First Impressions - Guilds of Cadwallon (card game)

The game showing guild suits building up.

We played Guilds of Cadwallon last night. This was a very early kickstarter for me and I’ve been trying to get it to the table for ages. The kickstarter version I have comes in a box with a 5x5 board and a second set of cards to support up to 8 players and bigger versions of the city. We played using a single deck and a 3x3 set up. We didn’t use any of the extra options like contracts (bonuses for the end game) or conditions (impacts on how the game works).

Anyway, the youngster (11) played it with for a first game and then the eldest (15) joined in. The theme is that you’re trying to garner power in the city of Cadwallon by gaining influence with the guilds and key personalities. You’re trying to avoid the militia noticing you, so I suspect that you’re really a criminal faction.

The game uses a deck of district cards which are laid out in a 3x3 grid with spaces between. Each turn you can place one agent, and play an action card if you have one. You place your agents in the spaces (boulevards) between the grid to leverage the support values on either site. Once the round completes, you see who has the most support and can claim those cards. Not all cards have support values though. The district cards include guild cards (all of which have a different suit to represent the guild and a value in gold), action cards, personality cards and militia.

You don’t start with action cards but instead win them on the table. Each has a unique effect and a gold value, so you have to make choice whether you want to play them or hold them for the endgame.Some of the most devastating uses for them are to move or swap district cards while leaving agents untouched.  Personality cards don’t have support value but are valuable in the endgame scoring. Militia cards are effectively the direct opposite of guild cards - they score the same way but negatively.

Play proceeds through a series of rounds until you no longer have enough cards to build out the city in the 3x3 grid. Once that happens you score the game.

Scoring is simple but needs some multiplication. You collect the guilds of the same type together and add up the golden guild points on them. You then multiply the score by the number of cards to get the score for that guild in total. Personality cards can be added to guilds in your hand when the guild has four or less cards to boost their multiplier. The militia cards score the same way as guild cards but reduce your score. Action cards are scored for their unique values and don’t multiply.

The youngster enjoyed the combination of strategy and maths a lot. He carefully thought through his placements to get as many cards the same as he could and also to block me getting certain cards. The eldest didn’t quite get it and managed to have the militia all over him. I think we’ll likely be playing this again as it’s quick and clever. I’ll add in the contracts and conditions next time.

Recommended.

29 December 2022 

The second game - this time with three players.