my 2024

2024 has been a memorable year for me. Having been a boardgame hobbyist for 20 years, this was the first time I visited the Essen game fair in Germany. For boardgamers, Essen is a pilgrimage. I went purely as a gamer. I was not an exhibitor. I did not go as a publisher or as a business. I was a consumer going there to fully enjoy myself. And what an experience it was. It was earth-shattering to me, a first timer. So many games, and so many are interesting. So much to see and to be amazed by. By gamer standards, I didn't buy that many games from the fair. Mostly small box card games, and only a few standard sized boardgames. Several months in, and there are still many I have not yet played. I have much homework ahead. 

 

Of the games I played for the first time in 2024, my favourite isn't even a recent game. It is Seven! (with exclamation mark). This is a simple and silly card game. The core mechanism is straightforward. It is something casual players can easily pick up and enjoy. Despite the simplicity, I like how it creates tension and surprises for the players. There certainly is some luck, but it's exhilarating when you feel you've read your opponents correctly. I am working hard on creating games like this - simple yet enjoyable, and not rehashes, and not dumb. 

Heat: Pedal to the Metal is a race game, and normally race games are not my thing. However I enjoyed it greatly, despite having only played it online. Days of Wonder (the publisher) is working their magic. Excellent game choice and amazing production. 

Riftforce is a 2-player card game which gave me a pleasant surprise. Even after reading the rules I wasn't confident I would like it. Only after playing it I was able to appreciate the intricacies of the design. 

An Infamous Traffic was a memorable experience. This is a game about China and the opium wars. This story is not often told in boardgames. 

I have played many trick-taking games, and by now I tend to be wary of them. OnStage / SangDen from Vietnam turned out to be delightful. It has several neat ideas, and they come together splendidly. 

Other new-to-me games I like are Hegemony, Ticket To Ride Legacy (Legends of the West), Sky Team and 300: Earth & Water. 

The number of plays I had in 2024 is less than in 2023. In 2023 I had 813 plays, of which 678 were Race for the Galaxy, Star Realms and Ascension. After deducting these three which greatly distorted my total, the total becomes 135. In 2024, I had 534 plays, of which 440 were the same three games plus Dominion. Deducting the big four, the total becomes 94. The big numbers come from games with digital versions. That is why I manage play a lot. Some are played with Han, and some against AI's. In 2024 I played 72 different games, slightly more than 2023 when I played 61 different games. I knew I was playing less in 2024, because I was busy with work, and also my boardgame time was spent not only on purely playing games, but also on designing, playtesting, publishing and selling games. 

I published two games in 2024, Snow White and the Eleven Dwarfs and Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. Snow White was originally slated for end of 2023, but it was delayed and released only in early 2024. Ali Baba was scheduled for December 2024, but I managed to get it out by early November. I guess that's an improvement. I have started work on my 2025 game. I have decided the next one will be Pinocchio. I have been thinking about which game to choose for some time. I pick Pinocchio because I want my next game to be something simple and has wide appeal. That means it needs to be something casual gamers and non-gamers can easily learn and enjoy. The price point needs to be low. Non-gamers find it hard to accept the typical price points of games that gamers are used to. 

My first published game Dancing Queen has sold out. I have no more stock available. There may still be stock at some of the retailers which have bought copies from me. Dancing Queen will have an international release by a large publisher likely within the first half of 2025. Since an established and experienced publisher is publishing and marketing it, normally I would not need to work on the publishing part of the game any more. They have many more resources than I do and can do it much better than I can. However there is something about the older art and theme that I still feel attached to. So I decided to still do my own small print run, with the agreement of the main publisher of course. So there will be a second Malaysian edition of Dancing Queen, in addition to the international edition. This edition will have Chinese added, because I want to enter the Chinese language market, not just in Malaysia but also hopefully in Taiwan, Hong Kong and China. The international edition will be in English and French, and will likely be focused on the US and Europe markets. So I'm hoping to do something for Dancing Queen to prepare for expansion to Asian markets. 

The second Malaysian edition of Dancing Queen will be different from the first. This time I am getting Magicraft to do the printing. I won't be using the custom-made Ricola-style box. It will have normal paper based cards and not PVC cards. It won't come pre-sleeved. So the 2022 first edition of Dancing Queen will become a rare edition. If someone offers to buy your copy at a high price, please don't sell it. Either that or take the opportunity to charge an arm and a leg. The second edition will have a lower price point, because those changes above will help me lower my production cost. 

2024 has been a busy year for me in the game design and publishing part of my boardgame hobby, especially in the marketing area. I counted that I have participated in 7 events as an exhibitor. Game On Lah in Putrajaya in February, HELP University Open Day in May, BOXCON (KLIA2) in June, Asian Board Game Festival in Penang (Malaysia) in July, MTG Family Day in August, C2AGE (comics, cosplay, anime & games) in September, Thailand Board Game Show in November. I don't always break even with my sales at events, but events are more about exposure and marketing than profitability and sales. Breaking even is nice, but it is not always something to be expected. Or maybe I need to learn to do my sales better. 

The Malaysian boardgame market is small. We the people in the industry still need to work hard to grow the market. We need to invest much effort in creating awareness, in spreading the love of boardgames. We are far behind many other Asian countries. 

Having spent much time, effort and money on many different events, I have learned much and I strive to be more selective in 2025, and to manage my booth better. I need to be clear about the objective I'm trying to achieve for each event, be it building my brand, connecting with other people in the industry, selling my games, getting my games playtested by strangers or learning from others. Certainly my trip to Bangkok to exhibit at the Thailand Board Game Fair has been eye-opening. 

Other than exhibiting, I have also attended other types of events. I went to some Tzu Chi activities. I visited the boardgame club at Monash University. Some of these help to introduce more people to this wonderful hobby of ours, and that's something I'm happy to do. 

I took part in the Pegasus pitching day, in the Young Buddhist Association of Malaysia (YBAM) game design competition, and in the Hippodice game design competition. All were good learning experiences. 

With so much time spent on all these activities, it is no wonder that I have been spending less time playing commercially published games. 

Boardgames is no longer purely a pastime. It is something bigger to me now. Not only a business I am trying to grow, but also a mission to bring happiness to people, and to help people create memorable moments. Got to work hard in 2025 too! 

Rebirth

The Game

I bought Rebirth not only as a boardgame, but also as memorabilia. I tried it for the first time at the 2024 Essen game fair. This is a design from Reiner Knizia, and I have been a fan of his for 20 years. The fair was massive. There were so many people that it was hard to find available seats to play games that you were interested in, especially if they were hot games. I was lucky to find a seat to play Rebirth. After playing, I found it nice but not groundbreaking. It felt like a slightly more complicated version of Through the Desert. I did not originally plan to buy a copy. Then I found out there was going to be a Reiner Knizia signing session. I thought this would make a meaningful souvenir for my trip. So I got myself a copy and braved the signing queue. Now, in hindsight, I’m glad I did that. Otherwise I would be regretting. 

Rebirth happens in a future earth where humankind has suffered severe calamities and is now rebuilding human civilisation, this time doing it in a way more aligned with nature. Whoever contributes the most in rebuilding civilisation wins. Your turn is very simple. You place a tile on the board, possibly scoring points, and then you draw a tile for the next turn. Everyone has their own set of tiles. There are three types of tiles - food farms, power farms and settlements. They score points in different ways. You play until everyone has placed all their tiles. You then do a final scoring and the game ends. 

Let’s talk about how you score points. Food and power farms both score points based on how big a connected group you have, so you tend to want to group your food farms, and your power farms. There are restrictions on where you may place which tiles on the board. Sometimes you place tiles to prevent your opponents from forming big groups. So yes, there is blocking and fighting for space. Settlements can only be placed in housing districts, and they are only scored when the district is filled. Settlement tiles have one to four houses. You use houses to compete for dominance in housing districts. When a district scores, whoever has the most houses scores the most points. The player with the second most houses scores too, but scores less. 

There are locations on the map designated for rebuilding castles. When you place a tile next to a vacant castle location, you start rebuilding the castle. You take one of your castle pieces and place it there. Castles in your colour score points at game end. Castle ownership depends on who has the most tiles adjacent to the castle location. Castle ownership can change hands because an opponent’s influence might overtake yours. 

Another major building type you can construct is the cathedrals. They are not worth points inherently, but every time you get involved in a new cathedral restoration project, you get to draw a mission card. These give you points at game end if you fulfill their conditions. 

All this is the basic game, played on a map of Scotland. The game also comes with an Irish map. The core gameplay is the same but there are some differences. It is slightly more complicated. So you get two games in one. 

The Play

Rebirth is about trying to grab small advantages over your opponents when you all play on a mostly level playing field. You have mostly the same set of tiles, just that you don’t know when you’ll draw which tile. Your opponent may have a 4-house settlement beating your 1-house settlement, but you will draw your own 4-house settlement sooner or later. This is what I mean by level playing field. So the game is about trying to do more than your opponents despite having the same resources. That means grabbing tactical opportunities that come up and also playing efficiently. 

You should somewhat balance between helping yourself and hindering others. It is best when you can do both. The play area starts with being big and open. You have many options. Only towards late game as more and more spaces are taken your choices dwindle. 

It is good to get involved in cathedrals early, so that you draw those mission cards early and can better plan your play around them. However the cathedral locations are far apart and you pay the price of dispersing your resources. So this is not exactly straightforward. 

The housing districts introduce a bit of a frienemy thing. Despite being competitors, sometimes you want to cooperate to fill up a housing district. Housing districts do score points at game end even if not completely filled, but usually you’ll score more for completed housing districts. This is an interesting dynamic.  

The tiebreaker rule is a little convoluted I must say. And it might not even be needed often since the points go high. In the case of ties, the control of Edinburgh Castle determines who wins. However if neither tied player controls Edinburgh Castle, it is the player who controls Stirling Castle who wins, even if they are not in the lead. I like this though, because it adds to the story and immersion. 

The Thoughts

Rebirth plays smoothly because of how simple a turn is. It gives you much freedom. There are many aspects you need to compete in. There is high player interaction. You need to constantly evaluate where to compete and who to compete against. The game components are excellent and they add much to the play experience. 

300: Earth & Water

The Game

300 is a game from Japanese designer Yasushi Nakaguro. He is the editor of a Japanese wargame magazine, and has designed many wargames. 300 is a historical wargame based on the Persian invasion of Greece. Persia is rich and can bring many resources to bear. Greece has capable leaders and excellent fighting tactics. The game is played over only 5 rounds. It is highly condensed. Among wargames, you'd consider this a filler. However this is a game with some depth. You don't get many actions, but you must think through every action carefully. 

This is the game board, small and simple. It shows most of Greece and a corner of Persia. Blue is Persia and Red is Greece. Cubes are armies and discs are navies. Persia has more money and can afford to buy more armies, navies and cards every round. However Greece has better fighting abilities. When rolling dice, any Persian roll of 5 or 6 is treated as a 4. So the Persians are at a disadvantage in battle. The Persians need to overwhelm the Greek by numbers. 

Armies need to be kept supplied. Every city provides supplies. You need to capture cities to be able to support more armies on the board. A supply check is done at the end of every round. Armies you can't supply are disbanded. This is a tricky thing to manage. There is no use having a huge army when you can't supply them. You'll lose them at the end of the round. Orchestrating any extended offensive is not easy because of the supply checks happening every round. 

There is a small shared deck of cards. Many historical elements are included. A card has two halves, one meant for the Greek and the other for the Persians. Some events only occur once. When such an event occurs, the relevant side must spend one token to mark the event on the board. This handicaps the Greek more than the Persians, because the Greek have a much smaller number of game components. 

These three characters represent the three Persian events. At this point one event has occurred, thus the blue cube. Two of the Persian events are the king dying. Whenever the king dies, that whole round is cancelled. This is usually very bad for the Persians, because it means one round wasted and not being able to attack. In this game the onus is on the Persians to invade. In the worst case, the Persians may only have three rounds. Your king dying on you is a major headache. Every round you decide how many cards to buy at the start of the round. Card are needed to perform actions, e.g. to march, to sail, to attack. You can also play cards for their effects. If you want to do more, you have to buy more cards. The dilemma for the Persians is if among the cards you buy is the event for the king dying, you must show it immediately and the round also ends immediately. If you have spent a lot of money buying cards, you've just wasted not only the money but also your whole round. 

Scoring is done at the end of every round. You count the number of cities you control. You score points if you control more than your opponent. You only keep track of one score, which is the score difference between the players. If the trailing player scores points, he doesn't actually gain points. You just deduct points from the leading player. When the game ends, whoever has points wins. The game can end in a tie. That's when neither player has points. 

 

Greece has two major cities. If Persia manages to capture both, the game ends in an instant victory for Persia. This, of course, is not easy to do, but it is still something you have to watch out for. 

Persia has two major cities too. If Greece manages to capture both, it is game over too for the Persians. 

The Play

At first glance, 300: Earth and Water gave me a wrong impression. It looks like a microgame, because the box is small, the board is small. There aren't many rules and they are straight-forward. There aren't many components. The number of actions you can take is low. This is a short game. Compared to regular wargames, this is a microgame. However this is in no way a simplistic game. This is not a light game. You don't get many actions, but you need to think through carefully how to utilise your actions. You don't want to waste any action. Much thought needs to go into every small decision. The cards contain many historical events and characters, which bring out much flavour. There are many powerful cards. Since the deck is shared, there is no guarantee that you will draw a powerful card for your side. You will likely go through the deck several times, since it's a small deck, but still there is no guarantee you'll see every card. How aggressive the players are in buying cards affect how quickly the deck runs out and gets reshuffled. This is a consideration when you play. 

I played Persia. That meant I could splurge on armies and navies. However their poor fighting ability was a major pain in the neck for me. As long as Greece rolled a 5 or 6, I would lose. I had to fight using numbers. I had to fight wars of attrition and try to wear the Greek down. 

Supply is critical. A supply line being cut can mean severe losses. There are two cities on islands in the game. Even if you capture the city, the port can become blockaded by your opponent. If you can't lift the blockade by the end of round, you will lose control of that city. This is something to watch out for. Navies have great movement range. They can attack any coastal city. You can't defend against that. The best you can do is build your own navies so that you can reinforce and counter attack. Yet navies by themselves cannot capture cities. You still need armies for that. That's another conundrum. 

Every round you don't score many points. Every point is precious. There is uncertainty in how soon the game ends, because depending on how frequently the Persian king dies, the game ranges between 3 to 5 rounds of play. There is always a sense of urgency. 

Other than the home bases, both sides have captured 3 other cities.

Major Persian invasion through land. 

This card is very helpful to the Persians. For one battle, their die roll is not capped at 4. 

Some cards are response cards which cancel other cards. 

Persia attempts an amphibious landing at Athens, defended by just one navy.

By the end of the game, neither Greek major cities had garrisons, but the Greek score was comfortably ahead. 

The Thoughts

300: Earth and Water is a compact and short game. This is not a casual player's game by any means. It is an entry level wargame. It is short, but not simple. There is luck in the die rolling and in the card draw. You need to be able to accept that. Life is unpredictable. You do your best to manage what life deals you. You take the macro view and do not fixate on any specific battle or event. Luck averages out somewhat. You do what you can to improve your odds. I like that the card draw makes each game a little different. Not all of your events will occur, because some would be drawn by your opponent. When you get more familiar with the cards, you advance to a higher level of play, planning for what may come and also using your opponent's knowledge of that to bluff. 300 is a succinct and flavourful game with good strategic depth. 

Radlands

The Game

Radlands is a two-player head-to-head card game by Australian designer Daniel Piechnick. Set in an apocalyptic future (think Mad Max), you are rival tribes trying to exterminate each other. You win by destroying all three camps of your opponent. 

I learned about Radlands through a series of articles on game design written by the designer. They are well written, candid and insightful, a must-read for new game designers. Some examples in the articles mention Radlands. So when I saw Radlands at a game store in Cologne, Germany, I decided I must get a copy and see how all those principles in the articles translate into this published game. 

In the game, players start with choosing their three camps from six randomly drawn camp cards. The game comes with many different camps so there is variability. Every camp has a different ability. The other cards in the game are people and events. You can play up to two people cards in front of a camp to protect it. People cards have various abilities you can use, e.g. attacking your opponent’s people or camps. There is a raid ability which lets you send raiders. Raiders are a special type of attacker which directly hits a camp, even if it is protected by people. Normally you can only damage a camp if it is unprotected. Cards, be it camps or people, all have two life points. The first time damaged, you turn the card sideways. It loses its abilities. The next time hit, it will be destroyed. There are cards which can heal though. 

You have three camps, and they have different abilities

This is what an early game looks like. 

The camps are well protected now. 

This is the raider card. Both players have one. You need the raid icon to deploy your raider. 

The event cards have a countdown mechanism. Most event cards need to be placed on a track, and they advance at the start of your turn. They are triggered only when they complete their countdown. This means your opponent has a little time to prepare to defend or at least to try to mitigate. 

The first person to destroy all three of the opponent’s camps wins. 

The Play

I played two games with Chen Rui back to back. The first one was quick but the second dragged somewhat, because we got better at defending and we had cards that could heal. You usually have three or four actions on your turn. Water is your currency and also your action points. The cost for playing a card is in water. By default you only get three water on your turn. Turns are generally fast and there is little down time. 

Game in progress with younger daughter Chen Rui. 

The icon in the top left corner is what you get if you discard the card. 

Events have a black-and-yellow border

There are many different characters in the game, all with different abilities. You want to build up a good army of fighters, both to protect your camps and also to give you good attack abilities. You don’t have attack abilities by default. You need to have cards in play with attack abilities, i.e. specific icons. There are cards with crazy abilities, e.g. the truce card returns all characters to hand. The camp abilities are interesting. They make every game a little different. You want to play to the strengths of your camps. 

There is a great variety of cards. 

All three camps have been damaged, and are thus rotated 90 degrees.

Many colourful characters

The Thoughts

Radlands is polished. I did not find it particularly interesting, because it felt like just another two player battle card game. There is no specific problem, just that I did not find anything that stands out. I wonder whether I have unconsciously set too high expectations after reading Daniel's article series. I might not be being fair to the game. I do like the variety in the camps and how interesting some of their powers are. I see Radlands as a well crafted product. Both well developed and marketed. It is ranked high on BoardGameGeek.com, which is no small feat. It has good art. Gameplay is smooth and streamlined, without being overburdened by too many resource types and stats to track. So although the game did not click with me, there is still a lot I can learn and benefit from. 

Onstage / SangDen

The Game

OnStage is a trick-taking game from Vietnam. I first saw the game at the Asian Board Games Festival Malaysia (in Penang) in July, but I had to take care of my booth that weekend and didn't have time at all to play others' games. It was later, in November, at the Thailand Board Games Show that I managed to try the game myself. I had a local assistant for my booth at the fair so I had some time to explore others' games. 

The most eye-catching part of the game is this little stage you build with the game box. The setting is traditional Vietnamese opera. But this stage is not just for show. It is a practical visual tool that supports gameplay. 

During game setup you line up the twelve performers randomly in a queue next to the stage. Before the start of every trick, the first in line goes on stage. The players compete to attract performers who are on stage. The performers hold one to three flowers, which represent their popularity among the opera fans. The flowers are also your victory points. You try to win tricks in this game so that you can attract performers. 

The trick-taking mechanism here is mostly standard. Whatever the start player of the trick plays is the lead colour, and everyone else must follow suit if possible. Only when you don't have that colour then you can play any colour. By default, it is the highest card in the lead colour which wins. The exception is when the trump colour is in play. The trump colour is determined by the performers on stage. If there is one single colour of performers which has the most flowers, that colour is the trump colour. In case of ties, there is no trump colour. If any trump colour card is played in a trick, then the highest card in the trump colour wins. The trump colour keeps shifting during the game, because the combination of performers on stage keeps changing. 

When you win a trick, you will hope to win one performer from the stage. This doesn't always happen. When you win a trick, you can only claim a performer in the same colour as the winning card. If there is no such performer, you don't get anything. Well, other than ridicule from your friends. The cards numbered 1, 4 and 7 have special powers. You get to manipulate the performers on stage. You may add, remove and even swap them with another still in the queue. What this means is the trump colour might change in the middle of a trick, because you can manipulate who are on stage. 

The cards have 1 to 3 flowers. When you win a trick with a card, you can only claim a performer in the same colour. If there is a performer with the same number of flowers as the winning card, you must take that performer. If that particular performer is not on stage, then you may take a different performer in the same colour. You will notice that the higher numbers have fewer flowers. It is easier to win a trick with a high number, but when it comes to picking a performer, you might be forced to pick a lower valued one. 

There is a shoot-for-the-moon mechanism. If you find that things are going poorly, you can try to aim for this rare situation of being the only player to not win any performer. If you can achieve that, you get to take all remaining performers who are still on stage. If there are none on stage, you get to take all performers still in the queue. Needless to say, being able to do this is difficult, especially in the 3 player game. With 5 players, it might be easier, and it is something everyone will watch out for. If you aim to do this, but accidentally win just that one lousy performer, you will be royally screwed. 

The Play

I'm not specifically a fan of trick-taking games. I don't dislike them, but I don't seek them out. I do think the trick-taking mechanism in general is a good one. There are reasons why this genre is so popular. I have played many trick-taking games recently. Sometimes I get a nagging feeling that trick-taking games are a shortcut to fame which small publishers are taking. Come up with a small twist, slap on a pretty theme, and voila! You have a product that has many ready fans. I must admit I am slightly negative towards this abundance of trick-taking games. The moment I tried OnStage, I immediately decided this is a trick-taking game I want in my collection. Probably the only other trick-taking game I feel so strongly about is Sticheln. I find that in OnStage, the tweaks to the standard trick-taking formula come together really well and create a fluid yet smooth experience. You get many surprises, and also opportunities for clever plays. 

You don't always score points when you win tricks. It depends on whether you are able to claim a performer. The stage situation keeps evolving, so it is not easy to manage your hand. If I distill the game down to just the mechanisms, this is a pretty abstract trick-taking game. However the opera performer setting matches this combination of game mechanisms very well. This certainly enhances the play experience. 

The spotlight on the stage is not just for show. It serves a purpose. If there is a trump colour in play, you place all the performers in the trump colour in the spotlight. This is a good visual cue for everyone. It makes gameplay smoother. 

Eight flowers mean eight victory points. 

The cards are in four suits (colours) and are numbered 1 to 9.

The Thoughts

Among trick-taking games, I wouldn't say the game mechanisms in OnStage are very radical. It is nowhere near as radical as Cat in the Box. I like OnStage more than Cat in the Box because the latter can be quite a stressful experience. It is an excellent, very clever and innovative game, and at the same time it stresses me out because I need to play defensively to avoid creating any paradox. Not that stressful is necessarily bad. In OnStage, I feel more positive and energised because the ever changing situation presents many tactical opportunities. You want to manipulate the performers on stage to your benefit. You have to consider how things will change when you claim a performer from the stage. You want to save your strong cards for the right moment. You won't always win a performer when you win a trick. However there is still the advantage of dictating the lead colour for the next trick. I am keen to see what other games Michael Orion will be making. 

Vagrant Dash

 

The Game

Vagrant Dash (2018) is a two-player strategy game. You each lead an army and start from opposite sides of the board. You head towards the three relic sites at the middle of the board. It is the control of these sites which determines victory. The game is played over a fixed number of rounds. When time runs out, whoever controls more sites wins. You can also win by sudden death if you manage to kill the opponent's general, but that's quite hard to do. 

You have five troop types, and they have different abilities. On your turn, you either move a unit, or attack using a unit. The different troop types move and attack in different ways. At the start of the game, many of the hex spaces are still black, i.e. unknown terrain. You can't move into unknown terrain. You need to first use your scouts to scan the terrain. When a scout moves into a space adjacent to one or more black spaces, you get to draw terrain tiles from a bag, and then you can decide how to place them over those black spaces. This is how the map is gradually expanded. Eventually you will reach the relic sites.  

Different terrain types affect movement differently. Units entering rough terrain must stop. They can only resume moving next turn. Mountains cannot be entered, unless you are moving flying units. 

You will be heading for the relic sites. You control a site by simply having a unit on it. Now these sites are not exactly safe havens or strongholds. Your units there are just sitting ducks. This is just like chess. There is no concept of defense. If someone attacks you, you just die. 

You have some cards that you can play for various effects. Some can be played in response to your opponent's actions. The cards create some hidden information in this otherwise open information game. You get to draw cards when you capture a relic site. This makes capturing sites early attractive, even though your unit might get killed. 

The Play

Playing Vagrant Dash feels like playing a perfect-information abstract game, despite the variability of the terrain tiles and the hidden information in the cards. You want to think several steps ahead, playing in your mind what your opponent would do and how you would respond to it. There is some luck. If you keep drawing difficult terrain, you will be slower than your opponent in reaching the sites. You need to time the capture of the sites well, so that you have the upper hand when the game ends. You also want to position your units well to prepare for the final scramble to control the sites. 

The copy I played was a special demo copy. The units were all handcrafted and painted. This is not the mass-produced version. You can't buy this version. 

Tiles with red-and-white borders are mountains. Blue-and-white are lakes.

This is the standard version of Vagrant Dash that you can buy.

You can paint the units if you like. 

The Thoughts

Vagrant Dash is one of only two Malaysian games which sold out at this year's Thailand Board Game Show. It is a game developed and produced with a lot of heart. It is quite chess-like, which means this is a thinky strategy game. The terrains introduce some variability and randomness, and the cards introduce surprises. Both inject some luck into the game. If you enjoy this type of strategy game, give it a go!