Wyrmspan - First Play Review

Finally got to play Wyrmspan with a few friends the other day. Here I will write a quick review of the game, that I will follow up with a more in-depth review once I get more plays under my belt.

The initial feeling I had was that this played like an improved Wingspan in many ways. Mostly due to the fact that there were more ways to set up satisfying combos. However, more to do might not be some people's style. The simplicity of the rules of Wingspan would still suit newer gamers better based off this first play. There also seemed the possibility that this game could potentially have a wider swings with both planning and luck of the draw. Wingspan's base game of course faced this issue with the Power 4 cards.

We played a 5 player game where for 3 people it was their first time, while the other two had only a couple games under their belt. So, this was a bit of a daunting task. Similar to Wingspan, my initial assessment would be that this plays best at 3-4. Maybe even more so, as there is more to do each turn and ways of gaining extra turns (more on that later), which can lead to extremely long downtime for some players. I think this is more of a nitpick for first plays, as I imagine that time being cut down as people better learn the game.

As only one game was played and only a small number of caves and dragons seen, difficult to tell what the meta might be. Did feel like a typical engine builder, where resources early seem key and then getting more turns and opportunities at combos.

A quick overview of the game. Similar to Wingspan, there are three habitats to play your dragons. In this game, they are called caverns. The Crimson Cavern allows you to gain resources, the Golden Gratto allows you to draw dragon cards, and the Amethyst Abyss allows you to draw cave cards. Each of the caverns eventually allow for an egg to be played, but it appears to be more difficult to gain eggs. In this game, in order to play a second, third, and fourth dragon in each cavern, you need to excavate cave cards first. The cave card will give you one-time benefits and are often beneficial for objectives/end-of-round scoring. Instead of turns, you start each round with six coins (in some cases more if you passed in the previous round prior to using all coins). Some dragons cost coins, which lowers you turn count, while certain dragon cards and cave cards gain give you additional coins in the round. Dragon guild bonuses, which I will touch on in a moment, also can give an additional coin. As noted earlier, this can cause an imbalance in turns per player each round, however, in this first game, more turns did not necessarily result in more points.

The dragon guild is a new feature that was critical in this first play. The guild consists of twelve spaces and has the shape of a clock. Each step gains new resources, dragon or cave cards, eggs, or coins. At the 12 and 6 o'clock locations, there are specific guild benefits (for example, gain a coin(turn) and two dragon cards). These are first come first serve, typically one spot for 2-3 player games and two spots for 4-5 player games. This means the guild can be critical for getting key bonuses for playing caves or dragons, gaining coins or resources, and even gaining victory points.

Strong cards on first play (do not have the game yet and cannot remember exact names and it appeared at least with the caves, multiple had the same power):

Hatchlings: Having an explore ability that can add a victory point and gain a benefit, plus an additional power once three cards tucked/food cached (maybe more) is extremely strong. They off course have one of the higher costs in the game, so likely will not come into play until 2nd hand
Cave that allows to immediately play a dragon for one less egg or resource. I have only played once, so by no means have found a broken card, but this one is powerful, especially early in the game. Gives you a leg up on opponents if you get it early and can start building an engine right out of the gate. This is especially helpful because it will help move up the guild track (more on that later)
Dragon that gives two extra coins. This is another expensive one that will likely come into play 2nd or 3rd round. But it sure felt nice having another 2/3 turns depending on other combos than everyone else.
The cave that allows you to use Dragon ability on your board can be a lethal combo, especially when paired with the dragon above that give two extra coins.

That list is solely from one play and I am looking forward to playing more and seeing if I was correct on my assessment or if there were sneaky options that I skipped right over.

Out of the group I played with, four out of five players liked the game slightly more than Wingspan even with the extended play time as we were all fairly new to the game. The sole dissenting vote was from the player who found it most confusing, which is why I might suggest introducing a person to Wingspan first if they are newer to gaming.

Lastly, while there is limited player interaction, I found the guild to be an interesting addition that adds a race aspect. Our game featured the Guild of Highlands, which emphasized an importance of caves. Once people realized a couple of the abilities were particularly strong, it was clear that some strategies changed. I could see this becoming a slight imbalance, if someone pulls far ahead in round 1 or 2, so I will keep an eye on that in future plays.

Looking forward to getting the game soon and providing an update with more plays under my belt. I will be able to give a full review and strategy tips at that point.