There are themes that I just never thought I would see board games built around.  One example being Apiary, a game about space bees (learn more here.)  Another being the subject of the review before you: Ezra, Nehemiah, and the lesser known Zerubabbel, from the Old Testament.  If you’re not up to date on your Old Testament knowledge, these two books describe the return from exile for the Israelites and how they rebuild Jerusalem.  Nehemiah and Zerubabbel both help to restore God’s grand temple, while Nehemiah also focuses on rebuilding the walls and gates around the city.  Additionally, once Ezra shows up, he takes on the challenge of teaching the Torah, familiarizing the post-exile generatation again with God’s law.

Designers Shem Phillips and S J Macdonald have literally taken these three focal points of the two Old Testament books and turned them into the three main actions in the board game Ezra and Nehemiah.  Don’t worry, you don’t have to be a biblical scholar, or even a believer for that matter, to enjoy the game.  But you probably should have some experience with modern board gaming mechanics because this game could be quite a bit to digest for a total beginner.  So, let’s jump into the review and see how the game works!

Garphill Games always knocks it out of the park when it comes to their rulebooks.  No, they are not typically very short, but neither are the games themselves, especially the games that have come out since the ending of the West Kingdom trilogy.  But I’m going to guess that most gamers who pick up a game of this weight aren’t going to mind a rulebook packed to the gills with information.  It is always laid out well and uses plenty of pictures to add context. 

One thing that I haven’t fully decided on if I like or not, is that Garphill now has a section near the beginning of the rulebook, typically labeled as Concepts.  This section will lay out the overarching concepts found in the game but I’ve noticed that without any other context, such as on first read, these concepts are hard to place in the grand scheme of the game.  Once a reader gets to the sections that explain game turns, they will probably be flipping back to the concepts portion quite a bit as they begin to connect the dots.  So, I guess I land on that my first few read throughs of a book like this, is not very streamlined and harder to decipher exactly how it all works.  But where I do think this is an advantage is once you begin playing, and you need to quickly find “how does X work?” you can find all the important info broken down in that concepts area, without having to trudge through how a round works.  In conclusion, it’s a great rulebook that tries a different layout from your standard rulebook and I’m guessing that some gamers will love it and get a lot of mileage out of it and others won’t.  So is life.

Moving now to the components, I’m honestly surprised how much fits into this small-ish box.  It’s on par with The White Castle on how much you’re getting for the size of the packaging.  The Main Board is beautifully illustrated, evoking the time period the game is set in, though I’m sure some beginner gamers are going to feel ultra-intimidated by the amount going on with the board.  Likewise, the Player Boards are tastefully rendered, while also being practically designed by having small cutouts where Upgrade Tiles and Meeples can nestle in without falling over.

Speaking of tiles, there are a lot of tiles so get ready for a lot of board-punching.  The aforementioned Upgrade Tiles act as four different places on your board that can be upgraded throughout the game.  There is a wide variety of these tiles so each game, your board will be slightly different, which is great for fans of variety.  The rest of the tiles come in the form of Scribe Tiles, in three different flavors, and only a portion of them will be used each game.  Again, props to Garphill Games for supplying variety in each play.  The Scribe Tiles have a lot of iconography on them, which players will eventually be able to remember but there is a nice glossary in the rulebook for those that don’t have the most wonderful memories. 

Along with the massive amount of tiles, players will be treated to quite a few types of cards, both in normal playing card size and then a some that are about half that size.  I will go into more detail about the different cards during the gameplay section, but rest assured that the majority of them have wonderful character artwork and even those that are more minimalistic, are designed in a way to match the rest of the game and to do their jobs properly.

Lastly, I want to call out the two special meeples representing Haggai and Zachariah¸ the two prophets that will play a part during the Sabbath.  These two meeples are unlike the other meeples in the game, with their arms (or a single arm in one case) thrown to the skies, worshipping their chosen deity.  Flourishes like these just make games stand out a little more when playing them.  Players will also get plenty of regular meeples, tracking tokens, and a ton of small cubes, representing the game’s resources: Stone, Wood, Gold, and Ash.  These are all fine but standard if you’re familiar with any modern board game.  Ok, so the game has great components, but what do you do with them all?  Let’s find out! 

Setup & Gameplay

First off, setup for Ezra and Nehemiah is on the high end of the “fiddly-ness” meter, so be prepared.  I find that it is one of those games that is easier to reset and play a few times in a row (if you have a table you can leave it out on) rather than packing it up and pulling it back out each time. I’m going to touch on the highpoints of setup but for a detailed look at the actual setup, please visit our full YouTube video here.  There are chapters so feel free to zip right to the Setup portion if you so desire.

The most annoying part of setting the game up is definitely placing the resources on the Wall & Gate spaces, around the perimeter of the board.  Players will want to set aside 10 of each of the resource cubes, and then toss the rest in the provided bag.  After shaking them up, they will then draw cubes out of the bag and place an amount onto each space, according to the symbol printed on the space.  The balance of the cubes will then be added to the set-aside 10 to create the bank.  Is this process hard?  No.  Does it take that much time in the grand scheme of things?  No.  Does it still annoy me every time I have to do it?  Yes.

Players will also need to put out rows upon rows of the Scribe Tiles mentioned earlier.  These should be separated by the colors on the back, shuffled, and then placed face-up into the correct row in the Torah section of the board.  If playing a 2-player game, or solo, two white meeples and Food Tokens will get placed in this area, with the former helping to create more “links” in the Torah (more on this later), and the latter acting as a reward for being the first to reach each new row of this area of the board.

I mentioned the word “variety” a few times earlier in the review, so let’s look at the parts of setup that achieve this.  First, one of the sides of the two Prophet Cards needs to be chosen to be used each game.  This card is illustrated with three levels, each split into three areas: behind both Prophets, between the Prophets, or ahead of the Prophets.  Each level is marked with a one, two, or three, representing the rounds players will work through in the game.  This card is going to impact players during the Sabbath of each round, giving out varying awards, or doling out different punishments.  A few sides of these cards can really ramp up the unforgiving nature of the Prophets, so it is nice be able to choose before you start playing.

Players will also each fill their personal board with four kinds of Upgrade Tiles.  These tiles give players a chance to send workers to them for added bonuses or resources and if a player pays the upgrade cost, they can be flipped over and become even more powerful.  They all lie in the same vein, so no single player is going to run away with the game just because they have a certain Upgrade Tile, but again, variety is the spice of life so I like not having the same board for every game. 

Enough of the boring setup talk, let’s finally get into the gameplay!  Players will start out with a hand of Character Cards, drawing four from their deck of eight.  All players’ decks are made up of the same cards, but obviously, their starting hand might differ.  These cards have a few places that players will want to concentrate on.  Most importantly is the banners shown in the top left of the card.  The cards will include three banners, each of a single color, either Red, Grey, or Blue.  These colors correspond with the three main actions of the game: Temple/Altar Actions, Building Walls/Gates, or Teaching the Torah respectively.  Across the bottom of the card is the Trade Action that the card enables the player to take.  There is also an icon in the top right, but we’ll discuss that when we get to the Sabbath.

The player will choose one of the cards from their hand, and play it into one of the three areas on their Player Boards.  At the beginning of the game, these are empty so it doesn’t really matter where the card is placed but as the round progresses, this decision becomes more and more important.  The catch is that you can only ever play two cards in each space, and once you cover a card, you can no longer use it’s banners in play.  So, what does that mean?  After choosing the card and playing it on the board, the player can count all the uncovered banners on their board, including both their played cards and any banners gained by placing a worker on their Upgrade Tiles.  Using these banners, in conjunction with the color of the banner, the player will decide which of the three actions to take.  Now, a player doesn’t have to use the banners on the card he/she just played, but in my experience, you want to take advantage of the colors that represent the most banners in your collection.

Let’s take a look at the individual actions now, starting with the Temple and Altar Actions that players can take, utilizing their Red Banners.  The first decision to make when taking a red action is whether or not you want to turn one of your worker meeples into a Levite.  These Levites will be placed below the Temple Board and each cost a certain amount of Food when placed, though they do provide a few benefits.  One benefit is that you will no longer have to feed them at the end of the round, unlike the rest of your workers.  Second, there is a printed award on each Levite level that you gain once you reached that level of the board.  Lastly, the Levites allow you to stretch out how many red actions you can take each turn, multiplying the efficiency of your turn. After deciding if you want to transform one of your workers, you then need to decide if you are going to help to Build the Temple, Make an Offering at the Altar, or both.  If you only have one Levite, you’ll only be able to do one of these things.  If you have two, you can choose to do two of these, either a combination of them, or a single action twice.  The more Levites you have, the more of these two things you can do.  But beware, as your Red Banner count might still limit you. 

When you Build the Temple, you will place either a Wood, Stone, or Gold into the left-most spot of any row on the Temple Board.  As the rows go higher, you’ll have to spend more Red Banners but the rewards printed on the rows are better as well.  You’ll also get Victory Points with Wood and Stone giving you one VP each and Gold giving you two VP.  Players will also notice the Temple Board is split into multiple sections and the player who places the last resource into one of these sections will also gain a few bonuses, though other players who have Levites can also benefit when a section is completed.

Making an Offering is slightly different from the Temple process.  Players can offer either Ash or Wood, needing to pay one Red Banner for the former, and three Red Banners for the latter.  Once the Banners are used and the Resources turned into the bank, the player will move his/her Altar Token the corresponding amount on the Prophet Track.  If a player passes or lands on a printed reward, they gain this immediately. 

Moving to the Grey Banners, these are the ones that are going to let players Build Walls/Gates around the city.  The first thing a player will probably need to do is Clear Rubble from the space where they are going to want to build.  Each rubble piece has a corresponding value and players will need to spend an amount of Grey Banners equal to this value.  Doing this gives two advantages: first, the player gets to keep all the rubble cleared, which can be used later to do the actual building, and second, the player will get to move one of their vases on the Blessings Track.

After a space is cleared, or if a player decided to pick a space empty of rubble, they are able to build if they still have enough Grey Banners left over and the required amount of resources to meet the printed values on the board.  Once these things are paid for, the player can build their selected portion.  If it is a Wall, players will draw three cards from their Wall Deck and choose one to put out on the board, one to put on top of their Wall Deck, and one to put at the bottom of the Wall Deck.  Walls grant the builder an immediate reward as well as a varying amount of Victory Points at the end of the game.  When a Gate is built, the player will take the Gate from beside the board, collecting any Silver Coins on it, place it on the Main Board, and then put one of their Workers on the Gate.  This Worker is now considered a Gatekeeper.  Gates award their builders with four Victory Points at the end of the game as well as an immediate reward.

Lastly, there are the Blue Banners, which players will utilize to teach the Torah in the upper-right quadrant of the board.  The Torah area is made up of four rows, each with an increasing cost of Blue Banners and other resources, printed to the left.  Players will start at the bottom level, needing to spend three Blue Banners and two Silver Coins to place a Worker (now called a Scribe) on one of the three tiles located there.  These tiles differ from the other rows as they each have a face and name of one of the game’s Heroes on them.  Placing a Scribe here allows the player to take the Hero Card into their possession, instantly gaining rewards matching the round number.  This card also will give players an on-going colored Banner for the rest of the game.

Once a player has Scribe on the first level, they can then move up to the second level on a future turn, paying the next amount printed on the game board.  Players can think of this as a ladder where they will need to have one of their Scribes on each rung (or row) in order to progress upwards.  Now, there is one way to get around this, but it’s going to cost you some money.  If a player wants to use another player’s Scribe as the link from one row to the next, they will need to pay that player a Silver Coin.

We’ve described the first row of tiles, but let’s take a quick look at the next three rows.  The second and third rows all contain Scribe Tiles that are going to give some sort of benefit as the game continues.  Sometimes this might be things such as a discount on feeding your Workers or getting to move your Blessing Tracker whenever you do a certain action.  The top row is reserved for tiles that will give players additional scoring opportunities at the end of the game.

Players will also notice a small chart to the right of the Torah area, listing a Blue Banner cost and a number inside the Tent symbol.  Players can also spend Blue Banners to move their Tent around the circular map, picking up rewards as they pass them on the trail.  This is a great way to spend leftover Blue Banners after placing a Scribe on a Scribe Tile.

Once players have taken six turns, it is time to Prepare for Sabbath and then to take part in said Sabbath.  Both of these sections of the game allow players to act simultaneously as they move through the below steps:

Prepare for Sabbath

1. If players have any Workers left over in their supply, they can assign them as Farmers or Laborers on their individual player boards.
2. Players should check to see where their Altar Marker aligns with the two Prophet Meeples and then resolve the corresponding effect on the Altar Card.

Sabbath

1. Feed their Workers, excluding Levites and those still in their supply, by paying one Food Token a piece.  If a player cannot feed a Worker, they must lose two Victory Points.
2. Take one Character Card from their player board and tuck it beneath their player aid.  Much like the Hero Cards discussed earlier, this tucked card will give the player an ongoing banner but will also give the player a round-end scoring condition for the rest of the game.
3. Score all Tucked Cards based on the printed scoring conditions.

After all three rounds are completed, the player with the most Victory Points wins.

Solo Mode Thoughts

I’ve heaped a lot of praise on Garphill Games and the designs of Shem Phillips, but one of the crowning achievements is always the solo versions that come included in the game.  Ezra and Nehemiah’s Solo Mode continues this long lineage of wonderful variants.  Players will play against a modified opponent that is controlled by two decks of card, the Focus Deck and the Scheme Deck.  The Focus cards will guide the opponent in choosing a Gate as well as a Trade Action.  The Scheme cards are divided into three rows, and players will evaluate the requirements from the top down.  Once the opponent meets a requirement, it will carry this out.  I do find that I have to have the rulebook close by as the iconography on the Scheme cards isn’t the easiest thing to remember and I usually need some wider explanation from the rulebook.  Overall, I’ve played the solo game numerous times and I’ve enjoyed it on every occasion.  Even at the easiest level, the opponent’s difficulty ensures that players still need to think on their feet as they play through the game.

Ezra and Nehemiah is just what I want from a game designed by Shem Phillips.  A perfect melding of different mechanisms, crunchy decision making, all wrapped up with a nice historical bow.  While this game is a little heavier than past games in his arsenal, this shouldn’t stop fans from trying out Ezra and Nehemia.

Ratings are based on 5 main criteria: rulebook, setup, components, art & graphic design, and gameplay.  The first 4 criteria are rated 1 to 5 and the gameplay is rated 1 to 10.  These scores culminate in an “overall satisfaction” score that is rated from 1 to 10.  If the reviewed game has both a solo and multiplayer mode, I have assigned scores separately to give context to which mode we enjoy more.