Queen Games Immortals - Strategy Board Game

Immortals is an area-control game from co-designers with 'Magic: The Gathering' and 'Shogun' to their credits. The game plays similarly to Shogun and Wallenstein, so if you don't like those, give Immortals a pass. If you DO like those, what makes Immortals different is that having a fantasy theme means the actions aren't constrained by what should historically make sense. It's basically two identical maps on a single board for realms of light and darkness. Certain cards correspond to regions of either realm, which makes Immortals feel like you have more flexibility with your actions. It's still to your advantage to have regions grouped together, but players who like to turtle for the entire game might have a bad time.After getting a random combination of tribes from the realms of light and darkness, the game begins with a single "draft and deploy" round. You draft cards that show regions of the map, and choose one of your starting armies to place into those regions. It's a pick-n-pass draft that alternates from light to dark cards, so you end up with armies in both realms. Sizes and numbers of armies will vary based on tribal alliances. It seems balanced after a few plays, but it definitely impacts strategy to start with 2 armies that have 10 troops and 4 armies that have just one, versus 8 armies with 3 troops each. About 20 percent of your total playtime will be spent in this initial round.Once all the armies are out, the real fun starts. You place 10 cards face-down on your "action board" that determine what you will do during the round, and where it will happen. Eight of them are things like: collect gold/energy, build a shrine/temple/magic portal, send reinforcements, and attack adjacent territories. The other two are magic abilities that allow you to draw cards, send reinforcements, take the first-player token, or my favorite - take a region card from an opponent by simply comparing the size of armies in the light and dark realms of the matching region. Everyone takes turns revealing a card of their choice, scoring points immediately for buildings, and then again for regions and bonuses after everyone has played all of their cards or passed. Region cards can be swiped from your board if another player conquers that region in either the light or dark realm, so timing is important if you want to gain the effect of a card before you lose it. Conflict cards are discarded. Magic cards and region cards always return to your hand. Play a few rounds like this, and then tally the points to determine the winner.My copy seems to have a production flaw in that the magic cards and 3 of 4 bluff cards have lighter backs than the region and conflict cards. Not a big deal for the magic cards, because everyone starts with the same ones and they are always played to the same spaces of the action board. The bluff cards are a problem though, because it's pretty obvious which actions you don't plan to perform, and other players might decide to time some of their own actions differently if they know that you're bluffing on a final attack, for example. It doesn't make the game unplayable, but someone should have caught it, and it because it could impact play it knocks a star off my rating here.Components otherwise are good-quality punchboard tokens and wooden cubes. Regions printed on cards are easy to locate on the board. The tumble-tower randomizer is identical to the one from Shogun, and thematically, armies that spill out of the tower are sent into limbo, eventually to return and fight for the opposite realm in which they perished. A lot of recent "dudes on a map" games come in big boxes stuffed with plastic miniatures. Not this one. I mean, the box is huge, but Immortals has a decidedly more "Euro" feel to it, like its predecessors. If you don't mind playing map-conquest games without dice or a bunch of plastic figures, Immortals might be to your liking.

Unique game with good replay value. Steep learning curve but once you get it the game plays fast.

I haven't had a change to play this game. It seems like a fair enough area control with a unique twists in that your characters respawn in the light or dark realm when they are killed. Kind of a fun, and unique feature. The quality of the components makes this game an incredible bargain at the $20 price I paid for it. It's easily worth $60-80 on components alone.I look forward to playing soon!

No me llego a 30€ este juegazo lleno de componentes con la calidad de queen games. Totalmente recomendable

Très compliqué pour pas grand chose. Une grosse déception.

Très bonne revisite de Shogun en version uniquement centrée sur l'affrontement.