Legends of Andor: The Star Shield Review

Legends of Andor: The Star Shield is an expansion for Legends of Andor and contains just one extra legend for the base game. Only one! Yes, one. I was initially disappointed to hear this. Surely, one extra legend won’t bring much more replayability to the base game? So, is this expansion any good, and is it worth buying if you enjoy Legends of Andor? SPOILER ALERT: Yes, and yes!

IMAGE – Legends of Andor: The Star Shield Text Image 1

How does the expansion work

This legend works differently from the ones in the base game. When you put the Legend deck together there are options for some of the cards you include. You randomly choose one of five A2 cards, one of 5 A3 cards, and one of 4 G cards. You also have the option to include an E-card to make the legend harder.

What this means is that from the A2 card, you have five different initial set-ups for monster placement. The A3 cards give you five different Prince’s tasks, tasks that you have to complete before the narrator reaches N on the Legend track. The G cards give you four different tasks to find the titular Star Shield. Added to that are 6 different threats – big bads – with only one being randomly chosen in each game. So, if I do the maths on that, we have 5x5x4x6=600 different ways the legend can play out. Maybe there is a little more variability than the one legend would have you believe.

IMAGE – Legends of Andor: The Star Shield Text Image 2

What’s Good About This Expansion

Variability. That’s the key here. Michael Menzel, the designer, has managed to do a lot with a little. The Prince’s tasks range from collecting parchments to document the heroes’ adventures to strengthening a gate by collecting wood, which includes an inspired game mechanic of putting logs actually onto your strength track.

The Threats are interesting and varied. The fire spirit requires you to put out fires in the forest to make a path to him before you can attack him. There is a siege tower that gradually approaches the castle, a dark temple that brings monsters back from the dead, and a water monster that resides near the river, amongst others. When we first got this expansion, we played six games in a row and made sure that we saw all the Threats. Every legend felt very different.

There are some extra items that you get at the start of the game to help counteract the increased difficulty. The Andoran Flute gives more willpower points to you and any adjacent characters. The horned falcon is pretty much like the falcon from the base game, except it can be used in battle to make the monster only roll one of its dice. The torch of Cavern can move a creature into an open adjacent space. And the Hadrian hourglass can give any hero three extra hours every day. These are all fantastic and are much needed as you can feel overrun very quickly.

Added to all of this are the wolves. They appear early on in the game and are initially problematic as they charge towards the castle. If you manage to tame the alpha wolf, they become your chums and will fight by your side. The clever thing with this is that if you attack them with 2 strength, they have a battle value of four times that, which is 8. Win, and each wolf will grant you 2 extra points in the battle round. Attack them with 3 strength; they have a battle value of 12, and each one will give you 3 extra points. So the harder it is to kill them, the better they are later in the game.

Any Problems?

The only downsides that I can see are that the legend always takes place on the initial map and that if you don’t like Andor, this won’t change your mind.

IMAGE – Legends of Andor: The Star Shield Image 3

Conclusion

If you like Andor, then this is a no-brainer. Granted, it’s not quite as impressive as getting one of the big box expansions, which add new maps and new rules, but even so, it’s a cracking expansion. For me, Michael Menzel is one of the most underappreciated designers. I’ve loved everything he’s done so far, and he is one of the only designers who, when he announces his next game, I will automatically buy it.

This legend feels harder than the ones in the base game, with the castle quickly being surrounded. You can feel like there’s no chance. But as you use the new items and find the Star Shield, which can enable you to skip any one of the things in the sunrise box, you will begin to see the light. On balance, they’re probably the same difficulty as the ones in the base game.

This is an excellent expansion that comes highly recommended.