Paper Tales Board Games | Ages 12+ | 2-5 Players | 30 Minute Playing Time

The game takes about 20min to play, regardless of player count. This is because all players do their phases at the same time, and “war” by comparing totals with the player to your left and right. Also plays two players. Players draft for a hand of five cards and are able to keep one card from the prior turn. Then they place their units which fight and/or produce goods/money/victory points, but have to buy them to keep them. “Wars” compared who’s front line is stronger, with ties resulting in each combatant winning. It is possible to win up to two wars (left and right), each scoring victory points. Remaining money is used to pay taxes to allow you to build upgradable buildings, which produce additional goods and are worth victory points at the end of the game. Cards may augment phases with special bonuses, some conditional. Cards age over time, causing churn. At the end of four turns, the player with the most victory points (with gold breaking ties), wins. Multiple winners can occur. This is a card drafting and resource engine game that’s easy to learn, fun to play, and loaded with strategy of being able to do anything, just not everything, and certainly not when you want, all under a deadline that shifts your priorities and goals. I have to say I like the 2-player drafting experience, which provides more choices and a twist to deny the other player useful cards. The expansion grants two more players, more unit cards, additional buildings, but it also provides solo play. These cards are marked with a key, so they can be removed later. Setup is easy. You can learn as you play, the instructions walk through nicely. The only hitch is that some of the iconography is a little small and subtle, meant for familiar players. Play once though and it’ll stand out like a sore thumb. Look for icons in the titles of cards indicating you may have one additional card on your front lines. Highly enjoyable. Fast to play. Great no matter the group size. Suitable for pre-teens.

An easy to learn game that I play solo using the Beyond the Gates expansion. Gorgeous artwork, great resource management card game with scaling levels of challenge. A quick 20 minute play

Good game, I'm not sure about replay down the road, but I'm certainly happy for now.

Paper Tales is an interesting game where you build your kingdom by getting income and recruiting people, creatures and other things by choosing cards. When you choose a card to keep you pass your hand to another player and you'll do this a few times. There are 6 different phases in the game that you'll go through and your cards can usually do something in each phase. You might get great cards but you can't keep them forever because they'll age and die. You also have buildings you can build or upgrade to make your kingdom better. What makes this game interesting is that there are different ways to score in the game. The common way to score is to fight your opponents by comparing strength and the other ways are like your unit dies, having a lot of a particular resource and more. There are different strategies to win the game. I recommend this if you like card drafting and hand management games where you play your cards strategically. Note: There's also an expansion for this game which adds more cards, buildings, a solo mode and more players. I think it's worth getting since it adds more variety.

Paper Tales, on the surface, seems really, really simple. You get some resources, you do some stuff with your guys, and you race opponents around the score track. Anyone can learn this game in a single playthrough. However, the strategy to this game is much deeper than the simple top level would suggest, and understanding Paper Tales enough to reliably win will take many more go-rounds. The fact that your units die of old age is a major complication to the normal kind of "buy it, keep it" strategy a lot of games have, and when you add in the fact that Paper Tales only lasts four rounds this becomes even more difficult to manage. You have to adapt on the fly to what's happening with your cards and the game, but you don't have much time to put a plan in place. This has become a real favorite for my friends who want something fun and fast that's not just a party game. Really enjoy it!

Fantastic game. Quick, nice to look at, easy to understand. The expansion adds a lot.

I bought it due to favorable reviews and it being an engine builder game played in less than an hour. We quit playing it after 2 months as it's just too easy to make a stupid mistake and ruin your game. Seems like you should be able to keep track of all of the factors, but we've found consistently that you confuse or forget something, then you don't want to finish the game, because you've ruined your play. Other engine builder games have ways to work around mistakes or alternative approaches you can take to keep in the game, but not this one. I DO NOT recommend buying it.

My husband and I like challenging, yet fun games. Paper tales is slightly complex, but pretty easy to learn after playing a few rounds. Highly recommend playing with at 3 people, battle is more fun that way, but my husband and I have fun playing by ourselves too!