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Have you ever fallen in love with a board game and bought its sequel right after? Or have you ever felt this urge to buy that game that is not only great but also will look awesome on your shelf side by side with its peers? Board game series and trilogies are frequently released and extended, and many times they can tell a bigger story in the broader context by building up on one another. Our bloggers’ team got together 9 of their favourites to share with you, from classics with very similar mechanics to original trilogies that shares a piece of history or a universe to deliver a full range of stories.
7 Wonders by Sophie Jones
7 Wonders is all about choosing a civilisation and building up your city. Along the way, you can collect resources, build monuments, research and go to war. During the game, you will interact with your neighbours. Their resources and war advances will directly affect you as the game progresses. This is an interesting dynamic as they will be your main source of trade, but also your main competition. Over the course of 3 Ages, players will collect cards and place them. The way your neighbours play will also dictate which cards you select each turn. It’s a strategic experience which has depth but also isn’t too complicated to play with a large group.
The success of 7 Wonders spawned 4 expansions and a spin off title,7 Wonders Duel. This edition is for 2 players. The game holds the same essence as the original but condenses gameplay. Despite its adaptation to suit the player count, the game doesn’t lose its strategic depth. Instead, its head-to-head nature makes for an intense battle as you draw cards each Age. Duel is brilliantly balanced, and its small size makes it perfect to travel with.
Finally, 7 Wonders Architects was born. This version allows for a higher player count and appeals to the younger ages. In Architects, players are racing to build their physical wonders. Over the course of the game, they will draw cards and use these to build each stage of their wonder. It has a fantastic table presence and is quick to play and teach. This version is great when you have that 7 Wonders itch but would prefer a shorter gaming session.
As someone who grew up playing PC games like Age of Empires and Sid Meier’s Civilization, 7 Wonders is everything I love in a strategy game. Each game, in this universe, offers a new take on the formula and adapts to new player counts and styles.
Undaunted by Pete Bartlam
In 2019 David Thompson and Trevor Benjamin designed a new type of skirmish level World War two wargame. Using a hand of cards drawn from a total Supply deck you controlled action of your individual troops over terrain constructed from overlapping tiles. Casualties saw cards lost and finally units routed. This was Undaunted: Normandy.
Following from its success they produced Undaunted: North Africa with the exploits of the Long-Range Desert Group (LRDG). Then Undaunted: Reinforcements was added to augment the first two. Finally for the land-based series they produced the outstanding mega game Undaunted: Stalingrad. Next Undaunted: Battle of Britain (BOB) took to the air for combat in the RAF’s Finest Hour and yet to come we will have Undaunted 2200 Callisto set on the moon.
Each game developed the troop types involved with just infantry in Normandy then the LRDG’s vehicles in North Africa and the plethora of tanks, aircraft, artillery, partisans and support weapons at Stalingrad and the aircraft of BOB.
The terrain has evolved too. Based on a brickwork pattern of numbered tiles we’ve gone form a double-sided handful representing European fields or African desert to the 129-tile detailed depiction of the streets of Stalingrad (pictured). Then, again, BOB uses a clever weaving of double-sided tiles to show the English coast and channel.
Undaunted: Stalingrad is by far my favourite and provides a story driven campaign of 15 scenarios. Each of the overall commanders, Uri and Max, has their own booklet of scenario descriptions with their different scene settings and victory conditions. As the campaign continues men get lost to be replaced by lowly recruits whilst survivors gain experience and greater powers. The city, itself, evolves with buildings being destroyed or perhaps fortified. The campaign is totally resettable, unlike Legacy games, allowing you to explore the many branching scenario paths.
Ticket To Ride by Victor Rios Faria
Ticket to Ride is among the most popular board games of all time. With simple rules, appealing theme, and well-produced components, it is often seen as a gateway to introduce newbies to the hobby. Its undeniable success led to a series of spin-offs and expansions after the original title from 2004. All of them follow the same main idea: get train cards, claim routes with your coloured trains and connect the cities in your destination tickets.
While the original title takes place in the USA, the first sequel, Ticket to Ride: Europe, explore the main cities of the Old World and introduces the concept of tunnels routes of variable length, ferries across the sea, and stations that help you fulfil your destination tickets using another player’s routes. Other standalone versions that are very similar to the original game are Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries, that offers a tighter map for 2 or 3 players, and Ticket to Ride: Germany, adding passengers to the game that offer bonus points at the end of the game based on their colours’ majorities. And this is not to mention the dozens of expansions available for them that bring new maps and mechanics to the table.
The city versions Ticket to Ride: London, Ticket to Ride: New York and Ticket to Ride: Amsterdam consist of smaller boxes with much shorter playtime and lots of flavour. They feature iconic transportation of the cities: two-deck buses, cabs, and merchant carts from the 17th century, respectively. Each of them also offers a new way to score extra points. Claiming control over any of London’s boroughs, connecting New York’s tourist attractions and collecting the most merchandise.
The title that differs the most from the original game is probably Ticket to Ride – Rails and Sails, where you will play in a World-wide map or in the Great Lakes region, claiming both ground and sea routes, splitting your attention between trains and ships. Most recently, Ticket to Ride – Legends of the West has been released as a legacy version of the game, promising a unique experience.
Smash Up by David Ireland
I love Smash Up! I first played the game after picking it up on a whim back at the end of 2012 and I remember thinking then that this game has an enormous amount of mileage and potential, they can literally do anything with it. Roll on 11 years and with three more 4 player core sets, fourteen expansion sets, two bigger storage sets (the big geeky boxes), an array of promotion packs and the 10th-anniversary celebration box with a new gaming format, the creators are doing very well at this point in 2023. They literally have done anything that entered their heads and I’m in awe of it.
Smash Up is all about the factions. Back in 2012 the creators used some classic gaming factions like Zombies, Pirates and Robots to name just a few. You take 2 factions and smash them together to create a unique combination. With 8 factions in that starting core set you can play a 2-4 player game, to which you take your unique combinations and battle over bases to break them, and gain VP’s, first to 15 taking the win.
With all the sets now available there are now over a hundred factions available to smash together creating the possibility of thousands of unique combinations for play. The game is different every single time as all the factions have unique traits and abilities bringing something different to the table top every single time. With these traits the designers capture the essence of the faction every time with those unique abilities. Capturing this with just 20 cards (20 cards in a faction) is truly incredible and I tip my hat to the creative abilities of the game designers, it is exceptional.
For me, the game has never lost its way. Everything seamlessly integrates. Some combinations work better than others, that’s always a given in board gaming. It’s exciting testing different combinations and finding out the strong partnerships. I cannot wait to see how the next phases of this game series unfolds as it is, for me, one of the best available games on the market.
Dice Throne by Rob Wright
A newcomer to the Dynasties of Gaming, but a powerful one, nonetheless. First released in 2018, Dice Throne has been described as a cross between King of Tokyo and Magic: The Gathering, but I know it by its true form – Battle Yahtzee!
The player count ranges from 2 to 6, but plays best as a PvP slugfest. Each player takes a character with its own set of dice, range of attacks and effects and deck of cards, which can be played using Combat Points and will have effects ranging from upgrading your attacks, manipulating your dice or providing one-off attack or defence bonuses.
Turns consists of rolling the dice and choosing which to keep and reroll to pull off the biggest or most useful attack. Each character will have two run attacks of four or five consecutive numbers, and a ‘YAHTZEE!’ attack for five sixes, but the other attacks will be based around the different symbols on the dice. The opponent then mostly gets the chance to make a Defence roll, which can block damage, do damage back or have other effects. When a player’s 50 HP has been reduced to zero, they are KO’d – last player standing wins.
Each character has their own strengths, weaknesses, and strategies – some, like the Pyromancer, are like glass cannons, hitting hard and fast but not having any defensive qualities at all, while others are all about guile and dodging, like Loki, who has an ability to prevent all damage from an attack – if the right card comes up. Characters also have difficulty levels, so the game is suitable for beginners to experts. The presentation is top notch, the modules are relatively cheap, and play is fast, fun and intuitive. Yeah, it’s good.
So far there are three ‘Seasons’ and one spin off – Season One, Two, Marvel and Dice Throne Adventures, though we are expecting an X-Men set very soon. Professor Xavier’s Dice Throne is sure to be a hover model…
Aeon’s End by RogerBW
The Aeon’s End series by Kevin Riley and Nick Little is a cooperative deckbuilding boss battler with some distinctive features. Specifically:
- Your player entity (“Breach Mage”) doesn’t only have a unique power, but also a set starting deck and hand.
- Card destruction (to get rid of your initial low-power cards) is quite rare. So is healing.
- When you exhaust your draw deck, you don’t shuffle your discard pile, just turn it over. During your turn you can arrange the discards to group together the cards that you’ll want to play together next time round.
- The market of new cards is limited in both size and depth (nine different cards, five or seven copies of each).
- Your damage-dealing capacity is constrained by “Breaches”, portals through which you power your spells. You upgrade these during the game.
- Every player will get a turn in a round, and the Nemesis will activate twice, but the order is determined by a card draw so you can’t predict whose turn will be when.
The setting is a post-apocalyptic fantasy: the powers of the Breach Mages drove civilisation, but something went wrong and monsters destroyed it all. Your job will be to fight off one of those monsters while keeping yourself, and Gravehold your home, alive.
As of 2023 there are six stand-alone boxes of Aeon’s End: the original, War Eternal, Legacy, The New Age, Outcasts, and Return to Gravehold. Each one gives you multiple Breach Mages, multiple Nemeses with their own special rules, and an array of gems (currency for buying more cards), spells (damage) and relics (special effects) to form the market. The two Legacy games let you build your own breach mages with custom power sets. Later boxes include the Expedition mechanic, a mini-campaign of four battles where you gradually upgrade both your Breach Mages and the Nemeses. Each big box was released with smaller expansion packs that add more of everything.
Even one box on its own gives you a great deal of variation for repeat plays; but all the content from any box or expansion, even the Legacy boxes once they’re complete, is also usable with all the rest. Fighting the same Nemesis with different Breach Mages will need different tactics if you’re to succeed.
Player count is 1-4; the game is at its best when the players are working together to generate synergies between their powers, and experienced solo players tend to run two Breach Mages at once.
Eric Lang’s Cultural Mythology Trilogy (Blood Rage, Rising Sun, Ankh) by Nick Trkulja
Every games night needs to include one box of awesomeness from this trilogy. They all have amazing artwork by Adrian Smith. They have epically illustrated boards and striking miniatures that bring the game to life. If you enjoy battling over areas of landscape using crazy powers and creative card-play, these are the games for you.
Blood Rage: The original and still the best? What can be more fun than pillaging provinces to gain rewards and glory. Compete with rivals to gain control over Midgard before Ragnarök ends the Norse world. This game is slathered in Viking lore and has different paths to victory that are beautifully balanced. This game starts a recurring theme in this trilogy: You can win by losing! There is glory (and points) in dying an honourable death and passing on to Valhalla.
A game that’s easy to teach and learn, but so epic in its gameplay.
Rising Sun: The most beautiful game ever? Can you control feudal Japan? Take control of a clan with its own special ability, ally yourself with a rival clan to leverage power, manipulate the influence of monsters and kami. When will you break alliances? Will your fight an honourable campaign? Will you sacrifice your warriors in Seppuku? Will you take your rival’s monster as a hostage? War is expensive: Can you manage your finances?
This is the most complex game in the trilogy, with the most possible routes to glory. If you have a consistent group of four or five in your game group, it is strongly recommended.
Ankh: The most Epic? In this game you take the part of one of ancient Egypt’s many gods. You compete for control of the territory, and to gain the most followers to your creed. Will you dominate, or will rivals join their religions to overpower you? Will you gain the assistance of powerful guardians to support your cause?
All of the games in this trilogy have superb table presence. With Ankh this goes through the roof. The miniatures for the gods, warriors and guardians are eye-popping and enormous.
Summary: If your working week leaves you with the need to spill some blood, any of these games are perfect for you.
Arzium Storybook Trilogy (Above and Below, Near and Far, Now or Never) by Camille Hindsgaul
The Arzium storybook trilogy consists of Above and Below (2015), Near and Far (2017), and Now or Never (2022). As the series title suggests, the games’ main unifying qualities are that they are set in the world of Arzium and that they use storybooks in their gameplay.
In Above and Below, your aim is to expand your village and collect resources. In order to build underground, you must explore, which is where the storybook comes in. You choose the villagers best equipped for the journey and get a short bit of story that you can approach in two ways. If you meet your approach’s die roll threshold, you get a reward.
In Near and Far, you travel across Arzium in search of the Last Ruin. Starting off in Above, the focus here is the journey and reaching the furthest corners of the ten maps, and their stories. These are a bit more detailed than in Above and Below, with scenes specific to certain map locations and storylines that expand into later maps. As in Above and Below, however, your rewards rely on your adventurers’ skills and how well you roll.
Finally, in Now or Never, the focus is back on building and protecting a village, but you must also explore the map around the village to find the stories. Each player plays as a specific character, so the content and available choices in each story differ slightly depending on who you play as. Like in Near and Far, you can play through a campaign to get a nice, rounded multi-session experience.
The more time you spend in Arzium across these games, the more you learn about the world. Its conflicts, history, and people. The stories of each game do not link together like sequels in a book series might, but the recognition of creatures and locations from one game in another enhances the experience in a way I very much enjoy.
Garphill Games’ Medieval & Ancient Trilogies by Luke Pickles
If ever there was a company who focused on making games in the same world, it is Garphill Games. Shem Phillips and SJ Macdonald have built a gaming legacy on trilogies of games, set in a continuous time, and generally in the same place. They started with the North Seas, with Shipwrights, Raiders and Explorers, following the Norse clans of the early 10th century. Then we move to the West Kingdom, known as Francia in the Carolingian Empire in the mid 9th century, building as Architects, defending as Paladins and ruling as Viscounts.
Their latest trilogy, Wayfarers, Scholars and Inventors of the South Tigris, focuses on the Middle East and the scientific discoveries made in Baghdad in the 9th century. Calculating the circumference of the globe, translating old texts and inventing all occurred in that part of the world in that time and it is fascinating to explore.
Of course, we’re not just limited to these trilogies. Garphill also explores the past in their Ancient Anthology series, with Hadrians Wall (a big crunchy roll and write), Raiders of Scythia (a revision and retheme of Raiders of the North Sea) and Legacy of Yu (a replayable solo campaign game) all receiving accolades of late. Coming soon to this series is the Garphill Greatest hits game, Ezra and Nehemiah, where players are rebuilding Jerusalem.
There have been some fantastic games from Garphill in this series, and I hope many more to come. The fact that each game is undeniably linked, despite playing very differently is a delight, especially when you combine the Runesaga and Tomesaga expansions, which let you play out a continuous story within their trilogies. It’s also somewhat fascinating to realise exactly how busy the world was in the 9th and 10th centuries. I think it’s just as I’m writing this post that I realise how interconnected the Cardinal direction trilogies really are. With one eye on the future, what do we think might be uncovered in the East?
Editors note: This post was originally published on 22nd November 2023. Updated on 15th March 2024 to improve the information available.