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In Relic Runners, each player takes on the role of a character keen to exploit and acquire relics that have been unearthed in a long lost part of the jungle. Each would-be archaeologist has a colorful past — retired university professor, former army captain, etc. — and wants to be the first to get their hands on the precious loot to earn the most victory points.
Players must navigate a series of paths in order to visit temples. The archaeologists are restricted in their movement by their access to rations, but thankfully they can place markers on paths to allow them to travel for free in future turns. The players also have a toolkit that can be upgraded in three particular ways to break the rules in some way or offer them an advantage as they move around.
Each time a player visits a temple, he takes a token. Initially the temples offer up victory points or some form of in-game bonus. When the final token is taken, a relic is placed there to be collected. The players earn large victory points for collecting relics of different types (set collection) and players can also earn bonus points for creating long routes and traveling along these to collect relics.
- Multiple routes to victory via relics, pathways, and temple points
- Ration management adds strategic depth and planning
- Clear win condition based on total victory points
- Potential complexity due to multiple interacting systems
- Relies on careful resource management and timing, which may lengthen playtime
- Relic collection and route building
- Ruins exploration on an ancient site with relics
- procedural/mechanics-driven
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
- base-and-resource loop — Return to base to restock rations and plan future relic runs.
- pathway movement — Build and use pathways to connect relics, enabling efficient travel and relic runs.
- Ration management — Rations limit actions: you spend rations to explore temples and replenish at base; you gain fixed rations from the base.
- relic runs — Take turns to traverse the board and collect relics to score points.
- Resource management — Rations limit actions: you spend rations to explore temples and replenish at base; you gain fixed rations from the base.
- temple scoring — Blue Temples grant victory points; other scoring vectors exist via relics and pathways.
- token-based progression — Crossing a path with a tool token flips the token, advancing along progression tracks.
- Track advancement — Crossing a path with a tool token flips the token, advancing along progression tracks.
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- okay so this is our new days of Wonder game Relic Runners
- it's actually Midway through a game
- the basic premise is you want to explore these ruins purple white ruins and you want to build Pathways
- once a ruin has been explored you'll have a Relic pop up
- the premise of the game is to grab as many different kind of relics as you can
- you do that by getting relics making Relic runs the longer the run the more Pathways you use the more points you get
- there are other ways to make points as well
- and um part of the strategy is you know using your rations properly and being able to create a pathway back to the base so you don't waste a whole lot of time
References (from this video)
- Adventure
- Exploration
- My Little Scythe
- Five Tribes
- Yamatai
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
References (from this video)
- Relic hunting
- Adventure/exploration
Mechanics (from transcript analysis)
Video topics + discussion points
Quotes (from this video)
- I went outside like for a whole two hours.
- Well, you're not the only one.
- You signed my game, but I didn't like it.
- That's a funny you signed my game, but I didn't like it.
- You get the one that's signed
- It's like you got the worst the worst component from my least popular game
- I think that's a much better fantasy to have that you fight dragons rather than you're a dentist
- Dragons? Surely that's what my uncle Adam does. Dragons, doesn't he's not a dentist.
- No, you can't make a Euro game set in space.
- It's interesting how that group think sort of works
- I think maybe it's a bit of group think in the industry
- One in 10 maybe
- Stack the deck
- That advice is right
- We probably got to check check our privilege here a little bit
- Very very fortunate to be in that position, aren't we?
- It's a practical problem, really