Oath: Chronicles of Empire & Exile

[DemoGraph]

Oath is a card-based boardgame that changes its default state - map, deck composition, some victory conditions - based on what happened during the last game. Player is welcome to keep "chronicle" of things that happened. The game focuses on representing political interactions between factions, where military conflict is just one of possible ones.

Useful links

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BGG: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/291572/oath
Vassal: https://vassalengine.org/library/projec ... _and_Exile

Rules: https://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/2134 ... e-rulebook
Playbook: https://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/2134 ... rn-to-play
Card spreadsheet (sloppy, but complete): https://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/2342 ... preadsheet

Possibly interesting threads to immerse yourself in the game.
Dev Diary: https://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/2206 ... gner-diary
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/358604 ... understand
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/266583 ... ategy-long
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/325996 ... strategy-2
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/268737 ... rt-13-game
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/300283 ... f-randomia

My take

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Pros:
- Interesting dev goal, partly realized.
- Good amount of randomness, promoting that "you can't control the world" feeling.
- Several victory conditions, with focus on politics.
- Art style - the chars are charismatic (but see below).

Cons:
- I find card combos to be on the weaker side, definitely less pronounced than in Knizia's games (Glory to Rome, Innovation), Race for the Galaxy or Cthulhu Realms. The same, IMO, could be said about card fluff.
- Some cards are strong, but many are too situational and so kinda meh.
- I find that campaign isn't pronounced enough. Yes, the game remembers some parts from the last game. But it doesn't keep the history, like a proper tabletop GM does. It also doesn't have any feeling of progress, since there's no tech progress or other time vector.
- Also, I found the conflict to be too "samey" - it's always chancellor vs pretenders, never interstate war or state vs calamity. The game tries to be too many things at once and fails.
- Art style - the chars are randomly colored blobs like in that modern office art about 2d people. This just screams "US culture wars".

Discuss?

[J1M]

I agree.

[Tweed]

More like OOF!