Winterborne is a deck builder that also brings kingdom building to the table. You will explore and expand, adding new cards and building up your overall reach. Trade and build to prepare for winter and see if you can discover your true Winterborne power!
Winterborne is designed by Brian Suhre and illustrated by Danny Dufford. It is published by Talon Strikes Studios and is played with 1-4 players.
Setup and Gameplay
Each player starts with a house and kingdom board, a power card and six house cards and all of the appropriate settlements, churches and gold. Each player will start with one each of the Shaman, Explorer and Warrior. The house cards are shuffled and create your starting deck.Your house board is where all your buildings will go as you setup as well. Next the Kingdom board is setup. This is where you will track the movement of your characters and expand your own kingdom through conquering and building.
The board is divided into 6 provinces each with its own color.
The main board is set with the province boards and each is given the ally cards, spoils and conquer tiles that belong to that space. The Exploration deck is set up with the core cards and extra Wylds cards and Banner cards added based on the number of players in the game. After this, deal 1 card from the Exploration deck to each of the Exploration sections and according to the number of players.
There are a number of different card types in the game that you will encounter and each will provide different aspects into your personal deck. Cards with multiple actions on the card may be present, you may only chose one of those and play it. Deck building along the course of the game becomes very important in gameplay.
Play consists of the following steps:
- Play cards from your hand to move your explorer, shaman, or warrior character. Move a character and it will provide its second action.
- Play as many cards or spoils as you want until you choose to end your turn.
- Discard or keep any cards in your hand and then you may draw cards from your personal deck until you have 4 cards.
- End turn.
Playing cards will move one of three characters of your choice. First you play a card with the character’s symbol that you want to move than you play a second with the movement symbol to determine how much they move. After movement you may perform that character’s special action as well. You continue with this gameplay until you run out of cards or spoils. Let’s look at the three characters:
-The Warrior. His character will allow you to conquer adjacent empty sections or build one of two buildings, the Settlement or the Church.
-The Shaman. He will allow you trade, tax and pray and his movement will also allow you to gain income as you move around the board.
-The Explorer. He will venture out to explore and Raid around the board.
The game progresses through seasons, and each season ends when that deck runs out of cards. This can happen on any player’s turn so you need to be ready for it when it comes. Once Winter is reached, the game will progress through three rounds of Winter and then the end of the game is reached. Winter adds a unique part of play when players can now use their Winterborne powers. A player may only activate one per round. Each power has two choices, players choose which one to play when playing the power.
The game ends at the end of the 3rd round of Winter. Players add their score through all ally cards, buildings, exploration cards, banner cards, favor tokens and resources. The player with the highest score is the winner!
Impressions
Winterborne brings a very unique combination of gameplay as you focus on both deck building and kingdom building that you construct together on your way towards victory. The choices seem very open and allows a player to really move around through exploring the board and finding ways to win. I do enjoy a good deck builder and Winterborne does a good job at hitting that gameplay aspect that flows smooth into the overall play of the experience.
The art and components are solid quality but I can’t help but think that this would be even better with some bigger and more robust pieces in the game. Part of that may be me being spoiled on games that do, but for this one I would love to see a deluxe version with bigger components and boards especially.
This won’t be a game for your younger gamers or those maybe a little inexperienced in the gaming world. It is bound to be one however that the teenagers in your life along with adults will appreciate and really enjoy when they get it to the table. The learning curve is a little challenging for the family gamer but one that you are likely to enjoy if you take the time and put it into learning the mechanics of this one. If you are love deck building, this game may be a great step up in the right direction to make things a little more complex and challenging for players.
Overall I would recommend this game and encourage you to take time to play it and see if it for you. Deck building and kingdom building smashed together is something definitely worth exploring and seeing if it is a good fit for you and your gaming group as you explore all Winterborne has to offer!
Be the first to comment