Review: Tales of Tails:: Tales of Tails by Spellendreef

by Bram Vonck

This article was first published in dutch on spellendreef.bespellendreef.be

[heading]Choose your hero dog and find a way out of the dungeon. But beware, your fellow dog might want to use your route too![/heading]

Goal of the Game
At the end of the game, collect as many coins as possible. The player with the most coins wins the game.

Setup
Each player chooses a dog, its corresponding player board, and the seven paw tokens. Five of these are placed on the player board, and the other two are set aside. Shuffle the quest cards. Each player receives two. The remaining cards are returned to the box. Each player selects one of their two cards to keep face-down. The other card is placed face-up in the center of the table.

The starting card is placed in the center of the table, with the side up that corresponds to the number of players. Stack three round tokens on this card, with the one marked "1" at the bottom, "2" in the middle, and "3" on top. Shuffle the room cards and place them in the center of the table as a draw pile.

The potion cards are shuffled, and each player receives one. The remaining cards are placed face-up near the play area.

Game Flow
A starting player is chosen.

The active player has three actions to choose from:

Explore the Dungeon: When exploring the dungeon, the player draws a dungeon card from the draw pile and places it orthogonally adjacent to a card already on the board. Existing paths must always be continued, so the card must fit the layout. However, the card can be rotated; its orientation does not have to match the others.

Escape the Dungeon: The player chooses an exit route, starting at the starting card. The chosen path must lead out of the dungeon/play area. A room may only be visited or activated once. If you want to collect a room's contents (like gold) or activate it (such as traps or enemies), the player places one of their paw tokens on it. If a token from another player is already on the room, no other player may pass through it. You can activate treasures already collected to gain access to certain rooms.
After a player successfully escapes the dungeon, a number of cards are drawn from the draw pile based on the number of remaining players. These cards form a new draw pile for the remaining players. If one player remains, draw four cards; for two players, draw eight cards; and for three players, draw twelve cards. Once these cards are gone, the dogs must either escape or take a nap.

Take a nap: The player ends their turns for this round and takes one of the tokens placed next to their player board. For the rest of the game, they will have one additional paw token.

A round ends when all players have escaped the dungeon and/or taken a nap. Each player collects their earned cards and places them under their player board, ensuring the rewards are visible—such as extra weapon symbols, which are placed on the left, or keys, which are placed on the right. Any dismantled cards are removed from the game, along with the card used to dismantle them. The remaining dungeon cards are shuffled with the remaining draw pile cards to form a new draw pile. The top round token is placed back in the box. If this was the last token, the game ends. If not, the game continues, and the player who played last receives the first player token.

After the third round, the game ends, and scoring begins. Each player counts the number of coins they’ve collected, as well as the combination of treasure chests and keys. If you have more treasure chests than keys, the extra chests are lost. Then, add the coins earned from personal and shared quests. Some monsters also display coins, which are added to the total. Subtract the number of room cards associated with unresolved trap cards or hired raccoons from this total.

The player with the most coins wins the game. In the case of a tie, the player with the most completed quests wins. If there is still a tie, both players win.

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Different Types of Cards
When encountering a monster card, you can choose to either defeat it or avoid it. If your attack symbols—sword/bow/magic—combined with those from any treasures you’ve acquired match the monster’s symbols, you defeat the monster and place a paw token on it. At the end of the round, you’ll claim that card and any associated rewards. From the moment you defeat a monster, you can immediately use any symbol displayed on it for the remainder of your path. If you can’t defeat the monster, you may take damage equal to the number of symbols next to the monster’s icon. Each dog hero has three shields, and if the total damage from monsters exceeds your number of shields, you cannot choose that path.

Along your path, you may also encounter coins, artifacts, and chests. If you place a paw token on these, you can claim the card at the end of the round. You may also find a potion card. When placing a paw token on it, you may immediately choose a potion from the current general supply. At the end of your turn, this room card is removed from the game.

Some cards feature doors. You can only pass through these doors if you have a key. One key allows you to open all doors, but at the end of the game, each key can only open one chest to claim its reward. Certain cards also contain portals. These portals are considered adjacent to each other, and no paw tokens need to be placed on these cards.

You might also encounter traps along your path. You can disarm a trap by placing a card you’ve previously won (with a specific symbol) or a potion card on it. This card could have been won in a previous round or in the current one. Once used, the card is placed face-down on the trap. Other players can no longer access that room. In this case, no paw token needs to be placed on the trap. Used cards are sent to the discard pile, and in the case of a potion, it is returned to the general supply for players to choose from.

Alternatively, you can choose not to disarm the trap. In this case, the player must place a paw token on it and claim the card at the end of the round. At the end of the game, this card will cost you one coin.

You may also hire a lost raccoon by placing a paw token on it. You must immediately choose which side of the card to activate: the side with two weapon symbols to choose from, or the side with one weapon symbol and a token image. If you choose the latter, you may take a paw token from beside your player board, place it on the raccoon card, and use it from this round onward. The raccoon card can also be used to disarm traps. If you still have this card at the end of the game, you will lose one coin as payment for the raccoon’s services.

Materials
The game components consist of sturdy cardboard tokens. It’s nice that there’s not only variety in the color of the paw tokens but also in their shape. The player boards are thin and flexible. Additionally, there’s a large collection of square cards representing room cards, quests, and potions. These cards are of good quality.

Conclusion / Our Opinion
It takes a bit of adjustment when playing this game. Your dog isn’t represented by a pawn or meeple, so you’ll need to carefully think about finding a route that you can take and that provides you with some rewards.

When playing with two players, we noticed that each player could somewhat play their own game. There are three exits from the starting card, and each player would create their route based on the symbols their dog hero had. This was especially true in the first round. In later rounds, when you hopefully have more weapon symbols, players could start interfering with the routes the other player was creating. It’s not difficult to block another player, and this becomes more apparent in games with three or, especially, four players. The blocking becomes frequent, and it happened multiple times that players were forced to take a nap. If this happens in the third round, the extra paw token isn’t very useful. And that’s where the issue lies.

The core of the game is solid, but the additional elements or minor rules leave you wanting more. For example, at the start of the game, you choose between two quests—one personal and one shared—but if you don’t happen to have the right weapon symbols to defeat the monsters, you’re already at a disadvantage. The deck, or the number of cards, is also very large. So large, in fact, that if you’re unlucky, you might never encounter your “quest monster,” and it might not even appear in the dungeon. This makes it difficult to score extra points, and it feels unbalanced if one opponent happens to have the right combination of weapon symbols and quests while you don’t. There’s nothing you can do about it. Even with only half the deck in the draw pile, this would have been enough in all our games.

Therefore, this is a game we would recommend more for two players, as there’s less interference, and you’ll have a better chance of pulling off some clever moves—with a bit of luck.

Overview
Playtime: 30 minutes
Players: Two to four players
Difficulty: Easy
Who is it for? Ages 8 and up

We thank Hobby World International for providing a review copy.
Our opinion is subjective and in no way influenced.

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