Matthew BaileyAfter the crushing disappointment of “Clouds,” we wanted something better so based on absolute “guesswork of quality” we went with game 39 of the “Bailey family sorta Summer Board Game Bonanza” which is “Dragon’s Cave” played by myself Jack(7) and Toby(4).
Dragon’s Cave is a fairly simple little bluffing game that we all found fun and ended up playing a few games of.
You each choose a miner and get a set of each of the cards representing spaces in the game, plus a treasure chest.
You move by secretly picking a colour card that corresponds to the next square you want to go to. These squares have different coins on them that are needed to win the game.
Each turn you take turns to be the dragon and once the other players have picked what cards they want to lay you move the dragon onto a corresponding colour. They turn the cards over and if they are a different colour from the dragon they advance to the next space and collect coins if required. If they chose the same colour as the dragon then they go back to the previous space of the colour. The losing player then picks up all of their unbanked coins (more on that in a sec) and places them between their hands. The dragon player then picks which hand he wants to destroy. All coins in this hand are discarded. This adds a fun risk-reward strategy for kids. Do you go all in and hope they pick the wrong hand? Do you spread it out and take a hit but know you won’t lose everything?
On a card laying turn, you can also choose the treasure chest which lets you bank treasure keeping them safe on future turns (but wastes a go)
Play continues until a player teacher the last space at the dragon’s cave and gains 4 coins.
Add them up, most coins wins.
The boys really enjoyed this and as a family game, I thought it was excellent. It really is a game to introduce elements such as bluffing, risk/reward, social deduction and predicting what others are going to do.
It’s super simple I reckon you could play this with a savvy 3-year-old yet there is enough here to keep adults interested.
Great stuff a def recommendation from me…
Unlike “Clouds”… “Clouds” sucked
