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You have conquered the north with ease but this has caused enemies to join forces to defeat you. I have written this how to play to help you learn how to play the expansion Fields of Fame and to become victorious.
Set Up
Most of the setup for Fields of Fame is the same as the base game (see here for my how to play Raiders of the North Sea) with the following exceptions.
You place the new board to the bottom right of the main board. Shuffle the 15 Jarl cards and place them on the space at the bottom of the new board. Add the 12 Jarl tokens to the bag before you start to populate the raiding areas. Populate all of the areas including the 3 new areas. Also don’t forget to add the 3 new grey workers to these locations.
Add a score marker for each player to the fame track at the 0 position and give each player a Jarl encounter board. Finally shuffle all of the new townsfolk cards into the main deck.
Jarls
Whenever you raid an area with a Jarl token you must reveal a new Jarl card. At this point a player must decide if they want to kill, subdue or flee the Jarl. If you encounter multiple Jarls you cannot flee the first one and then kill the second. You must always complete it in the order Kill > Subdue > Flee. So, if you subdue the first Jarl you can only subdue or flee the second.
It is important to remember to complete the encounter with the Jarl (s) before any Valkyrie token is activated. Also remember to place the Jarl token on the relevant space on your encounter board after you have finished the encounter.
Encounter – Kill
If you decide to kill the Jarl you have to take wounds equivalent to the Jarl’s strength (5 or 6) plus 1 more. These wounds must be placed on your crew up to the military strength of each one (therefore crew with 0 strength cannot take any wounds). Heroes only take up to their base strength not any strength gained from bonuses.
The good news is wounds do not kill your Fields of Fame crew and instead just weaken them for future raids. A crew member with military strength of 3 but with 2 wounds will only have a strength of 1 until cured.
When you kill a Jarl you take the bonus action in the bottom right of the card and gain 2 fame on the new track. The Jarl card is then discarded.
Encounter – Subdue
Maybe encouraging the Jarl to join your crew is the way to go. If you decide to take this action you must take wounds equivalent to the Jarl’s strength minus 1. Then you have to pay the silver coins (3 or 4) required to hire them for your crew.
They cannot take wounds at this point or be killed by a Valkyrie this turn (why would they be hitting themselves) but they can take wounds and be killed in raids later on in the game.
Encounter – Flee
Your final option when you encounter a Jarl is to run away. When making this decision discard the Jarl card then choose to lose either 1 fame or 1 victory point. If you have neither a point or fame then you lose neither.
Cure Wounds
You can cure some wounds through actions at the town hall or 1 other way…...Death. Using an injured crew member to clear a Valkyrie token is a good tactic to use. Once a crew member is removed from your crew they take their wounds with them.
When Will I Be Famous
Another way to gain fame is to exceed (greatly) the strength needed when raiding. If you exceed the maximum strength by 4 you receive 1 fame, by 8 gives you two fame and by 12 gives you 3 fame.
Variants
The instructions recommend a drafting system for the opening cards if playing with more than 4 players, but you can also do this with less than 4. This is also a way of kickstarting the game as you will already have one crew in your Viking ship. The drafting is a simple affair of looking at your initial 5 cards, keeping one for your ship face down at this time, passing 1 card to the player on your left and 1 to the player on your right. After the draft has finished reveal your crew member and then start the game with 4 cards in hand.
This expansion also includes 2 new dice called Valkyrie dice which would replace the normal strength dice if you choose to use them. These now add an element of push your luck as on the 2 side of the dice there is also a Valkyrie marker. When this is rolled you must also lose a crew member at the end of the raid.
Game End & Scoring
Game end scoring is very similar to the base game with the exception you will now score for your fame track as well as any Jarls that remain in your crew.
Conclusion
I hope this has helped you to learn the rules and how the expansion to Raiders of the North Sea Fields of Fame plays. Obviously I would always recommend people use the official rule book to learn the rules in depth but this blog should give you a really good flavour of how the game flows.
I really enjoy the game and if you want to find me on twitter to discuss how brilliant Fields of Fame is please do @boardgamehappy.