Rajas Of The Ganges Dice Charmers Review

A 3D Dice Holding Elephant? I’m In!

Haha okay so there’s way more to Rajas of the Ganges: The Dice Charmers than a jubby jumbo. But it’s definitely an eye-catching bit of kit!

If you aren’t aware, Rajas of the Ganges is a popular dice worker placement game with a very pretty setting. The Dice Charmers takes the core dual track (wealth and fame) element of that OG gameplay and mixes it into a puzzly, roll and write which has stayed in our list of favourite games since we got it back in 2021.

I won’t cover the set up and gameplay in detail here as there’s a separate How to Play tab which will take you through the basic steps of a round. But essentially, Dice Charmers is a good old-fashioned race. And each round, you will be checking off boxes and trying to maximise both your wealth and your fame so that you can be the first player to have your wealth and fame tracks overlap. Why? Well, you do want to be crowned the Righteous Raja don’t you?

Combotastic Crossing

I know there are a lot of games out there that let you trigger multiple things on a turn. But this is a combotastic game that will have you chaining actions together like a BOSS! One turn can rain bonuses down upon you like nothing you have ever experienced. And ultimately that’s a good thing because you will need all the extra actions you can get! You see, this is a game where you want to do everything, but you can’t. Because you only get to pick 1 (or 2 if 2P) dice per round. So finding ways to maximise what you can access, unlock, trigger, and convert into money and wealth every single turn is essential! And you can’t blame anyone else if you don’t. Well, you could grump at an opponent for taking the die type you wanted. But it’s mainly multiplayer solitaire, and you can karma dice back into the fold. So whose fault is it really? Hmmmm? Haha

Residence, River Or Royal Favours?

With the sheet separated into different areas, Dice Charmers feels like it has a number of different placement optimisation puzzles going on. But ultimately, they all feed into each other. You need to connect roads to trigger sales at the market and building bonuses. But to make use of the markets, you need to have collected goods first, so you can’t ignore the purple die. Palace aficionados can help you along your way, but there are only so many favours they are prepared to give. And the river has some jubby stuff sailing by, but do you need that right now? Could some money or a T road trigger the next chain of moves that could push your tracks along to that sweet victory laden intersection? The choice is yours, my friend. And if you don’t make the most of it? Well, it’s no money mo problems for you!

Final Thoughts

Hands down, we love Rajas - Dice Charmers. The ability to turn 1 action into a chain reaction of box crossing fever is such a satisfying feeling. It makes us feel smart and (dare I say it) some of us quite smug! When it happens to you, that is. When it doesn’t and you’re left watching you opponent(s) whizzing around their sheet like a paper pinball it can be teeth gnashingly green-eyed monster time. But with so many ways to score, fear not as you won’t be left waiting for long.

The fact that almost every main action provides additional bonuses after triggering it multiple times is another nice touch. And everyone loves a game where you feel like you’re getting stuff. And not just any stuff. But the good stuff. The stuff that will let you score money and fame from all sorts of sources.. And, whilst you might think it doesn’t matter what you do as you’ll get money and fame somehow. It absolutely does. This isn’t a cakewalk. You’ve got to strategise from the first die pick to the last! You need to work those actions to make them pay off in multiple ways. And that’s particularly true because you need to pay attention to both tracks. Going hard on money or fame is a strategy. But ultimately you need the two to meet. And meet by a big overlap if possible. Because when everybody takes their final turn in this race for renown and riches, somebody might just make their last move count in the crossing off department!

Having two sides of the board is also cool. There’s no need to learn any new rules (phew!). It just shakes up the in-track bonuses a little which shapes the rest of your box-crossing capers in a slightly different way. And not that Rajas needed any help on the replayability front – the variability that comes from the drafting sees to a different set of decisions each time you play – having a second board feels like the publishers left no opportunity wasted. Which is awesome.

When we don’t have time for a Hadrian’s Wall epic experience but we want the same satisfying feeling, Dice Charmers is one that hits the table before most of the others. It’s colourful, easy to learn, and we never tire of chasing those tracks!