Episode 184: Lost Ruins of Arnak

Lost Ruins of Arnak is a 1 to 4 deckbuilding game designed by the design team of Elwen and Mín, with art by Jiří Kůs, Ondřej Hrdina, Jakub Politzer, František Sedláček, and Milan Vavroň, and published in 2020 by CGE. In Lost Ruins of Arnak, players will compete to explore new and dangerous territories, fight off guardians, collect tools and artifacts, and explore a dangerous temple to earn victory points.

At the start of the game, each player receives an identical starting deck from which they will draw five cards. Then, they will use those cards and other resources to take one of a number of actions, with cards having different functions depending on how they are used. Most cards will provide one of two resources – coins or compasses – or a special ability. Cards also provide different kinds of transportation resources – boots, cars, boats, or planes. When played, cards may be used for their transportation resources OR their card action, but generally not both.

Players take actions by playing one or more cards as well as spending resources from their supply. For example, a player might explore a new territory by spending the appropriate transportation icons and compasses. New territories open up new action spaces on the board that are later available to all players – but they also summon powerful guardians that need to be defeated. More valuable territories require additional transportation icons and compass resources, making them difficult to reach until later in the game.

Players will also purchase new cards to go into their decks. There are two kinds of cards in the game. The first is Tools, which are relatively basic cards that, when purchased, go on the bottom of the player’s draw deck. The second is Artifacts, which will trigger immediately upon being purchased, and then will go into the players Played Cards area to be shuffled and placed on the bottom of the draw deck at the end of the round. Tools and Artifacts have a gold cost that can be paid by a combination of coins from a player’s supply as well as coins on cards played during the purchasing round. Most cards also give players a small number of points.

Players will also move up a Research track, one of the main ways to score points in the game. Moving up the track required an expenditure of a variety of resources depending on the level into which the player is moving. Players will advance one of two tokens, their Notebook or their Magnifying Glass, with the caveat that their Notebook can never advance beyond their Magnifying Glass. The research track is made up of a number of spaces with various ways of connecting to the spaces below them, so players will have to decide the path they want to take up the track. Advancing provides special one-time benefits to the first player to move into a space, and an additional bonus depending on which token was moved there as well.

The game plays over five rounds, and careful listeners will note that the manner in which Lost Cities of Arnak handles deckbuilding means that you may see cards purchased into your deck only a handful of times, if at all, by the end of the game. At the end of the fifth round, players score their cards, guardians they’ve defeated, position on the research track, and any other victory points, and the player with the most points is declared the winner.

01:42:03 – Review

02:04:30 – Ratings

ReRoll

02:15:51 – Runestones * [Buy] – Queen Games; Designer: Rüdiger Dorn; Art: Dennis Lohausen;

Check out our original review for Rune Stones during Episode 159.

Gameplay Photos

* Disclosure: These titles were received free of charge by the publishers or distributors. If you are interested in submitting a title for review, please read our Review Policy.

Show Notes

Banter

Plays

News

REVIEW: Lost Ruins of Arnak

ReRoll

Gameplay Photos

Episode 303: Tag Team

Episode 302: Shackleton Base

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