Victory Points Aplenty in the Highly Strategic Board Game “Icaion”
With so many ways to gain points and so many different characters builds, Icaion offers tons of different paths towards victory.
Venture into the deadly wastes of Icaion, seeking to harvest a newly discovered source of power: Qoam. These crystals will power your massive machines and aid in your fight against the toxic environment, which is riddled with parasites and under constant threat of the looming colossus. Reputation is the only real currency here, so stake your claim, and may the best Seeker win.
Icaion is a competitive strategy game with resource management mechanics and unique player abilities. The goal of each player is to earn the most Reputation points by the end of the game’s third year. Reputation is earned in a lot of different ways, which allows for a multitude of strategies to victory.
The game starts with some machines already on the board, don’t think yellow just really sucks at building.
Each round begins with the players flipping over and event card, which will either populate the board with Qoam crystals or cause the colossus to lumber about, causing quite a ruckus.
During their turns, players must move unless they spend a blue Qoam to set up camp and remain where they are. They will then either take a Standard Action, a Special Action, or both.
There are 6 Standard Actions:
- Extract – Collect Qoam from all adjacent regions and activate all machines in that region, which can earn points
- Deploy – Place a machine on the board, which earns points
- Eradicate – Kill parasites which attack your machines, which earns points
- Investigate – Take a shard from the colossus, which earns points
- Retrieve – Gain an apparatus which is a token which can earn points
- Install – Install the apparatus, which allows it to gain points
As you can see, every action can gain points. On top of that, each player has a unique Seeker card and Gear card, which greatly affect how that player interacts with the game.
For example, the above Seeker card (on top) grants THREE times the amount of points when investigating the colossus. And their Gear card allows them to Deploy as a Special Action, meaning they could Deploy and Extract on the same turn, or Deploy twice in the same turn. That’s HUGE! And all of the cards are equally as powerful.
But this is balanced by the need to collect Qoam. Sure this Seeker can earn points like crazy, but they still need to collect Qoam to do it. As evidenced by the fact they are all out, save one crystal.
After 5 rounds, that year ends, which increases Colossus activity and the next year begins. After the third year, the game ends, and after some last-minute point collecting bonuses, the play with the most Reputation points wins!
Final Thoughts
I really liked Icaion a lot. It’s got everything I look for in a game: impactful player abilities, multiple viable strategies, and great game balance.
The game also is built to combine with Mysthea, which we recently also covered. The new game, called Mysthea: The Fall, combines components from both games and utilizes brand new rules into a mini-legacy style game where you play a game of Icaion or Mysthea, then without clearing the board of that game, begin a new game of Mysthea: The Fall, using the board you build in the previous game. It’s a super cool idea to implement legacy elements without having to go that deep into a full legacy-style campaign.
If you’re a fan of strategy games at all, I highly recommend Icaion. This has quickly risen to the top of my favorite game charts.
Icaion – Available Now
Icaion is an Engine Territory Building, Resource Management eurogame for 2 to 4 players designed by Martino Chiacchiera and Marta Ciaccasassi.
The game tells the story of what is happening in the regions around the giant crystal on the surface of Icaion, the planet below the clouds from which the floating islands of Mysthea detached millennia ago.
- 2 – 5 Players
- 90 – 120 Minutes
- Ages 14+
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