Matthew BaileyGame 19 of the “Bailey Family Summer 2023 Board Game Bonanza” is the winner of this year’s “Kennerspiel des Jahres” (Connoisseur Board game of the year) – “Challengers!” played by Jack (8.) and myself.
Before I start the review, I will say that even though I have only played “Challengers!” here with Jack, I have played it with a group of four, and I have also played it multiple times on “Board Game Arena” with eight players. I will obviously comment here on how the game went with, and how an eight-year-old understood it, but I’ll also draw on my experience playing with adults to give a bigger oversight of the game at a much higher player count.
“Challengers!” is a “card drafting deck management auto battler tournament game” (that’s the best way I can describe it” which is a card game that draws on the recent popular video game genre auto battlers, where you set up your team between rounds but have little control over how those rounds play out. If you are familiar with the game “Hearthstone”, this plays somewhat like how the battlegrounds mode works in that.
From a storyline point of view, you are all playing Capture the Flag (and the game has nothing to do with golf despite what I thought the box looked like when I bought it) and competing against all the other players in a tournament. Obviously, with a two-player game, you are playing against the same person over and over again, but with a larger player count, you will be playing in a series of one-on-one matches. If there is an odd number of players, there is also an automated deck that the odd player plays with.
You start the game by having a deck of not-very-powerful starter cards and draw five cards from whatever pool is that abs you on that round. In the first round, you pick five “A” cards, moving up to “B” and “C” as the game progresses, with “C” being generally the most powerful cards.
Once you have selected either one or two new cards to add to your deck, you can then also decide if you want to remove any cards from your deck to try and build the best possible deck, ensuring synergy where possible between cards.
You then either toss a coin to see who starts with the flag or in later rounds whoever has the most fans (points). Once your deck is shuffled and placed face down with the player who starts with the flag laying their first card, the attacking player turns over their cards one at a time until they match or beat the point value of the defending card, resolving special powers and abilities as you go. Once you beat that card, the last card that the attacker played then ends up as the defending card, and play then switches, and the other player attacks. Any defeated cards go on your bench, and once your bench is full and you are unable to lay another one, you lose the round. You also can lose the round if you run out of cards to lay, which becomes more of a possibility if you try to shred your deck too much later down the line.
This then continues for seven rounds or, in the case of a two-player game, until one player has 11 more fans than the other.
“Challengers!” is an unusual game in that card drafting is key, and the synergy of the deck you build is essential, but you are still at the mercy of which cards are drawn and when. Now, the game I played with Jack is the first time I’d ever played two-player, and while we both really enjoyed it, the issue with playing with two players is that because you are always playing the same deck, once one person gets ahead, it is then very difficult for the other player to claw back victory. In the game we played here, I won the first round, Jack won the second, and then every subsequent round until he had 11 more fans than me. Having played this at much larger player counts, I must say that this game really needs to be played with four-plus players. Equally, playing with an even number of players is preferable, but the automata deck does work well and, because of the relatively low level of decision-making during play, does not feel it takes away that much.
Looking around, seeing a strong player, and knowing you are going to have to play their deck is great fun. And because of how the card synergy works, even if you have lost two games in a row, your deck might be particularly strong and maybe, with a bit of luck, beat the player who looked the strongest.
My main reason for purchasing this myself is to play at my school in a full group of 8 year 9 students (plus me) and at that player count it really is something special.
Production quality is very, very high. The cards are well made and of a nice card stock. The tournament mats that everyone plays on are neoprene and of high quality. My main whinge is that even though it has an insert, everything doesn’t fit in it that well, and they definitely could have thought that through better.
I really like “Challengers!” as does Jack who completely got everything. Rules are not that complex and the cards explain themselves well. I am actually surprised this was put in the Kennerspiel category rather than the regular category as I would not consider this any more complex than Dorfromantik which won this year’s main award.
The whole idea of setting everything up and essentially letting your deck play itself may be alien for some but as someone who likes the auto battler genre of video games Jack and I really enjoyed and took to this.
This is an excellent game for families with older children, but I would only recommend it if you are going to be able to play with four or more, and ideally an even number of, players, as it is not as good at two. “Challengers 2” is coming out in a few months and will be standalone but also work alongside this.
Equally at around £25-£30 it’s pretty well priced for this type of game with high-quality components.
The version of this on Board Game Arena is really good, and I would 100% recommend you try it on there to get a feel for it. Equally, if you decide to play the game physically, the Board Game Arena tutorial is excellent and how I learned how to play the game.
Very good game, but definitely not for everyone with a few player-size caveats.
