Stats:
No. of players: 3-5
Amount of time to play: 30 min
Age requirements: 13+
Set-up time: 5 min

QE Commodities adds a new wrinkle to this auction board game. Now you’ll sell commodities during your auction to offset your spend and score VPs for the commodities auction winner.

QE Commodities Rules Description:

This post is going to concentrate on the new elements in the Commodities expansion. If you have never played QE, you can read my review and game overview here.

The QE Commodities expansion introduces three different commodities to the game, oil, gold, and crypto. There are six tiles of each type of commodity. Oil is worth four or five VPs but the player with the most oil gets a bonus five VPs at the end of the game. Gold is worth six or seven VPs. But if it is all sold the market crashes and all gold tiles are worth three VPs less. Crypto is erratic. The crypto tiles are worth ten, eight (x2), five, two and zero.

You get these tiles if you have the second place bid in the auction. The highest bidder wins the company tile as usual. The auctioneer tells the player with the second highest bid to choose one of the commodities. Then they take top tile off the face down pile and write what they spent on that commodity. On their extension player board they write that same bid unless they were the second highest bidder. Both are kept secret.

Most rules from the base game are unchanged, but zero bids no longer gain you VPs.

The amount on your extension board represents the commodities you sold. At the end of the game, you subtract the total from your total spent. This can help you get the bonus VPs for spending the least amount in the game. And avoid automatically losing by spending the most.

Quick Review of QE Commodities Expansion:

Commodities creates more ways to score and adds paths to victory in QE. The new mechanics and rules are easy to pick up and blend seamlessly with those from the base board game.

The components for the expansion are inline with the base game components. Everything can be written on with dry erase markers. The rules are well written with examples when needed.

I like that the second highest bid still wins something. It creates an interesting dynamic as sometimes the commodities might be worth more than the company that is up for auction. It is also great that more players win. In the base game it can feel tough when only one person gains VPs each round.

The expansion makes for a more strategic experience, but I wouldn’t recommend it with three players. It makes it far too easy to stick the auctioneer with their commodities which can force them to have the most spend.

If you enjoy QE, the Commodities expansion is a nice addition that doesn’t require you to learn a lot of new rules. It changes the experience and adds more VPs to be won. If you are a fan, pick this expansion up.

Score and synopsis: (Click here for an explanation of these review categories.)
Strategy 4 out of 6
Luck 2 out of 6
Player Interaction 6 of 6
Replay Value 4 out of 6
Complexity 2 out of 6
Fun 5 out of 6
Overall 5 out of 6