Having celebrated my birthday a few weeks ago, I ended up with far more games then I expected. Remind me next year to ask for a shelf to store them all on, because I don’t know how many more games my roommate will let me keep under the coffee table in the living room.
But all these different gifts means I’ve got lots of new games to learn, and I was really planning on learning them all except Tom and I ended up getting hooked on one game: Ascension: Chronicle of the Godslayer.
It is the Age of Man, a time without gods or magic. After a thousand years of peace and prosperity, the barrier that separates your world from the multiverse has been broken, and demonic forces threaten to destroy your home. But not all hope is lost: the benevolent gods of the Old Realms have also returned, bringing with them mighty heroes and powerful constructs that are yours to command. Only through your courage and leadership can the forces of light fight off the incoming hordes. Only by defeating the Fallen One can you save your world. Let the Ascension begin!
Suggested Ages: 13+
Suggested Players: 2 to 4
Playing time: 30 minutes
Contents: 1 game board, 50 tokens (25 red, 25 white), 200 cards
Retail price: $39.99 available at Amazon or Ascension Game
Created by Gary Games, anyone with a knowledge of the professional Magic: the Gathering scene would be impressed by the names associated with the game. With people like Justin Gary, Brian Kibler, Rob Dougherty and Geordie Tait associated with the game, I had a pretty good idea I was going to enjoy the game (and not just because I lived near Your Move Games).
At its core, Ascension is a fantasy-themed deck building game that takes elements from Dominion and improves upon them by adding classic Magic: the Gathering ideas. If you’ve played either game, you’ll quickly pick up the rules of Ascension. Everyone starts with the same deck of 10 cards – 8 Apprentices, 2 Militia which introduce you to the two core concepts of the game: Runes and Power.
Runes are used to buy new cards, like better warriors or elaborate constructs that will help you win the game. Power is used to kill monsters, which in turn reward you with Honor (the point system used by the game)
Unlike Dominion, the board of Ascension is constantly in flux as people acquire cards or defeat monsters. The middle row of six cards changes depending on what the Portal Deck randomly dishes out. In addition to that, three staples are always available to players to purchase: Mystic (+2 runes), Heavy Infantry (+2 power) and the Cultist (1 honor). This is the foundation of the game that results in a weird mix of drafting and battling at the same time.
Like Magic, there are five different “colors” in the game that are really nothing more than convenient ways to keep track of what cards do. Void (purple) is about banishing cards (trashing or exiling), Enlightened (blue/white) is about drawing cards, Lifebound (green) is about gaining honor without fighting and Mechana (brown) which are focused on constructs and building. The final type is Monsters (red), which can be killed for honor.
The game ends when the set amount of honor has been gained. In a two-player game, you start with 60 honor available and every time someone earns honor, it comes from the common pile – and once all the honor is gone, the game ends. But to add an element of surprise, all non-Monster cards have an amount of honor that they are worth at the end of the game. This often results in the person who ended the game not being the same one who wins. To represent honor, the game includes a collection of red and white crystals – that while cool, don’t work nearly as well as a handful of dice.
So while the game is rather simple, the constant shift of what cards are available really makes me like how the game can rapidly swing. But there are some oddities about this game that just don’t quite make sense to me. First, the card types are vague at best and there doesn’t seem to be a real theme beyond mechanics. A pure Lifebound deck can work, but a pure Void or pure Enlightened deck could never really be pulled off. This often results in games escalating into a Lifebound versus Mechana battle.
Another big issue are the honor tokens. I’ll admit, at first I thought they were really cool – but then I started playing with them. Their weird shapes makes them impossible to count on the fly and glancing at a handful of them could be worth 18 points, 34 points or 50 – you can’t really tell. It’s like trying to count a herd of zebras!
The art for the game is done by a single individual, Eric Sabee and he did an excellent job of using different styles to let each card type appear different and unique. The similar themes of color and style help bring the game together. Another minor thing that really excited me is that the cards are the same size as Magic cards – meaning they’re super easy to sleeve!
As a game, Ascension: Chronicle of the Godslayer is a fantastic starting point for a card game. The themes and ideas presented allow for a lot of fun and a surprising amount of strategy that isn’t ruled by luck alone. It’s a game that shows a lot of potential and thankfully, the expansion adds a lot of depth and much needed changes.
Pros
Great deck building game
Consistent and stylized art
Cool looking tokens
Super easy to sleeve
Cons
Half the cards lack identity
Honor tokens awful in execution
Begging for addition in the form of an expansion
Images from Ascension Game site.
Tags: ascenion chronicle of the godslayer, ascension, game, gary games, review
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