7 Wonders Duel: Pantheon

Pantheon is an expansion for 7 Wonders Duel. Allen came across this at Cash Converters in Singapore, and it was a fantastic deal, SGD3.00! That's less than MYR10.00. As a game buyer I’m thrilled about these great deals. At the same time as an indie publisher it’s a little sad to see slightly older games get the stock clearance treatment. I guess to view it positively it is a good thing that a game gets sold and it gets played. 

Pantheon brings gods to 7 Wonders Duel. There are three gods for each of the five ancient civilisations, and every game up to six may come into play. Each civilisation has a different strength, and their gods have powers in that specialty. For example Egyptian gods help you with wonders of the world. 

In Age 1, players have opportunities to choose which gods to bring into the game and where to place them at the pantheon. Where a god is placed on the board determines how expensive it is to summon them. The nearer they are to you, the cheaper they will be to you, which also means they will be more expensive for your opponent. Each god can only be summoned once per game, and they give powerful one-time abilities. 

When you pick up a brown-backed token, you get to choose a god to introduce to the game.

Five stacks of gods, and one gate.

Mesopotamian gods (green) help with science.

The original game board gets extended, adding a pantheon above it where five gods and one gate can be placed. 

There are new wonders and technologies related to gods. You also get some game components which are for specific gods. Guilds are replaced by grand temples. This aspect has become simpler than the base game. Guilds used to offer various ways to score bonus points. Grand temples are associated with gods of specific civilisations. If you have collected tokens of the corresponding civilisations earlier in the game, their grand temples are free to build. Otherwise you can still build them using your resources. There are at most three grand temples in a game. The more you build, the more points each will be worth. 

Grand temples

The red pawn is Minerva's shield. It prevents one military attack. 

Nisaba's snake copies an opponent's science icon. Copyright laws were not yet invented.

Pantheon adds some gameplay elements and offers more options. When you summon a god, you don’t take a card from the card structure. This can be important when you want to avoid letting your opponent take a certain card. The god powers are potent. They can give you a critical advantage. If you play the base game a lot, this is a nice expansion to give you some new content. It is not just more of the same. It brings in new elements.