Valeria Card Kingdoms: Darksworn - Review
Information:
Mechanics: Engine Builder, Co-Operative, Dice Rolling
Player Age: 14+Player Count: 2 - 5 PlayersTime to Play: 60 - 120 Minutes
Game Designer: Isaias VallejoGame Artist: Mihajlo DimitrievskiPublisher: Daily Magic GamesYear Published: 2021BGG Weight: 2.25
Player Age: 14+
Game Designer: Isaias Vallejo
Objective:
This expansion changes the mechanisms of Valeria Card Kingdoms more than any other expansion. Instead of building your own kingdom and aiming to gain the most points, you are now defending the kingdom together with your fellow players. Valeria card kingdoms can now be a cooperative game with a story compartment as you journey together through six adventures.
Game Anatomy:
Number tiles:
These tiles will sit above the monsters and dictate which number on the dice they will activate when rolled.
Wall Tiles:
These wall tiles are the protectors of the civilians. They can be damaged twice by monsters before they are destroyed completely. As an action these walls can return through blessing (this will cost 8 victory points). Some blessing allow for a cheaper cost.
Shade Monsters:
These are monsters that will be shuffled into the monster deck. They have effects on the top of the card that will either be instant or will activate when a certain number is rolled.
Blessings:
Blessings now turn the victory points into a currency. There will be three randomised blessings revealed at any time. These blessings show players to trade victory points for different effects, other resources, returning citizens or to re-build walls.
Book Cards:
There are two forms of book cards that will tell a story as players immerse into each story scenario.
Rule cards have story text at the top of the card and rules that must be followed at the bottom. If there is a lightning symbol in the rules this rule must occur immediately when the card is revealed.
Task cards are the obstacles you have to overcome. These are designed similar to monster cards where they will have a cost on the left hand side and a reward that players will earn once defeated found at the bottom of the card. These tasks have to be completed equal to the amount of players. Once it is completed a player will place an achievement token on the task to remind players how many times it has already been completed.
Set-up:
Set-up will change based on the scenario, these parts will remain consistent though.
- Place the story board at the top of the play area.
- Place achievement tokens equal to the player count on the story board.
- From left to right place the 1 to 5 number tiles above the five monster cards on the monster row.
- Choose five monster areas and remove any cards with the five, boss or warden symbol.
- Shuffle the monsters together and draw five monster cards face-up under the 1 to 5 tiles.
- Then shuffle nine shade cards into the monster deck.
- Place a wall tile with the wall illustration face-up below each monster in the monster row.
- Choose one citizen for each activation number to form the citizen stacks (Two below each wall).
- These citizens stacks are equal to the player count plus two.
- Place the aquila board below the citizen Stack.
- Shuffle the blessing cards then draw three face-up into the slots on the aquila board.
- Create a stack of exhausted cards and place them near the play area (no event cards).
- Give each player 1 explorer, 1 peasant and 1 knight starter.
- Each player starts with two gold one magic and one victory point.
How to play:
As Darksworn turns Valeria Card Kingdoms into a co-operative game the game flow has now changed immensely. At the start of every new book (new game) players will have to flip the card over to sit on the left hand side and players will read the setup instructions and new rules of the book.
If players are familiar with the base game, these are the rules that will change each phase of the game. The monster phase is an added phase that will depend on the dice rolled during the dice roll phase.
Action Phase:
Players can no longer buy domains as they are no longer used in this game. When players slay monsters they no longer keep the card as it could be reshuffled and used later in the game, instead players will immediately gain victory point tokens equal to the victory points the monster will normally give you at the end of the game.
Three new actions have been added to this action phase. Players can share resources by one player giving another an amount of resources and in return they will gain half that amount of different or similar resources.
Players can engage the book, this is how they progress with the story, by paying the resources on the left side of the task card. These resources can be paid with magic substitutes as per the norm. Once a player has paid the resources they will gain the benefit at the bottom of the card and will place one achievement token on the card.
Players can also pray to Aquila which allows players to spend victory points to either build a demolished wall spending 8 victory points, or they can use one of the revealed blessing cards then discard the card after receiving the benefit.
Monster Phase:
A new phase is added after each players action phase. In the same way to activating your citizen cards, each monster that shares the individual values of the two dice rolled will activate and also the sum of the dice will activate. This activation has the monster either damaging the wall below them or, if there is no wall, they will capture one of the civilians below them. Some of the shade monsters have unique abilities or unique activations.
End Phase:
The end phase has changed in this version of the game, if there are achievement tokens equal to the player count on the task page. Then turn the page, reading the flavour text and executing the new instructions.
Refill any empty blessing card slots, refill an empty monster cards and then pass the dice to your left starting the next players turn.
Ending the Game and Scoring:
In this new mode there are only two end game scoring conditions. If you must discard or banish a citizen card and there are no valid options, you lose the game. The second end condition is that you have reached the final page and win the scenario.
The next time you play if you have lost you will replay this book, however if you win you get to continue the campaign with new rules and challenges.
Final Thoughts:
- Your life force is your civilians.
- The expansion comes with 6 continuing story adventures and a way to play randomly and indefinitely.
- New tokens and cards are added to keep each story feeling fresh.
- Not all villages seamlessly go into this new mode.
Darksworn expands the tried and true game of Valeria Card Kingdoms into completely new territory, a co-operative game. It does this extremely well it keeps the essence of the base game while creating a different puzzle for players. A great example of these new puzzles is whenever you buy civilians to make your tableau stronger, you are depleting your groups health. This creates an interesting dynamic thats different from the competitive mode while still keeping the core game essence. This is an amazing expansion which makes me consider if i want co-operative or competitive whenever I open up the game. This is one hundred percent earning a Go-To Golden Game Seal.
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