Wrap up warm as we head to the artic to join the Scots,Vikings & Inuits. Here you will take on the role of a Clan Leader and embark on a quest to build, sail, pillage & conquer to out-rival your opponents. Will you succeed in creating the greatest faction in Imperial Settlers: Empires of the North?
Empires of the North is a stand alone game in the Imperial Setters universe published by Portal Games. It is an engine building game with a lot of depth and exciting features that enable you to get truly immersed in one of the six Clans, battling it out for the ultimate victory.
Each Clan has its own unique deck of cards along with your 3 ‘field’ cards, which lay face up in front of you to start your empire. You draw 5 cards from your deck to begin with and decide which 3 of those you are keeping for your starting hand then collect your 5 worker meeples and resources matching your field location cards.
There are four phases to the game, which begins with the ‘Lookout’ phase. Here you add 4 more cards to your hand and spend a worker for each of those cards you wish to keep. The rejected cards get added to your discard pile.
Phase 2, the ‘Action’ phase, is where the real fun begins! Here you can build a location card into your empire by spending resources and also use boost cards, extra fields & upgrade cards.
You can use an Action on one of the cards in your empire by exhausting the card and gaining resources, victory points or other special boosts. You can turn from Clan member to pirate by Raiding one of your opponents, which stops them taking an action on one of their cards for this round. Finally, you can use one of your 2 Clan Action Pawns (twice if you spend a food resource) to: SAIL (one or more ships in the expedition phase), HARVEST (gather more resources), EXPLORE (draw a card to your hand), CONSTRUCT (Build a card for free)or POPULATE (add a new worker to your supply). Taking one action per player, this continues clockwise until all players have passed.
Phase 3 then sees the Clans set sail for near & distant islands in the ‘Expedition’ phase. Here you can choose to pillage islands for resources & victory points, or conquer islands and take resources and actions back to your empire.
Phase 4 is the ‘Clean-up’ phase where spent workers & action pawns are returned to your supply, cards are un-exhausted and ships return home to begin the next round.
Once a player passes 25 victory points in the Action phase, this signals the end of the game after one last expedition.
This game has everything - gorgeous artwork & wooden components; depth with 6 unique clan’s special attributes & abilities and one of the best Action phases in a game! There is also a fantastic solo mode and lots of re-playability with 3 must-have expansions and 2 more on the way this year.
Empires of the North will have a lot of wind in its sails at the front of your game shelf for several winters to come.
