Raiders of the North Sea Magazine
Raiders of the North Sea Magazine
Assemble a mighty crew and head out to sea to search for places to attack, as Glory and Valhalla await only the strongest and bravest warriors! You will face many dangers and enemies on your journey, so a well-equipped crew is just as important as their strength and numbers. In Raiders of the North Sea, you will have to balance logistics and strength to become the most successful clan!
Check out our full overview of Raiders of the North Sea below.
- Nominated for Spiel des Jahres Kennerspiel 2017 (enthusiastic game ...
- Impress the chief with attacks on the village!
- Part of the Runesaga trilogy campaign for the North Sea!
Overview of Raiders of the North Sea (TL; DR)
If you are looking for an introductory game to deploy workers and a relaxing 1-1.5-hour Raiders of the North Sea experience is one of the best games in the genre.
High-quality components, a good pace of play and a perfect balance between complexity, replayability and fun are just some of the reasons why this game might interest you.
As someone who has played all 12 hours of Twilight Empires in Carcassonne, it takes a lot to impress me, but Raiders of the North Sea managed to do just that and earn a spot on my list of regularly played games.
A brief overview of the Raiders of the North Sea
Raiders of the North Sea is a game of medium light complexity that can be described as a game to accommodate workers and complete tasks. The goals are simple - to raise funds to save, spend on attacks, or offer to the leader to earn more winning points.
The game is limited to two , 3 or four players , with a playing time of 60 to 80 minutes. I can recommend Raiders of the North Sea as a pallet cleaner or a great introductory board game. The balance between affordability, mechanics and replay value makes the game worth considering!
Unpacking Raiders of the North Sea
The game includes the following components:
- 1 game board
- 16 Supply tiles
- 12 point markers
- 18 tokens of Valkyrie, iron and gold each
- 32 silver and supply tokens each
- 26 livestock tokens
- 7 black, 11 gray and 12 white workers
- 2 Averaging cubes
- 1 black bag
- 1 Rules
- 71 bourgeois cards
- 4 ship cards
Once we remove the eye-catching box lid, the same art can be found in the 12-page rulebook. The first half of the policy contains some illustrations to help you keep track of it, and the second half is very full of text, but well structured, making it easy to follow.
When we extract the supply and stock tiles from the thick cardboard, we come to a double-folded game board. The art on the board is unobtrusive to play, but it has impressive details if you want to take a closer look. The gloomy color palette combined with fog and snow accents accentuates the cold weather.
Worker and resource tokens are made of wood in custom shapes and colors - always a big plus. The two cubes have the same color scheme and font as the Armor tracker on the board, which is a nice touch.
The coins were by far the biggest surprise. I was expecting an extra layer of cut cardboard, but instead I found a bag full of metal coins! Even if they were ordinary pieces of metal, I would be pleased, but they have an old silver look and a runic engraving on both sides. I just wish there were more than 18 of them so I could use them in other board games!
I love Viking drawings on townspeople maps. I can’t understand what it reminds me of, as I see hints of anime-like facial features, older comics, as well as somewhat comical expressions. The characters on the box are also used on the cards, so this should give you a good idea of what they look like.
How to play Raiders of the North Sea
In the game Raiders of the North Sea, the goal is to have the most winning points that can be obtained by attacking, robbing and donating. A rather unique mechanic that is important to remember is that each player starts but also ends his round with one worker in hand.
Game setup
You’ll follow the board setup guide and arrange the different pieces, but it’s important that each player starts with one black worker. In addition, no player may have more than 1 silver, stock or card at the end of their turn.
When turning
The game is played clockwise, with each game twisted with two actions. There are no special rounds or unique turns - the game continues until one of the three conditions for the end of the game is reached.
Raiders of the North Sea has a unique mechanic in which only one worker can occupy places on the map, but unlike other games, this does not prevent you from performing this action during your turn.
In the first act, the standard rules for the distribution of workers apply - you can only place your worker in the available area of the board. When you finish the point campaign, you will pick up any other worker from the board and either resolve the act or ignore it.
This way, players can’t completely block anyone else, but they can regularly disrupt their order. This creates a unique dynamic, as some tactics rely on raising enough funds with the first action to successfully execute the second.
Workers' rates
It is important to note that although the game only starts with dark workers, players can also acquire gray and white workers, which are important for carrying out certain work actions and attacks.
Work action
Before you can go on the attack, you need a crew and the necessary supplies. You can do this by taking action in the lower half of the map, in the village of Viking.
Of the 8 actions available, some will be blocked by an existing black worker, while others will require a gray or white worker. Through early work campaigns, players gather crew, gain silver or collect supplies, and strive to expand their levels of labor and gain greater benefits.
Raid Action
Raiding is a multi-stage process and the player must first meet the requirements. To make the game more interesting, each settlement has different conditions and each settlement can be attacked only once.
Attack requests include:
- Crew size.
- Enough supplies (and gold if needed).
- Workers of the right color.
During the attack, you can earn victory points with one or another military force , hired crew or loot & valkyrie .
Military strength is equal to the strength of the crew, dice, crew actions and armor. The strength of the crew is found in the upper left corner of each map, while the dice add a dose of RNG. The crew can also have actions that will increase your strength, and the armor acts as a lasting entertainment effect for you .
The settlements you attack have two or three levels of reward that you can get if you meet the required requirement for military power. Failure to meet even the lowest requirements will not earn you any winning points.
A hired crew not only increases your military strength, but offers additional winning points if the conditions are met, which usually include an attack on a particular settlement.
Predation involves taking on your new worker, taking prey, and gaining winning points for military strength and hired crew. If the attack involved a Valkyrie, part of the group will die, but reward players with points on the valkyrie tracker.
End of the game
The game enters its final phase when one of the following conditions is met:
- Only one attack on the fortress remained in the game.
- The pile of offers is exhausted.
- All valkyries were removed from the game board.
The player who reaches one of the conditions completes his round as usual and everyone else has 1 last turn to complete the game.
Players gain additional winning points on the Valkyrie route, weapon tracks, collected tiles for the offer, hired crew and loot. Add up all the progress to calculate the score at the end of the game and see who wins. The draws are broken if we look at the Valkyrie track followed by the Armory track if the players are still tied.
Your first game Raiders of the North Sea
Raiders of the North Sea is a fairly intuitive game, especially since it starts with a limited number of available actions. While some games require hours of preparation and stand-alone games to get in shape, you can gather the rest of the team and learn the game together.
The board has a variable setting, which means that no two games will be the same, which means that tactics that work in one game will not work in the next. Half the fun of playing a game like this is discovering your own strategies and moves, so I won’t teach you much in terms of Strategy .
I can tell you that Raiders of the North Sea is a game where you have to watch out for other players and prevent them from snowing easily. This is mostly reduced to denying one player too many valkyries and figuring out what others want to do, and preventing them from taking the place as the first act.
Advantages disadvantages
One of the most difficult challenges for a board game designer is to strike a balance between the complexity of the game and how easy it can be figured out.
Multiple layers of strategy, dozens of mechanics and a lot of player interactivity will make each session unique, but understanding the rules and ideas for the game can take hours and several sessions. On the other hand, you can make the game too easy and figure out the best strategy to win.
Advantages:
- The perfect balance between sophistication and repeatability
- Innovative mechanic for installing workers
- Excellent component quality
Raiders of the North Sea strike the perfect balance between the two. A player without prior knowledge of the game can sit at a table and learn while playing. When the first game is over, they will have already identified the main concepts and will be ready for competent competition in the next one, as well as in dozens of games to come.
I believe this is the first time that the game has included the rule of scheduling workers ‘first place - choose one’. This is not a trick and works very well. Two actions per turn somehow speed up the game, although technically you would have to wait twice as long to get in line. In a genre that is very saturated, it’s nice to see a developer figure out a new and functional way to make their game stand out.
The quality of the components, especially the artwork on the cards, is top notch. I can’t say anything bad about the components as everything is durable and the way I like it. And of course, I can’t talk about components without mentioning metallic silver coins.
Weaknesses:
- Maximum 4 players
- The theme is not well executed
The fact that Raiders of the North Sea can only be played by 2-4 players limits its value. Solo mode is not always required, but a maximum of 4 players is often limited.
The problem is fixed with extensions that add extra player space and can be combined with the base game for a total of 6 players, but they are not the cheapest, so keep that in mind.
The only thing that really stuck in my eyes in a negative way is the theme. I’m not exactly a fan of stories or themes, but when you decide on a Viking theme that’s already being used too much, you’d better do it right.
In Raiders of the North Sea, the goal is most to suck at the chief. That's it! You’re not attacking for the title of jarl or at least house carl, you’re not offering gifts to Odin to become his favorite clan, you’re just trying to impress your chief.
Then you look at the map and see that your Nordics… live in the south? And an attack to the north, to the snowy regions? I understand that everything in aesthetics and more frequent actions is closer to the players, but the Vikings attacked and traveled south, especially in the summer.
I know this doesn’t apply to playing at all, but like some history buff, so such details really stick to me. I really wish the designers had more of a sense of grandeur where you choose the good to reassure and fight for their fame while keeping the gameplay exactly the same.
Variations and extensions
Raiders of the North Sea: Fields of Fame
Your clan has been the cause of terror long enough and the enemy jarls have decided to join forces and defend their settlements with swords and axes!
Fields of Fame expands the game to accommodate a fifth player with additional components, but also adds a city board, chips and cards of enemy jarls, damage, fame, and new townspeople. You can use it along with the Hall of Heroes for a six player game!
- Components for the extra player
- City board with 3 new attacks
- Jarls bring new strategies and more ways to earn points
Raiders of the North Sea: Hall of Heroes
The newly built mead hall attracts new adventurers, tasks and interesting mechanics! Another extension for Raiders of the North Sea adds another player seat and can be used with Fields of Fame to increase the number of players to six.
This extension adds 30 citizen cards, 27 quests, 12 reputation tiles and a new medico hall board along with 40 medica tokens!
- Components for the extra player
- Mead Hall board with new Village location and card preparation area
- Challenges bring new strategies and more ways to earn points
Raiders of the North Sea: Collectible Box
- Raiders of the North Sea is set in the central years ...
- This collector's box contains a plastic insert and can store ...
- Requires Raiders of the North Sea and both extensions: Fields of ...
Raiders of the North Sea is also available in digital editions on Steam , Android and iOS !
Conclusion: a verdict?
I was really looking forward to trying out Raiders of the North Sea, and despite all the hype, the game still managed to impress me. This is exactly what I look for in my 'casual' games - it's complicated enough that your decisions are important, it doesn't drag on and it's evergreen.
We haven’t played the extension yet, but after reading the rules and watching a video or two, I managed to get three other players ready in less than 30 minutes, and then the first game lasted just over 2 hours. After that, every match went smoothly and no one could really consistently dominate.
Watercourse Masters was my best game to accommodate workers, but I think it’s time for a new game to take its place. I’m not 100% sure if Raiders of the North Sea is this game until the novelty factor fades, but for now, it’s definitely my favorite in the genre.
- Nominated for Spiel des Jahres Kennerspiel 2017 (enthusiastic game ...
- Impress the chief with attacks on the village!
- Part of the Runesaga trilogy campaign for the North Sea!
We hope you enjoyed our review of Raiders of the North Sea! Have you tried this mechanical sound board game Renegade? We'd love to hear your thoughts - so leave a comment below!
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