Goat Lords

My husband, son, and I love this card game. Not only is the art work cute but the Action Cards help give the game a little extra strategy. It’s great when you know someone has a Chuck Norris or Leonardo de Caprio stack with several 25 and/or 50 wild cards and you have three action cards to help you steal it from them: play the action card where you ask the player to your left for their highest wild card until you get to someone who has a wild card to give you (players should be honest about it or why bother playing?), plus one more action; that action is to play the card where you pick a player to put a stack of your choice to the top of their stack plus one action; the plus action would be to play another action card, especially the one where it tells you to steal the top stack of any player and now you can steal the big points stack you just had someone bring up to the top of their big stack AND you get one more action; the last action would be to put another two matching goat cards on top of your own goat stack to “protect” your new, just stolen goat stack! I’m not sure why some of the 1-3 Star reviews had issues with the rules as they are pretty straight forward and the action cards are self explanatory. There were also some 1-2 star reviews from people saying Goat Lords is a blatant rip off of Uncle Becks Cover Your Assets but I don’t agree. This game has the action cards which help add some strategy to your play as I outlined above. Plus the art work makes this game so much more pleasant to look at. This game is much more fun to us than Cover Your Assets and the action cards and art work play a big part in that assessment. I think it’s completely wrong for people to accuse Gatwick Games of stealing Uncle Becks Cover Your Assets game and simply switching it up by giving it a goat theme. Cover Your Assets is an updated knock-off of a couple of games going back 50 years! And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that just as there’s nothing wrong with Goat Lords being similar to Cover Your Assets. It’s all a matter of whether you want to play a game with action cards and cute and funny art work or a more streamlined similar mechanic game like Cover Your Assets. This game has been such a hit with everyone we’ve played it with that we end up giving away our copy of the base game as well as the expansion as soon as we finish playing to the people we just played it with because they loved it so much! We end up buying another copy of both and end up giving them away each time! I’ve bought four copies of Goat Lords and the expansion after giving away our other copies to two teen girls in college, a couple in their late 20s, and my in-laws who are in their late 70s and play card games with other elderly couples in their building. Anyhow, everyone is entitled to their own opinion and their own review but I don’t think accusations of stealing are the way to deal with that opinion. But the game and decide for yourself. And if you’ve never played Cover Your Assets, get that one too and decide for yourself. I’m in no way shape or form related to nor do I know the creator of this game or anyone at Gatwick Games. I just think this is a very fun card game if you just want a casual game night.

Fantastic fun game. We played this multiple times during the holidays. Great family game or for adults if you want a lot of fun. Age range: 8-adult, maybe younger if the child has experience playing games and is a good sport if his pile gets blown up or stolen. This is not a serious game, but a game to play if everyone wants a good time. Play time is 15-30 minutes depending on number of players.

This is a well made game with a lot of thought and love put into it. The art is great, the captions are snarky and hilarious, the gameplay is easy to pickup (especially if you watch the videos), and we play it with kids from 6+ at our house. It's light-hearted and fun, and games last 15-20 minutes or so once folks get going at a good pace. Beware! The atomic goat may cause younger children to cry dejectedly when their stack of 300 points worth of Fire Breathing Dragon Goats they stole from their dad gets blown to smithereens. See also their other versions of this game -- lots of fun!

Summary: Goat Lords is a game for 2-6 players, ages 7+ from Gatwick games. The premise of the game is that you are collecting sets of like goats (herds) in your stack by putting matching cards from your hand (or from your hand and the top discarded card) onto the top of your stack. It is not that easy though as other players can steal or eliminate your herds through either duels or the use of action cards (which have truly zany effects). A typical game lasted 20-40 minutes for my seasoned gaming group. The cards are cute. There is a little overlap with current politics in the deck, but it is not overpowering. On to the Dr Games’ Criteria … GO/NO GO Criterion • Complexity: (GO) The game is not complex, but I don't recommend it for the very youngest players in an unsupervised setting. There are actions that you need to work through carefully while being open to some level-headed, mature discernment. Based on the tone of the game, it is both intended to be and best played as a light-hearted game. If you do not take it too seriously, small disagreements about the rules will not lead to hurt feelings. For that reason, I highly recommend that you do not just hand these cards to the under 14 crowd. The game is simple enough to be mostly understood and played by younger players, and the fun, cartoonish cards might lead you to believe that this can be played unsupervised by youngsters, but we made that mistake. You should not. • Balanced: (GO ) This game is completely balanced. • Chance (GO) It is very random, and some of the action cards make it extremely unpredictable. Because it is a silly game, no one should get too upset when your stack gets nuked by an unexpected action or two. If you enjoy careful, deliberate planning and water-tight strategies then this game might not be in your favorites stack. • Clarity: (NO GO) Some of the cards are not clear in effect. For example, if someone uses an action (not the dread raining fire-goats card), but say the Russian Goatlette, if someone plays Escape Goat, does that just apply to him/her, or does it stop the action? If part of an action is stopped, do other aspects continue, for example, the +2 play? Etc. Etc. Etc. I only took off one star for this (when normally it would be at least two stars off) because this is clearly supposed to be a silly game. You should go into knowing that you will have to develop some table rules as you play. Better, play a couple of hands with another, like-minded gamer and develop the table rules in advance so that you can share with your other players as you explain the game. • Reasonable Time: (GO) The game plays in 20-40 minutes. Bonus Criteria • Social: The cards are fun and might spark bad puns, chuckles, and other social interactions. There is nothing in the rules to either hinder, nor to cause the interactions. • Unique/Interesting Mechanics: The various nuking and other action cards are unique. • Informed: Not for this game. • Rewards Throughout: No. You can lose everything after 40 minutes in the final round.

Great fun!

I run a board game club at my high school. Often I have then students test out new games to learn how they work and to have a good time. I had 4 boys sit down to try this one and here's some highlights: 1. The game was quick to learn and the gameplay loop was fun. 2. I think they need more variety of goats (I told then about the expansions and they thought that was good) 3. Thus would be a fun game to play with my family and little brothers. 4. We really like the artwork too. So overall the game was a hit with the high schoolers and they thought my own children (5-6 years old) could learn the game and have fun too. A great game for you to consider for your own family.

Played with teens and young adults, it’s a game we keep pulling out

Fantastic game, great fun, my husband and have only just got this game after reading all the positive reviews, and weren’t disappointed, we had great fun and many laughs. We have now arranged a games night with some of our friends to share the experience. Would definitely recommend.

We recently purchased Goat Lords as we love to play board games and card games as a family. We often find that games tend to bias the adults, as they understand tactics and gameplay better which makes it fairly tedious for younger players who rarely win (unless the adults let them!). Goat Lords however introduces enough 'chance' and luck so that younger players can win. We play with our 10 and 12 year old...they both love the game, love stealing stacks and particularly love winning the 'mega stack' through careful playing of action cards or wilds. All in all, it's one of our favourite games... and easily small enough to take on holiday too. Highly recommended.

This is our kind of game. Easy to learn, easy to teach to new people when you have friends over, fairly quick to play (you can reduce the number of cards in play if you're in a hurry). Fans of Exploding Kittens and Sushi Go will enjoy this, as will people who haven't played many games but want to try something fun. Excellent gift if you're not sure what to get a teenage boy. Highly recommend for a Christmas gift if you want to play family games over the holiday season.

Value for money... Very fun game