Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Dominion: Seaside is the second expansion (but first strictly-expansion expansion) to the award-winning uncollectible collectible card game Dominion. The first expansion, Dominion: Intrigue, was an expansion, but could also be played on its own. Seaside, on the other hand, is a strict expansion- it lacks the Land and Money cards that Dominion and Dominion:Intrigue come with, and can only be played when on also has a copy of one of those two (or both, if you have all three!). Dominion (the original) had 25 different stacks of Kingdom cards, from which you chose ten stacks to use in any given game (about three million possible scenarios). Intrigue added another 25, for a total of 50 stacks from which you chose 10 (for something like 10 billion possible starting scenarios). Seaside adds 26 more Kingdom cards, for a total of 76 from which one chooses ten (pushing the possible start scenarios up towards the trillions). Like the other two games, the game starts with each player having a fixed deck of ten cards, and using those cards to purchase more cards from a central pool of Land Cards, Money Cards, and Stuff Cards. One recycles this ever-growing deck back onto itself, simulating a small dominion's cycling economy, and competing against the other player's kingdoms in a race of efficiency and resource-wealth. Intrigue, as the name belies, introduced many "sneaky" or "mean" cards into the game- attacks that pulled cards from other peoples hands and decks, or cards that punished other players who were getting ahead. Rather than rehashing the original game's mechanics, it pushed them in new, interesting directions, typically by forcing competing players to choose the lesser of two evils when presented with certain card-actions. Seaside continues this trend, adding an overall theme of "your next turn". Many of the cards in this expansion let you sacrifice a not-so-great hand for a nearly-guaranteed amazing hand next turn, or squirrel cards from your deck away, to be drawn back into your hand later. Other cards let you pirate treasure from other players, embargo goods and services, or move cards from the bottom of your deck to the top. This theme gives games played with these new 26 cards a much different feel from playing just the original or Intrigue- there are more elements of chance, whimsy, and, after sufficient quiet building momentum, the heady exercise of much-restrained power. It is a nice companion to the smash-and-grab routines introduced by Intrigue. Like the Intrigue expansion, the 26 Seaside expansion stacks can be used on their own, or combined with the other 50 stacks from the original and Intrigue. Seaside has some game mechanics that are a little more complicated than the other two games, but this complication is mitigated by the excellent reminder mats and (real metal) tokens that come with the game specifically to make those mechanics easier. It does not, though, take too long to get up to speed. (All three games share that quality- it takes a couple of turns to learn how to play, a couple of playthroughs to learn how to win, and then has more possible game-states than atoms in the universe- you can always come back for more). The only downside to Seaside as compared to Intrigue is that it is a strict expansion- it cannot actually be played without the Land and Money cards that come with the Original or Intrigue. Also, (and this isn't necessarily a downside), it has about 500 cards, and one really ought to by card sleeves for them, both for protection and easier organization. In any case, Seaside is an interesting, challenging, and all around excellent expansion to Dominion and Dominion: Intrigue.