Brass: Birmingham English Version

- Game in English
 
- Number of players: 2 - 4
 
- Duration: 60 - 120 min
 
- Suggested Age: 14+

Brass: Birmingham is an economic strategy game that is the sequel to Brass, Martin Wallace's 2007 masterpiece. Birmingham tells the story of competing entrepreneurs in Birmingham during the Industrial Revolution, between the years 1770 and 1870.

As in its predecessor, you must develop, build, and establish your industries and network, in an effort to exploit low or high market demands.

Each round, players take turns in order according to the turn order track, receiving two actions to perform one of the following (which are in the original game) :

1) Build - Pay the necessary resources and place an industry tile.
2) Network - Add a rail/canal link, expanding your network.
3) Develop - Increase the VP value of an industry.
4) Sell - Sell your cotton, manufactured goods, and pottery.
5) Loan - Borrow £30 and reduce your income.

Brass: Birmingham also features a new sixth action:

6) Scout - Discard three cards and take a location joker and an industry joker. (This action replaces the Double Build Action in the original Brass).

The game is played in two parts: the Canal Era (1770-1830) and the Rail Era (1830-1870). To win the game, you must score the most VPs. VPs are counted at the end of each half for canals, rails, and established (flipped) industry tiles.

Birmingham features dynamic scoring for canals/rails. Instead of each flipped industry tile giving a static VP to all connected canals and rails, many industries give 0 or even 2 VPs. This gives players the ability to score much higher value canals in the first era, and creates interesting strategy with industry placement.

Iron, coal, and cotton are three industries that appear in both the original Brass and Brass: Birmingham.

New "Sell" System

Brewing has become a fundamental part of culture in Birmingham. You must now sell your product through merchants located on the edge of the board. Each of these merchants is looking for a specific type of good in each game. To sell cotton, pottery, or manufactured goods to these merchants, you must also "grease the wheels of industry" by consuming beer. For example, a level 1 cotton mill needs one beer to flip. To encourage earlier selling, the first player to sell to a merchant receives free beer.

Birmingham features three brand new industry types:

Brewery - Produces the valuable barrels of beer needed to sell goods.

Manufactured Goods - Works like cotton, but has eight levels. Each level of manufactured goods offers unique rewards, rather than simply increasing VPs, making it a more versatile (but potentially more difficult) path compared to cotton.

Pottery - These behemoths of Birmingham offer huge VPs, but at a huge cost and must be planned for.

Increased Coal and Iron Market Size - The price of coal and iron can now reach £8 per cube, and this is not uncommon.

Brass: Birmingham is the sequel to Brass. It offers a very different history and experience than its predecessor.