How to Use the Builder Role in Puerto Rico

Building in Puerto Rico is always a fun experience, because you get to add an interesting building to your city. Depending on whether you're playing with the expansion or not, there may be all sorts of buildings you want to grab as early as possible. And best of all, choosing builder gives you a free one coin discount on whatever you build. As roles in Puerto Rico go, builder is one of the better ones.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Puerto Rico board game
• Strategic mindset

1. Build the building you want as soon as you can afford it. The earlier you build a powerful building, the earlier it can start helping you. Waiting a governorship to build means that you'll be without the benefit of that shiny building for all those turns, and that's a bad thing.

2. Choose Builder if you need one more coin for that fancy building, and Prospector has already been taken. If you can't afford to build that factory or harbor when the player to your left picks Builder, you'll be kicking yourself for not taking Builder yourself.

3. Choose builder when your opponents are one coin short of a key building. Obvious key buildings are production buildings for cash crops they've already gotten plantations for (Coffee or Tobacco), or big earners you know they are saving up for (Factory). If you can Build when they're a coin short, they'll have to wait at least a governorship for the building they want, or settle for a worse building now.

4. Build production buildings in the very early game. Unless you have corn, you'll need a production building to produce any barrels. Also, if you have any cash crop plantations (Coffee or Tobacco), try to build a matching production building as soon as possible, otherwise your fields will lie fallow.

5. Avoid picking builder if you can't make use of the one coin discount. If you have a Quarry, remember that you can get some buildings for free (Small Indigo Plant, Small Market) even if someone else picks Builder. If you plan on building one of these with your quarry and can't make use of the additional one coin discount, don't bother with Builder. However, keep in mind that if you do have a quarry and pick Builder, you can get a large Indigo plant for one coin - the usual price of the small Indigo plant.

6. Grab scarce buildings before your opponents by picking builder. In a five-player game, or if playing the expansion variant with one of each building, the chances are good that many buildings you want will be bought out before you can get them. Avoid this unpleasant eventuality by choosing Builder and grabbing the popular buildings (Small Market, Factory, Harbor, Library) before they disappear. In a standard three-player game, however, this is not much of a concern.

7. Watch your opponents and figure out if one of the next few players is likely to choose Mayor. If so, Building is extra useful because your buildings will be manned swiftly and come into play. If all the other actions will be chosen before Mayor, keep in mind that your new building won't help you for any of those roles, until someone picks Mayor.

Tips & Warnings

• Grab a factory and harbor if you have varied production. If playing with the expansion, build the library as soon as humanly possible.
• Don't build just to build; unless you're building a free building, make sure every building you build is something you really want.

[doitrightnow]

on 11/21/2009 What is this article about? Can you tell us what "Builder" is? Is it a game?