No, there are no mistakes in the title of the article. Today we are going to talk about the game Tales Settlement, a party game for 3 to 6 players where one player will have to prevent the others from accomplishing certain objectives. Are you ready to embody a hero or the evil Dragon?
30 ans pour Gigamic
For once, we will present the editor before the game itself. It's quite rare for me to talk about games from this publisher, because I'm not particularly the target of their editorial line. But you should know that Gigamic is a purely French company which celebrated its thirtieth birthday this year. It is both a publisher and distributor of board games with a fairly wide range but still fairly focused on games for all types of players (even if the range includes many games focused on young people), puzzle games and atmospheric games. You have surely already played certain games from this publisher without really realizing it, with, for example, "6 who takes", "Quarto" or even "Champ d'honneur".
Duel the bluff
Tales Settlement is a fairly fast-paced 3-6 player party game where two teams will battle it out for victory. A designated player will embody the Dragon which will aim to hinder the actions of other players who will be in the shoes of the heroes of the story. At the start of the game, each player will take the cards corresponding to their role (4 Location cards + 1 Camp card per hero / 4 Dragon cards for the player playing the villain of the story). Regarding the set up of the game, you will have to place the two time / flame tokens on the "small" central board as well as the 4 Neutral Place cards which will occupy the central place of the game where the players will interact with each other. On each of the Place cards, you will have to place the number of tokens according to the number of players.
The goal of the game will be for the heroes either to build all the houses in the Village or to completely empty 2 of the 3 other Location cards. For the Dragon, victory will be obtained either by having successfully blocked the opponents to increase his flame token on the dedicated track, or if the 10 rounds of the game have ended without the heroes having been able to fulfill their objective. The course of a game turn is quite simple because the only thing players will have to do is to secretly choose a card from their hand and reveal it later along with the other players. Depending on the choices of each, the effects will be different:
- The cards between the Heroes and the Dragon are different : the Heroes will be able to remove a token from the Location card they have revealed and in the case of the House card, they will have to add a token from the supply on the card.
- Cards between one or more Heroes are common : first of all, the Dragon player will have to move the flame token as many spaces as the number of players who have chosen the same card as him. If the Village card is shared between the Dragon and the Hero, he can take any token from the Camp card of the heroes concerned to put it back on the corresponding Location card. The second KissCool effect of having chosen the same card as the Dragon is that the trapped Hero(es) will not take any action this turn as well as the next. However, it will be possible for these heroes to permanently spend certain resources from their Camp card (2 Apples or 1 Shield) to return during the next turn in the game.
Once all the effects of the turn and the Victory/Defeat conditions have been checked, the Dragon player can advance the hourglass on the Time track and each player can take the cards played back into their hand to start the next turn.
Conclusion
Rules of Tales is a good little game for adults and children alike. Being an asymmetrical game between the one who will embody the dragon and the others, that is to say the heroes, the parties can follow one another fairly quickly. For children, it is quite easy to make them play, since the rules are very easily assimilated. If you're a good bluffer and you like games where you have to be a little strategist, Rules of Tales can be an excellent pastime to start or end a fun interview.
The game is available in most stores for a price of around 15-20 euros.
