Getting Familiar with The Village Crone

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Beasts that Crawl, Fly, Slither, & Stalk

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What witch could succeed without the assistance of her Familiar breed? In The Village Crone, you command your Familiars to assist you in the completion of your Witch’s Schemes.

Each witch has their own set of Familiar tokens that represent their animal minions. The choices you have are cats, bats, rats, snakes, spiders, and crows. If you have a personal affinity towards a particular animal it may bring you luck!

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You will get 5 tokens displaying your Familiar’s likeness, you will place 3 of them on the board at the beginning of the game. In order to put the other two in play, you must use the Conjuring Spell.

The Familiars are placed on the board in various locations around the Village for several strategic purposes.

A vital function of your Familiars is harvesting of Ingredients you need to cast Spells. During the Harvest Ingredients phase of a round, you will receive two Ingredient cards for each Familiar you have in a given location. For instance, if you have one Familiar at the Lord’s Manor, you will receive two Silver. If you have two Familiars at the Farm, you will receive four Soil (two for each Familiar).

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You may also want to move your Familiars around using your Movement Phase if you need to change the Ingredients you have been gathering to cast different Spells. This strategy will depend upon the Spells required to complete your Witch’s Schemes.

There are spells that require a Familiar to be present in a location to affect that space, such as Summoning or Switching.

An overcrowding of Familiars can occur, triggering a Scatter effect and kicking Familiars out of a specific location. For more details on Scattering, check your rule book page 3.

Whether you prefer cat-like reflexes, a bird’s eye view, or the creepy-crawly vibe of an eight-legged friend, your Familiars will be a most valued resource as you vie to be The Village Crone!

 

 

Which Witch is Which? Look Inside the Book of Spells

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What is inside the Book of Spells?

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Each player in The Village Crone will choose a Book of Spells at the beginning of the game. You will use this as a privacy screen to keep your Schemes away from the prying eyes of the other witches and it acts as a handy reference guide for the Spells you will be casting and some of the rules for gameplay.

The book you choose determines which Familiar becomes yours to command. The image of your Familiar is displayed on the outside facing portion of your Book of Spells so the other witches know whose Familiars are whose.

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Inside the Book of Spells you will find a handy chart of the Spells you will be casting. The chart includes a description of what the Spell does, the Ingredients required to cast it, and the Incantation you must say to give power to your spell. You may also choose to make up your own incantations, which can lead to some really funny moments in the game!

There is also a reference guide for Order of Play when you are first learning to play the game or have new players joining you, and a helpful reminder list for some of the rules you will want to keep in mind without having to look them up in the rule book once you get going.

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Don’t forget to make sure you have the latest version of the rules with the correction to the Unbinding spell. You can also print out a patch for your Books of Spells Charts.

 

DragonCon, Here We Come!

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Dragon Con logo

It’s that time of year again already! Next week we will be heading to Atlanta, GA along with 70,000 other people for DragonCon.

This year the Exhibitor Space is in AmericasMart Building 2. We will be on the First Floor in Booth 1425.

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We will have copies of The Village Crone for advance sale, so you can take it home with you before it releases in stores in September. But we only have a limited supply, so be sure to come by early.

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DragonCon is a unique show and we get to see some pretty sweet costumes walk by the booth! If you are going to the show this year, stop by and say “Hi!” You can pick up the 6th Level Agranok card for The Dark Titan or an Alarm Clock for Bears!

Oh, and we’ll have these super sweet Deluxe Monster Draw Bags for Castle Panic for sale. We just got them back in stock!

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Scheming Witches: Anatomy of a Witch’s Scheme Card

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The main objective in The Village Crone is to be the first witch to score 13 victory points. You score points by completing Witch’s Schemes valued at 1, 2, or 3 points, depending on the difficulty level of the objectives in the scheme.

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In order to score a Scheme, all conditions on the card must be met in the same turn. Cards contain both Active and Passive Schemes. What’s the difference? Active Schemes must be completed by the Witch scoring the card, Passive Schemes may be met by conditions existing on the board or by the Witch scoring the card.

Let’s take a look at an example: Continue reading Scheming Witches: Anatomy of a Witch’s Scheme Card

Unbinding Unbound

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We want to extend a big “Thank You” to everyone who has been spreading their love for The Village Crone through your reviews, blogs, posts, and tweets.

As you are enjoying the game, we want to let you know about an error in the Unbinding Spell that affects the rulebook and Book of Spells. Binding a location requires 2 Soil cards, but the Ingredients required to Unbind a location should be 2 of the same of ANY ingredient, not just Soil.

Visit The Village Crone info page to download the latest version of the rules with the ingredient fix.

We have updated the rules PDF (which is available online), provided a small patch for the Book of Spells (which can be downloaded and printed), and will be including an errata sheet with all games purchased after the publication of this post.

Download and a print the patch sheet for the Book of Spells quick reference guide to update your game.

The Village Crone releases September 30, and we’re looking forward to bringing you more bewitching good times. Happy casting!

Welcome to Wickersby

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A look at the modular game boards in The Village Crone.

One of the many fun features of The Village Crone, is the modular game board. In this game, the play area is comprised of six (6), 9×9 boards that each represent a different location in the medieval village of Wickersby.

The layout of the boards is changeable each time you play. For standard play, we recommend you lay them out on a standard 3 x 2 grid; however, if you would like more complexity in your game you may choose to offset the boards, creating new pathways that must be maneuvered when moving Villagers and Familiars from location to location to achieve your Schemes.

With this added flexibility in the game, you will discover new challenges to your strategy each time you play. The “best” path from the Forge to the Mill will change each time you lay the tiles differently, adding a simple, yet meaningful, twist that keeps the game feeling fresh even after repeated play.

You can pre-order The Village Crone on our site or at your Friendly Local Game Store. It officially releases in stores everywhere September 30. To read the full rules, visit the information page about The Village Crone and click on the PDF download link under the How to Play header.

GenCon 2015: Post-Show Wrap-Up

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Another Gen Con has come to an end. We came, we played, we conquered.

This year had record attendance, according to the official count from Gen Con, and the sea of people around the booth indicated they all made it through the exhibit hall at some point. Things went very smoothly for us this year, thanks to our awesome volunteers and staff!

Our demo tables stayed full with barely a lull. Players were scrambling to get in one more round each night at closing time and were snagging chairs minutes after the hall opened each day. Many thanks to everyone who came by to play with us, you made the con such fun for us!

The calm before the storm…
The booth in full swing!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Village Crone debuted at this year’s Gen Con and we are thrilled so many people came by to demo, get an overview, and take an advance copy home with them. If you missed Gen Con this year, never fear. It is now available for pre-order on our website or through your Friendly Local Game Store. If you need help finding a game store near you, check out our Store Locator Map.

Some serious spell-casting going on in The Village Crone

You can also download the special 3D printer files we created for The Village Crone components on the product information page. They are FREE to download until the end of the year, so get them now and use them later!

Anne-Marie De Witt, designer of The Village Crone, signs a couple copies for fans

We are already brainstorming about how to make next year even better and we have several new games that will be coming your way in 2016. So, go get some sleep. Recuperate and rest assured there are big things coming your way at Gen Con 2016 and we invite you to join us for the fun.

Dead Panic got a lot of love this weekend as well. Who says zombie games aren’t still popular?

What were your favorite moments from GenCon? Tell us in the comments below!