Creature Caravan

Introduction

If you know any of Ryan Laukat’s other games (Sleeping Gods, Above & Below, and so forth) then the artwork in Creature Caravan is going to feel very familiar. This is a standalone game, set in the fictional world of Arzium for one to four players and it can go up to six with the expansion.

You are travelling across the board towards the city of Eastrey and along the way, you add creature cards to your caravan, thus building up a tableau in front of you. The game lasts twelve turns and the counter for this is your supply of camps – you place a camp at the end of each “day” and once you run out, the game ends.

Gameplay

The main mechanism is dice worker placement. At the beginning of each turn you roll all your dice and then place them out on your player board or on certain cards in your caravan that have action spaces. You gather resources from these actions, which you can then spend to play cards to your tableau. You can also use dice actions to get more cards, fight zombies and move your caravan.

The main resource for playing cards is food – you need to feed the creatures that you add to your caravan. There are two other resources – coins and satchels – that can be sold in the marketplace for points and food. Collecting satchels or coins to sell allows you to use the food received to play a more expensive card to your tableau.

At certain points in your journey, your caravan may be attacked by ember zombies, which will score you negative points if you don’t deal with them. Fighting a zombie also allows you to place a token on the ember zombie board, for which you can score positive points.

Your caravan can only hold twelve creatures, so once you’ve played your twelfth card to your tableau, unless one of those cards circumvents this rule, then your tableau is complete. You can’t add any more and you can’t discard tableau cards once played.

You score for how far your caravan has progressed towards Eastrey and safety – maximum of twenty-five, plus a bonus five for making it to Eastrey, which is a total of thirty points. You also score for how many different squares you camped on – maximum of twelve if you never camp in the same square twice.

The fourth resource, after bread, satchels and coins, is fruit. Fruit can be collected when placing a camp on square with a fruit icon. Fruit can lower the activation threshold of action spots on cards to one pip, meaning that any die can be used.

Artwork

I really love the artwork in Creature Caravan and the iconography is clear and consistent, which makes for a very smooth play experience once you know the game. The art is in a cute cartoon style and is very distinctive – you instantly know you are playing a Ryan Laukat game. I would give a score of 5/5 for artwork.

Likes and dislikes

I found the rulebook a little confusing at first – perhaps I’m just impatient – and I felt it could do with an FAQ or a player aid or both. Perhaps just a list of common misunderstandings. Another small point that came up with one group of players was the lack of a card market, meaning that every card is drawn blind from the deck. This adds to the randomness, which some people don’t like. However, cards can be traded for food or coins as a free action, so there is some mitigation possible by cycling cards through your hand. Also, a card market would mean that play couldn’t be simultaneous.

I really liked the simultaneous play, but it does come at the expense of less interaction. I also like the puzzle of collecting the right keywords to power up your tableau and max out your score. I like the theme and the artwork (I may have mentioned this once before). This is a medium light game that really can be played an hour to an hour and a half, but there’s enough depth for a satisfying experience.

Complexity

Mechanically, the game is quite simple. Each turn you roll dice and place them out on actions, which you then resolve. The depth and complexity come from the scoring requirements of cards in your tableau. A card might give you 8 points for having four or more “Tiny” creatures. That means you need to collect at least 4 cards in your tableau

that have the “Tiny” keyword in order to activate the score. This is reminiscent of games like Terraforming Mars at one end and Castle Combo at the other, where you are collecting tags or symbols or, in this case, keywords. I would give a score of 3/5 for complexity.

Replayability

There are 134 unique cards in the base game and another 45 cards in the Wanderers expansion, which is included in the Deluxe Edition. This means there is plenty of variation in the game play, especially considering that scoring is driven by combinations of keywords. There are also many ways to score, which adds variability in strategy. You can score from your tableau, from your camps and caravan on the map and from the ember zombie and market boards. There are also bonuses to be had from collecting treasures when you camp.

Admittedly, I have only played a few games so far, but I would still give Creature Caravan a 4/5 for replayability.

Player interaction

The player interaction is quite light, with simultaneous turns and only moderate competition for the spaces on the market board and ember zombie board. Once a spot is claimed on either board it remains available for the current turn and the next turn before being locked out. Advancing across the map to the city of Eastrey, there are no restrictions on occupying the same square as another caravan. The game is a race to acquire the most points before the end of twelve turns. I would give a 2/5 for player interaction.

Component quality

I have the Deluxe Edition and the component quality is excellent. There are screen-printed wooden tokens for the food, fruit, satchels and ember zombies. The player pieces – cubes, camps, caravan and dice are all wooden. The boards – player boards and the map, market and zombie boards – are thick cardboard and finally, the coins are metal. The cards are printed on good quality cardstock, but smooth not linen textured. This means that I would give the game a 4/5 for component quality of the Deluxe Edition and 3/5 for the standard edition.

Conclusion

Overall, I would give Creature Caravan a rating of 70. It’s a very enjoyable, quite light experience, but it’s not to everyone’s taste. I think the theme and the artwork work well together and are immersive. If you like games like Everdell, Roll for the Galaxy or It’s a Wonderful World, then you should probably take a look at Creature Caravan.