Become the New Mayor of Everdell: Everdell Duo

(Photo credit to Starling Games)

Written by Ed Carter, Staff Writer

 

Everdell Duo

Starling Games

1-2 players

Worker placement, resource gathering, cooperative, campaign, competitive

 

Who will be the new mayor of Everdell? Game overview

Everdell Duo is one of the many Everdell Games.  This one is designed to be played in 30-45 minutes as opposed to the base game length of 90-120 minutes. It introduces some new sun/moon mechanics that shorten the game considerably. It has a cooperative campaign or challenge mode as well as a 2-player competitive so there are lots of replay ability in this little box. The game takes place in the meadow of Everdell where players place workers, gather resources and build the best city in the meadow to become the new mayor of the meadow.  My review is going to cover the 2-player game but the rules go over the changes for the coop challenge and campaign modes.

The tortoise and the hare meet again: Game setup

To start, the person who most recently took a nap is the hare. Gather the three hare worker meeples and the hare player aid and hand the tortoise meeples and player aid to your opponent. Set out the meadow on the Journey side of the board and take the 32 event tiles, separating them into piles based on their letters A through E. Gather one tile from each pile, adding the Journey tile and shuffle them.  Lay out the events above the meadow and return the others back to the box.  Shuffle the critter and construction cards and from the top left lay cards into the meadow until all 12 areas are filled.  Place all the resource and point tokens to the side into piles of twigs, berries, amber, pebbles, 1 point, and 3 points.  Take the season tiles skunk side down  and set them up in the following order;  winter, spring, summer, and fall.  Place the sun and moon tokens at the leftmost space of the center path in the meadow. Shuffle the river tiles and place 2 out in the river spaces at the bottom of the board. Deal each player 2 cards from the deck and follow the instructions based on what season you are in. The season tile indicates who goes first and what action to take on your first turn.

Building the best city: Gameplay overview.

On their turn, a player chooses one of three actions; place a worker, play a card or draw a card. Each action will move the sun or moon tokens along the path one space. These tokens determine what action can be used based on their location along the path.

• Place a worker – Place one worker at a location in the meadow or on a location card in a city and complete the action indicated.  There are 4 spaces adjacent to the river called the farm that a player can use in addition to the river in the meadow to collect resources. Location cards have specific effects when a worker is placed there. A player can only place a worker at an objective tile if they meet the requirements to claim it. If a player uses a location in their opponents city, the owner of the location gains 1 victory point. At the end of the action, move the sun token one space along the path.
• Play a card – A player may play a card from 3 areas; their hand, a card adjacent to the sun token or a card adjacent to the moon.  Each card type has a cost in resources that must be paid in order to use it. Once the player pays the required resources they can place the card in their city.  After playing a card, move the moon token one space.
• Draw a card – Players can draw a card from either the deck or the meadow.  There is no hand limit.  If drawn from the deck, move the moon, if the meadow, the sun.
• Once the sun or moon are at the final space, that action can no longer be taken.  When both tokens are at the last space, the season ends.  Place the sun/moon tokens back at the starting point on the path and move on to the next season.
• The game ends at the end of Fall and players move to final scoring.  Each player adds up the points from the cards in their city, objective tokens, purple card bonuses,  and point tokens. The player with most points wins and is the new mayor of Everdell.

Welcome to the new mayor! Some final thoughts

Everdell Duo is definitely its own game in the Everdell series. While it shares some of the same  mechanics, the new sun/moon tokens speed up the game and add some new challenges. Timing of actions becomes vital in order to win because once a sun/moon token is at the end and can no longer move, that action is no longer available.  Playing a balance between resource gathering and city building becomes very important in order to avoid lost action opportunities. The game’s replay ability is high with all the different modes of play.  I like that it focuses on two players as well as having a strong solo experience. For fans of Everdell who mostly play with two, this may be a good alternative to the base game.

Until next time, keep moving those meeples and happy gaming!