Like many minotaurs before you, you have rigorously studied the art of dungeon crafting. Now all that is left to do is carve your dungeon into the Stonespine Mountains. Will your dungeon prove to be the most challenging to the heroes the Queen sends? If so, you’ll be crowned the Master Architect! Let’s get to work!

What Is It?

Drafting – Each round, players will pass around hands of chamber cards and will place each card into their dungeon when drafted

Tile Laying / Pattern Building – When placing cards, players will be building out their 4×4 dungeon. They will be trying to make paths , have certain elements in certain areas to fulfill their blueprint cards, and work on the game goal, and the individual challenge cards they collect to score points

Who Is It For?

  • 1 to 5 Players – Solo is pretty good, it’s a bit more of a puzzle. Multiplayer scales well overall, though the improvement (market) phase can be a bit slow with more players
  • Ages 10 & Up / Family Weight Gamers – Drafting is smooth, improvement phase keeps everyone invested in others. I think the goal of the game is straightforward which helps keep is approachable
  • Fans of tile laying, pattern building, drafting, and a tight market
  • Fans of solo puzzley games

Variants / Extras

Shrines & Fountains Mini Expansion – Adds a few chamber cards. Some are multi-type, and some have shrines or fountains which will let players manipulate their dungeon a bit, swapping chambers or moving elements – It’s fine. The cards can get buried because the deck is pretty big, and even if you do see them, it is super circumstantial if you can even use the abilities. If you have it, might as well shuffle the cards in, but it’s not a huge addition.

Solo – Play against Jael (automa). Changes drafting to a bit of hand management where you’re trying to avoid letting Jael collect too many cards so he doesn’t score too well. Comparing gold will let Jael collect market tokens and discard challenge cards as his turn – Very smooth gameplay, and a fun puzzle trying to maximize your score, but also consider what cards you’ll be letting Jael collect based on what you keep. It works well, and plays quickly too.

PROS

  • Aesthetics – Nice art, and the dungeons look cool when complete
  • Components – Good quality cards, tokens, and wooden pieces
  • Rules – Well-written and clear
  • Drafting is smooth and quick
  • I like that you have a lot of options for scoring (blueprints, goals, challenges, paths)
    • Similarly, I like that you don’t have to connect paths. You’ll score more if you do, but you don’t have to, meaning you will never be prevented from playing a card to every slot
  • Nice puzzley vibe
  • Good game length, doesn’t overstay its welcome at any player count
  • Nice balance of the option to visit the market vs pass to get a challenge card / priority
  • Solo mode works well, not too much upkeep for the automa

CONS

  • Chamber cards are all kind of dark. Things can blend together a bit easily which can make tracing paths tricky
  • I wish there were a few more goal and blueprint cards, for a little more variety

Final Thoughts

Overall, I thought this game was pretty cool. I really like that you have so many places you can get points, so even if you are lacking in some areas, you may be able to make up the points elsewhere. I thought the market could seem really pricy, especially depending on how much gold you got in a round, but I thought that also built in some interesting balancing, because you often had to choose between buying something that could be really useful, like a secret passage, or passing early so that you could grab a really well-scoring challenge card. I think the balance just worked well so I definitely recommend this one!

Additional Information:
My Final Rating – 8/10

Designer – Jordy Adan
Artists – Jordy Adan, Damien Mammoliti, Lucas
Ribeiro, Diego Sá
Publisher – Thunderworks Games
MSRP – $44.95
Website

*I was provided a copy of this game to do this review*

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