Social Isolation Report Day 13 – Guardian’s Call

Day 13 – Guardian’s Call

Day 13 of social isolation. I played Guardian’s Call. This is a bluffing, set collection game for 2-5 players. During the game, there will be two spots to stop and score.

Players are trying to build their tableau up and score the most victory points at the end of the game.  You’re doing this by offering cards to the other players. Wither your honest about this offer is up to you. The game is about bluffing and trying to keep the cards for yourself.

The offer has to be of one card type. Players can’t announce curses are being offered, and then they either tell the truth or lie.

The recipient of the offer has to call the offer. They say that it’s true or it’s false. If the recipient is correct with their statement, they take the cards and add them to their tableau. The other player gets a coin. If they are incorrect, the player to make the offer gets to keep the cards and put them in their tableau and the recipient gets a coin.

Cards you put in your tableau do different things when you get them.

• Villages – Move your character up one on the castle track.
• Spells – Wild card. You can place them on other stacks for your tableau.
• Curses – These are bad. When you take these, 1 will make you discard a card from your tableau, 2 will have an opponent discard one of your cards, 3 will have the opponent steal one of your cards.
• Artifacts – Turn 3 in to get a treasure card. Treasure cards are worth VP and have an action you need to take immediately.
• Shields – Gives you points at the end of the game based on how many you have in your tableau.
• Weapons – Gives the player with the most off these points at the end of the game.

This goes on until the council card is revealed. At that point, any quests that are scored now are assessed Then the player the furthest on the castle track gets 10VP and the second furthest gets 5VP.

Then when the war card is drawn, you do the same.  In addition to that, you score your weapons, shields, treasures and coins. The player with the highest VP wins.

This is an interesting bluffing game. I wasn’t sure how it was going to work out with just two players. I was pleasantly surprised.  It’ still works, and it’s so back and forth that it feels like a battle of wits.  I liked that the collection of different guardian cards do different things. Villagers move you up on the track and can get you points. There was a quest where if you had no villagers out, you get 5 points. So you’re trying to weigh it out what one will be better in the long run. Then the shields and weapons you’re trying to get and keep. But there’s another quest out that limits the cards you want to collect to gain even more points. So you’re constantly weighing out your options on top of trying to bluff your opponent. I liked this at two players, so I can’t wait to try it at even higher player count.