Like so many games today, Richard Lawton’s first work had its origins in CrowdfundingThe game designer from London convinced over 2023 people of his game on KickstarterIn Germany, Corax Games has taken on the task of bringing the game to players. A dark theme and a game that combines two popular mechanisms - worker placement and area control? That can only be a good thing, right?! Find out what we think of it in the following review.
For decades, the kingdom was ruled from its central citadel under the watchful eye of the king. His princes administered the surrounding lands and ensured prosperity, stability and peace. But as the princes grew in popularity, so did their power. Envious and bitter, the king used intrigues to set his princes against each other, causing war to break out. Only when all the warriors were dead and the land was burned and destroyed was a ceasefire reached. The king's betrayal was revealed, but the treasuries were empty and revenge was not forthcoming. So that the land could recover, the princes had an alchemist put them into a hundred-year sleep. They did not know that this was the king's last ruse that drove the princes mad. As hideous creatures, we only want one thing: to claim the land for ourselves. Alchemy helps us to resurrect the fallen warriors of the war and go into battle again.
The Dead Awaken
In Crown of Ash we take on the role of one of the four princes who, as horrific creatures, want to seize the land under their own control. A game lasts four rounds, in which we aim to end up as the ruler of the land with the most influence points. The game principle is classic worker placement. We take one of our four workers or servants and place it on a free action space on the game board. The actions let us either collect, build, fight or recover. After we have carried out our action, we can awaken a unit from the display above the game board by spending the necessary resources. This unit then goes into our hand.
The actions are also as simple as their name suggests: sammeln lets us collect resources that are available at the current location. If this location belongs to an opponent, they receive the bonus available at the location. If we have collected in our own area, we can reinforce it with units from our hand. We receive units with the resources we receive from collecting. At the end of our turn, we can always spend the resources on a unit that is on display to put it in our hand.
Build lets us build buildings in areas we occupy. They provide new resources to all players. In addition, buildings increase the amount of influence we generate in the place if it belongs to us. Once we have built a building, we then receive its resources and can send units to the area to protect it.
struggle for power
With the action Fight, we attack the location on which the action field is located (in the picture above left) on which we placed our worker. To do this, we as attackers choose - depending on the location - up to 2 (or 3 in the citadel) units from our hand, as well as a combat card. The defending faction has to make do with the cards placed at the location (in the picture above the two units with a strength of 3 each) and a combat card. These are then played simultaneously. The person with the most combat points wins the game. Depending on the outcome, the ruling prince of the location changes or not. The losing faction has to put its units in its own graveyard and can only take them back into its hand at the end of the round. The combat cards used, on the other hand, only come into play with the last action Recover back to the hand.
After all four workers have been placed, there is an interim scoring. Here, the current influence of all players is calculated. For this, all controlled areas and their influence points (based on the number of buildings) are added together and noted on the personal game board. Then all servants are taken back and the game board is prepared for the next round. At the end of the fourth round, you also receive points for leftover resources and fate cards, which can be treated like personal goal cards. Each one specifies certain unit colors that you have to collect. For each unit of the color, you receive points equal to its level (1 - 3). Whoever has collected the most influence wins the game.
Information about Crown of Ash
| Number of players: 1 – 4 Age: from 14 years Playing time: 60 - 90 minutes Difficulty: expert game Classification: Worker Placement, Area Control Author: Richard Lawton Illustrations: Vadim Mishin, Rafael Nobre Publisher: Corax Games, Card Noir Official Website: Link Year of publication: 2024 Language: German Cost: 59,99 € |
Conclusion
For a worker placement title, Crown of Ash is brimming with interactions thanks to its area control elements. Depending on how and where you position yourself, you can deny your opponents important resources, buildings or units and make life difficult for them with fights. Every game we played was particularly exciting. You try to somehow anticipate what your opponent will do, only to realize at the end that they are bringing you to your knees in a completely different way. Then you plan your nasty counterattack. It's just fun!
It's also great that the whole game is easy to learn, as it offers a lot of familiar things, but combines them well. Basically, we just put a worker on one of just four actions and that's it. Even players with little gaming experience can certainly understand these four actions well. The points system is also easy to access. Nevertheless, even though it is simple, the game has enough depth to require a lot of brainpower to put into it. What do I need for what? Is now really the right time to attack? What can I do to make life difficult for the others? Lots of little things make Crown of Ash a really tactical game.
But Crown of Ash can also be pretty frustrating. Once you're knocked out, it's difficult to get back into the game. Starting the next round first with the least power isn't as advantageous as you might think. The rule book itself says that if you go first, you'll have more access to action spaces and units - but later players have advantages when it comes to building and conquering. This is particularly noticeable. Once you're without a place, you can quickly be kept small, as areas you've reconquered can then simply be conquered again by your opponent. So at the end of each round, you're a person with no places and the least power, and you can't get out of this loop.
In general, Crown of Ash was a lot of fun. The game was exciting throughout, as long as no one was left behind. Crown of Ash's solo mode also works well and offers enough of a challenge with three difficulty levels. It's also great that the solo mode's automa can be incorporated into games with 2 or 3 people. It's worth it, because Crown of Ash is particularly good with the full number of players. It's also nice that there's a game mode for advanced players. We didn't try this, but it adds asymmetrical skills that are supposed to increase the complexity. But we still had a lot of fun with the game without the skills.
In summary, we can definitely recommend Crown of Ash. The rules are simple enough for anyone to understand. But the game also has enough depth for frequent players. It has a high level of interaction. However, the game does not exactly shine through innovation.
PS: Another positive thing to mention is that it uses colors that are specifically suitable for people with color vision deficiencies, and it uses only symbols and is therefore language-neutral.
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Corax Games | Crown of Ash - King of the Necromancers | Connoisseur Game...* |
60,00 EUR |
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