Welcome to Roll for Vibe Check, your one stop shop for vibe reviews of board games. Let’s take care of something before we get to our review of Quacks: All-In Edition by CMYK publisher.
“What is Roll for Vibe Check?”
RfVC is a review of the experience of the game, not a score of the game itself. These articles will be my opinion of what it feels like playing the game, built around most of the questions I ask my friends when shopping for a new game.
Let’s get to those vibes!
Quacks, published by CMYK is a reprint/redesign of The Quacks of Quedlinburg, designed by Wolfgang Warsch and published by Schmidt Spiele. New art and some quality of life updates make the CMYK version a fan favorite. In Quacks you play as a “quack” doctor/potion brewer competing against other brewers to make the most potent/popular brew. This is done by blind pulling your ingredients out of your bag and placing them in your cauldron. The more ingredients you add to the brew for the round, the more victory points and money for new ingredients you earn. Too many “boom-berries” and your potion explodes, and you get EITHER points or money at the end of the round, not both.
The All-In edition includes both original expansions The Witches, and The Alchemists. These expansions bring the player count to 5 players, and add new ingredients and ways to get points so BIG increase in replayability. The All-In edition also upgrades the cardboard tokens used for ingredients to LOVELY plastic tokens.
Quacks is a favorite game of mine. It hits the sweet spot of being complicated enough for tried and true gamers, and easy enough to learn and teach for new beginners. Simple dialed in gameplay, thrill of pushing your luck, and a clever catch up mechanic, also means that the person who plays the most won’t necessarily be the winner every time.
Overall Vibes:
PLAYERS - 2-5
TIME - 45 minutes
AGES - 10+
How competitive will we get?
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You’re definitely out for the most points, but there’s no real way to mess up any other players' plans. Y’all will still be friends at the end of the game.
Was it worth the price tag?
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Even the base version of Quacks has solid cardboard and high quality printing. The All-In Edition upgrades are great and look awesome on the table. Both versions are solid purchases.
Anything missing?
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Minor complaint: No anthropomorphic ducks. Missed opportunity for CMYK to reprint the game so you’re REAL quacks
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Real talk: As someone who likes well organized trays and inserts (thanks nerdivergent brain) I wish the All-In Edition had a better insert for the box. Everything fits, but not in a pretty way.
Overall: Good vibes all around.
Thanks for reading, and let us know in the comments what you’d like reviewed next!
Bring good vibes to the table,
Josh H.
1 thought on “Rolling for Vibe Check - Quacks: All-In Edition Review”
Paul
Great review. I love Quacks. I remember playing this game for the first time at BGG Spring along with Ganz Schon Clever. Both were up for awards in their categories and I remember thinking it was unimaginable that one person could design 2 games in the same year that made my brain so happy. They were both perfect games at providing the best experience they were aiming to provide. Quacks almost created a whole new category of game for me. The bag building, push your luck, engine building pure distilled fun of it was perfection. It was immediately one of my favorite games. It’s still in my top 10. I think that Quacks along with Wingspan are 2 perfect examples to show a new gamer today. They are both the peak example of just how far we’ve come as a hobby.