joined had his copy with me. He guided me and my partner through the rules of the game. After the first few rounds, I was sold. I hadn't played many games at that point, but Dominant Species felt unlike any other game I had played at that time. I promptly bombed it as the best game ever and couldn't wait to add that clunky box to my own collection so I could play this game anytime, anywhere.
... The latter is a bit disappointing ... because Dominant Species is an epic game. Even with players who know the game well and with the shortest variant, you'll still spend a few hours trying to settle this battle for dominance. Another stumbling block: this game can be mean.
Survival of the fittest
This is not multiplayer solitaire where, as that player playing the insects, you place green cubes like bees and ladybugs on the tiles and then let them walk around happily and peacefully. No. In this game, it's best to think of those green cubes as praying mantises. Who will stop at nothing in a world where a poisonous spider, a bird of prey or a pesky snake lurks behind every corner. Many of the actions you and your opponents do have a direct effect on the world and on the other players. This is most visible with the attack action, which allows you to unceremoniously nod off another player's cube on a tile where you are also present. No fussing with dice and attack and defense values here.
The actions that change the state of the central board are more subtle, but no less consequential. Players can accelerate the ice age by turning once hospitable terrain tiles into harsh tundra. Or remove elements. Those elements come in about six types and are the species' food sources. Since it is an asymmetrical game, each species starts with a preference for a particular combination of elements. The better adapted a species is to its environment, the stronger or more fit to survive (more dominant) it is. You can add an element token from the market to your player board through the "adaptation" action, increasing not only your chances of survival but also your dominance in one fell swoop. Conversely, the disappearance of an element token on a tile where you are present can take away your chances of survival. But don't panic: this is not as random as it seems, because the game of actions is well and logically constructed.
At the start of a round, players take turns placing their action pawns on the action spaces they want to perform. For some actions, the number of places is limited and smaller than the number of players. Can you already feel how each choice is important? There are 12 different actions and you have 5 action pawns in a 4-player game. Only when all players have placed all their pawns, the actions are completed, from top to bottom, left to right (when there is room for more than 1 pawn). The first action space allows the player who claimed this space to move up in the player order. Next come actions that allow you to change your species, by taking one of the four elements lying there (were randomly drawn from the bag), whoever stood first has first choice. Then follow action spaces that let you add elements to tiles on the board, remove an element from the board, convert a tile to tundra (which immediately removes from the board all but one cube of each present player), let your species reproduce so you get more presence on the board, or migrate if it gets too hot (or too cold) under your feet, and so on. The last action is immediately the most drastic one - and an important one if you want to score points, because in this game, too, the player who manages to accumulate the most points wins.
What do you mean I can be dominant with just one cube?
With the domination action you can do two things: first score a tile and then play one of the domination cards in the display on the board. Scoring a tile is preferably done on a tile where you yourself are present and where you are dominant. You are dominant on a tile when your species is best adapted to survive on that tile. The type of terrain plays no role in this, it is all about the elements present on that tile. Suppose your species is adapted to survive on tiles where water, sun and seeds are present and on a tile where you are present there is only meat, then you will not make it to the end of that round on that tile. If, on the other hand, there is grass and water present on that tile, you will make it, thanks to the water. Your dominance value is calculated by multiplying the number of symbols present both on your player board and on that tile. If that value for you is higher than the other players present on that tile with their cubes, then you are dominant and may indicate that by placing a cone on that tile. The number of cubes of your color on that tile does not affect your dominance at all: one cube that is better adapted to survive beats 10 cubes that are less well adapted. Don't numbers ever play a role? They do: when scoring tiles in that domination action.
So, back to the beginning: you choose a tile you want to score, preferably one where you yourself are dominant (why will become clear later) or at least one where you have sufficient presence. Tiles come in different terrain varieties: jungle, grassland, forest, desert, ocean, etc. Each terrain variety scores differently: oceans are the most valuable in points and distribute points among 4 players, mountains (and tundra) the least. These points are distributed according to presence: whoever has the largest presence takes the most points. Next, the player who is dominant on that scored tile must choose one of the domination cards and play it immediately. Trust me: each of these cards is incredibly powerful and will thoroughly shake up the status on the board. So you definitely want to claim some of the cake to have some control over the effects - e.g., you will absolutely want to be first to choose a card because you don't want the effects of a particular card to be used against you.
This is why Dominant Species rules for me
Dominant Species is a game that falls into the euro category for wargamers and the wargame category for euro gamers. The game has obvious euro elements with the action selection/worker placement and area control/area majority. However, there is no getting around the fact that this is an interactive game to say the least. And that's OK, that's an essential part of the game, so certainly don't take it personally if an opponent's action has a detrimental effect on your cubes - rest assured that sooner or later that opponent will curse you due to the effects of one of your actions.
Dominant Species may put you off because the big box and the abstract components that give the game the cachet of "complicated" - but that is unjustified. The actions are all logically and clearly laid out, and your player board basically tells you everything you need to know. The rules in themselves are also not complex: you actually have mainly the different actions to explain and the average game lover will pick up on them quickly. Dominance and how it is calculated is about the only tricky element.
Dominant Species combines strategy and tactics, and also manages to forge a strong bond between theme and mechanics. This manifests itself at the very start of the game, when players choose which species to play - each species has a unique advantage that they benefit from throughout the game. For example, birds can travel greater distances in a migration action, and insects reproduce more easily.
However, there are a few drawbacks as well: it's not a game I put on the table in any company, partly because of the aforementioned degree of interaction, and partly because of the time you need to play it. I have not yet managed to play a 4-player game in less than 3 hours - and that's with the short variant, and experienced players who no longer need game explanations.
At times, the game can also feel finicky, as just about every action that changes something on the board does or can have an effect on dominance, so you often have to step back to recalculate "the lot" to see if another player is now dominant on this or that tile... That is why I usually use tiny dice in the player colors to track dominance on each tile.
But after a few hours of play, when the battle is settled, the feeling of exciting and epic gameplay prevails most of all where, thanks to the integration of game mechanics and theme and despite the fact that you've just been busy with wooden cubes and cylinders and cones, at the end of the game you still feel like you've told a story and while cleaning up you'll still be chatting with your fellow players "remember when your spiders were there attacking my birds but I finally got you with a well-aimed glaciation action?" Good times!
