Stats:
No. of players: 2-6
Amount of time to play: 60-120 min
Age requirements: 14+
Set-up time: 5 min

The Farmers adds livestock to Keyflower. Now you can raise and breed animals to score points.

Keyflower the Farmers Rules Description:

If you have never played Keyflower read my overview and review before reading this post. It is going to focus on the new things added in the Farmers expansion.

In this expansion you get three types of animals, sheep, pigs and cows. You gain these animals from the tiles in the game and place them in the fields on the tile that generated them. If you used an opponent’s tile to get the animal you add it to a field next to your home tile. Roads separate fields and you cannot have different types of animals in the same field. If you have two more animals in a field at the end of a season, you get one more of that type of animal.

Wheat is a new resource that helps you move animals and transport resources. When you take a transport action you may move your animals to an adjacent field as one of the moves. For each wheat token you spend you may move a resource or animal one more tile or field. Wheat tokens are kept secret behind your screen.

There are also new tiles for each season and start player. Many of which get you livestock or wheat and interact with the new resources in some way.

Quick Review of Keyflower the Farmers Expansion:

The Farmers adds another way to score to Keyflower and this forces you to plan accordingly. The change is not drastic but it will require your attention.

The components for this game are excellent. I love the animeeples and the other chits and tokens are thick and durable. The rulebook is easy to read and reference too.

I like the addition of wheat. It can really help you move things around the board. You’d think having to move animals and resources would be too much but wheat can really help you get things on the tiles they need to be on.

Having new ways to score is a nice change. Like I said, animals will require a shift in how you approach the game. You don’t want to spread your efforts too thin. Whether you bother with animals or not will probably depend on your Winter tiles. If they increase your VPs per animal then you should try to make use of them.

The only problem I see with this expansion is when mixing it with the base game you have no idea what tiles are coming out. If you get a Winter tile with an animal VP booster and go for animals and there are no tiles that provide that animal you are in trouble. This does not happen as often as you think. Or it is easier to avoid then you think because you are getting an additional Winter tile at the start of the game. So you can adjust your strategy accordingly if you are not seeing tiles to get you what you need early.

If you enjoy Keyflower then keep enjoying it. It is a really fun game. But if it is getting stale add the Farmers expansion. It will change the focus of the game and freshen up your plays without forcing you to learn a ton of new rules.

Score and synopsis: (Click here for an explanation of these review categories.)
Strategy 5 out of 6
Luck 4 out of 6
Player Interaction 5 out of 6
Replay Value 4 out of 6
Complexity 5 out of 6
Fun 5 out of 6
Overall 5 out of 6