The Dragon Prince is one of my favorite series right now. I’ve compare it to Game of Thrones, but with more focus on the plot and less on sex and violence. Don’t be fooled by the fact that it is animated: this show has more depth than other dramas airing at this time.

So I was thrilled when Brotherwise Games announced they were making a tabletop game. I pre-ordered it the day it became available. I really had no idea what it was all going to be about, but I loved the look of the miniatures and knew I needed those, no matter what. The game finally arrived earlier this month and I am pleased to share with you that the miniatures are awesome AND the game is lots of fun!

Pre-ordering perks: the game came with a card set for “Dark Callum”, a What If… scenario if Callum decided to dabble in dark magic. In addition, there is a Dragon Prince card set for Brotherwise’s breakout hit, Boss Monster (which I sadly don’t own…yet).

The game is different from anything else I own – a card battle game with miniatures and maps. The game comes with 3 2-sided game boards, each map with different terrain and obstacles. There are a total of 9 playable characters (if you count Callum twice) and they all have their own unique fighting styles. There are 4 heroes on the board at all time, which means you can play this as a 2 player game, with each of you controlling 2 heroes, or go up to 4 players, with 2 teams of 2, but each of you in charge of your hero.

Each hero has their own unique deck of cards along with one special ability that allows them to recharge for special attacks. Each hero has a stack of hit points. The goal of the game is to knock out the other team’s heroes 3 times.

So far, I’ve only played 1v1 (which is actually 2v2??) – The first time, I played as Callum and Rayla while my partner played as Soren and Claudia. Just keeping it canon for the first match. Callum obviously deals a lot of ranged, magic attacks while Rayla is the most rogue-like, gaining power by getting away from her enemies by the end of her turn. Soren is a tank, hitting hard when up-close and Claudia uses dark magic to sacrifice cards, or her own health, to cause more damage.

I was really surprised how much strategy was involved! In my first game, I just charged forward and lost pretty quickly (especially since I didn’t shuffle well and ended up with a handful of Callum cards, not taking advantage of the option to discard everything). The second game, I took my time and tried to plan out my moves…I still lost but it was very close.

When we played a third time, I chose Callum and Ezran. Ezran doesn’t have a powerful attack on his own, but he can gain extra allies with Bait, Zym, and the Mama Dragon (whose name I just forgot) who have on-going effect cards, meaning they stay in play until the other team damages them or you discard them for their powers. My partner went with Amaya and Janai – two heavy damage dealers. Callum’s combo attacks with Ezran’s cards made this a close match also.

This is definitely the kind of game that you finish and immediately start thinking about what you could have done better and wondering if it is too soon to ask for a rematch. For someone new to this genre to tabletop game, I think this is a great entry level game, with enough complexity to keep me coming back and some advanced rules that can be added in once I’ve figured out all the moves and powers.

Have you played The Dragon Prince: Battlecharged or a similar miniatures card battle game?