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Ringyō Preview - The Forest Is Yours...How Will You Honor It?

BoardGameCo Jul 7, 2026
Transcript 26:00

Hey there gamers, welcome back to the Board Game Co. channel. And today we have a preview of Ringyo. Hey there gamers, it's Professor Meg here and welcome back to the Board Game Co. channel. Today we have a preview of Ringyo by Powersong Games. Now this is a current crowdfunding campaign, so you can check out the link down below for everything that they have planned. This is a sponsored preview and this is a prototype copy in front of me, so all rules, components, and things like that are subject to change. Now in Ringyo, players are going to be using simultaneous worker placement to grow their forests. So, you're all going to have your own province of forests where you have your own trees that you are able to grow with different types, and you're going to be using this to accomplish victory points in multiple different ways. So, over the course of five rounds, you're going to be advancing on your forestry track, which is studying the different trees that are growing. But you're also going to be able to cut them down to use them for structures such as military might or your rice paddies, which are going to grow food for you. So, all of these different things are going to feed into ways that you are able to get victory points for yourself because you have shogun's demands at the end of each round the players are trying to accomplish, and it's all a race for victory points where if you are the first one to do so, you get the most and everyone after that is going to get less than you. So, you want to make sure that you have everything that is necessary to be able to accomplish that, including being first in priority order, which is all going to happen with the diplomat that you choose for each turn. So, with that, let's dive into Ringyo. Now in front of you, this board here is going to be the main board for all players because it has a lot of information for

the round. So, obviously it is tracking the round for you as well as the player order here, and that's all going to be determined by the cards that you play each round for your diplomat. So, before we dive into that, I will explain more about what you can see in front of you, but just know that players are going to be vying for turn order every single round. So, there are also these decks that players are going to a from where these are going to be more immediately [clears throat] helpful where players are going to be able to use them for actions, whereas these cards are going to be end game scoring that are goals that you're trying to accomplish. Now, there's also weather that is going to come out each round and that weather is going to really affect players with not only which trees grow, but whether or not floods happen in certain areas as well, which can be really detrimental because a flood will take away trees from players if they're not able to handle what has happened. So, that is what is going to be happening up there.

And then as I mentioned, there are these shogun's demands that players are going to be trying to accomplish at the end of each round and those are going to be up here. So, for example, you can see pay the rice tax for nine rice or bolster military for five military, but they're going to award different victory points depending on when you are able to do it. So, if you are the first player to able to accomplish the pay the rice tax for nine, you're able to accomplish 14 victory points for yourself at the end of the game. If you're the second player, it'll be 11 and the third player would be eight. So, as you can see all of these demands are going to scale in what they're able to give players. And each round two more are going to come out. So, this round those are pretty high demands. So, they may not be accomplished on the first round. In fact, they probably won't be, but they are able to be accomplished in future rounds and I'll go over the sequencing of how that is going to happen. But for example, on round two, two new demands will come out. So, just to give you an example of what those demands would be, this one is a military one again, but instead it's going to cost more, but award more victory points. And this one is share forestry knowledge not forestry knowledge, which is going to be these tokens here. So, there are going to be ways for players to earn these tokens and you're going to have to spend four to be able to bank those points. So, depending on the demands that come out, players can kind of anticipate toward the end what they might need to accomplish the newer goals that are going to come out. For example, you can

see that there are already two military ones here on the track, but given that there would be two military ones on the track by round two, that may be an incentive for players to build up their military forces as well. So, that's just an example of how these are going to come out and these are going to be randomized each game, so it will differ depending on each game play which of these goals are going to happen when. Now, finally, this board is set up for three players, but this is one singular player area right in front of us. So, we have our province board here with all of our trees that are on our setup card. So, at the beginning of the game you're going to start off with some trees as well as some floods that are placed out. And then you're also going to have your forestry track as well as your structure board. So, that is how you're going to track not only how you are studying trees and gaining some benefits there, but these structures that you're able to place out, the cost of them, the victory points that you'll gain at the end of the game. And you're also going to gain some bonuses depending on what structures you're able to place out as well. And this is where players are going to track their rice, which you're going to be able to spend on different things. As you can see here, there is the rice tax, which is going to be one of the demands, but there are other things that you're going to be able to spend rice on. And so, players do start with five. Now, the most important thing that players are starting off with is two samurai. So, you have two yellow samurai here, and depending on the type of units that you have to place as workers that round, they're going to be able to perform different types of

actions as well as a different number of actions. So, for example, our samurai here are able to perform all of the worker actions, and they're able to perform two actions per turn. So, I wanted to go over the full round sequencing and how that's going to play out before I show you how you would use these per specific actions, but just know that the other workers that you're going to gain throughout the game are going to have a different things. So, for example, these two here, you're going to be able to use for only specific actions. Uh for example, the villager here is only able to plant, cut, and grow trees as well as harvest rice, but as you can see from this one line here, they're only able to perform one action. Whereas for the artisans over here, they're able to perform two actions, and they're also able to create rice paddies or build. And again, I'm going to get over with all of these I'm going to go over with all of these actions look like in a bit, but just know that they're only able to perform certain things, whereas your samurai here can perform anything. And the other thing that's very important to know is that these will go away at the end of the round. So, any of the villagers or artisans that you gain, you're able to place them out, but once they are placed, you will lose them at the end of that round, but the samurai you will gain back to your reserve at the end of each round. Now, finally, there are green samurai that are very rare and hard to get, but if you are able to get a green samurai for yourself, they have three actions instead. So, where the

yellow are able to perform two actions with the areas that they are touching, the green samurai are going to be able to perform three actions instead, and that's going to be the difference for the workers that players have available. So, now that you understand more about the board and what you're going to be working with, I'm going to go over with the different phases of each turn and what that's going to look like. So, players are going to have a hand of six cards numbered one through six, and those are going to be your diplomats. And each round you're going to secretly choose one of these, and then everyone will reveal them once they've all chosen, and that's going to determine player order. So, that's going to mean a couple different things, but the biggest thing that is going to mean is the shogun's favor, because there are going to be favor cards placed out each round and whoever is first in that priority order is going to be able to a draft those first. But, when you get onto those Shogun's demands, as I noted with where it's first come first serve for the victory points, that's where this turn order is also really going to matter because if everyone is able to accomplish the same particular demand in the same round, you want to make sure that you are able to do so first. So, taking a look here this round, this one here is going to allow a player to gain an artisan for that round. This one is actually going to be a another diplomat that you're going to gain to your hand.

So, it's not going to do anything this round, but when it is gained to your hand, when you play it, you're going to be able to gain another samurai, which is very useful. Now, finally, this one is going to be a forestry card and when that happens, you will reveal them. So, this forestry card is this round, whenever your samurai cut, you may leave one of the one of the cut tree segments behind. So, I'll go over what that's going to look like in a little bit, but just keep in mind that these forestry cards are going to perform special abilities for players. And then you're also always able to discard it for two rice. So, even if you just wanted that two rice, it may be useful. And as I noted, there are three cards for three players, so someone is always going to get left with the least appealing option, but it's still going to be able to be useful to them because all of these are still very useful. Now, when choosing your diplomats, they are going to have a special abilities depending on the level of diplomat you're choosing as well. Now, once they are used, they are lost. So, over the course of five rounds, you have six cards unless you gain any other diplomats through the Shogun's favor, but you're going to be using a card, losing it forever, and then having options of whatever numbers are remaining for future rounds. So, for example, this one here is going to allow you to place new territory tiles. I'll show you what that looks like in a little bit. This one here is going to gain you an artisan worker. This one would gain you a three rice. The four would gain you a villager. The five doesn't gain you anything because it is

very high, and then the six, because it is a six, would actually cost you two rice to be able to use instead. So, it does have a cost associated, but it means that you will probably be winning, and I'll show you why you might not win, is that in this example, if all players were to use a six, uh you would reverse the player order. So, if everyone used the same exact number in this example, blue would be sent to the front, gray would be sent to the back, and orange would stay where it is because you reversed that player order. So, that's what would happen there. And then in that turn order, you would draft these diplomat bonus cards. Now, for the sake of the example, I'm going to have us have drafted this one here to have a one extra worker because next is going to be the province phase, and this is when players are going to be simultaneously placing out their workers to perform actions in their own province.

Um so, you are going to have uh some actions that are only available to certain workers, and you're going to be working toward either this forestry track or your structures with what you're able to accomplish. Because as your trees grow, you are going to want to cut them down because the highest you're able to have them grow is five. So, once they hit five, if it does rain for them, uh it's not as useful for you because you're not going to be able to grow those particular trees. Now, on their turn, players are able to with any of their workers, uh you will place them adjacent to three different territories, and then perform as many actions there as you were able to in those different territories. So, one action players are able to do is plant, and that's when you're going to take a tree of the same color of the area that you were planting in, and you would be able to plant in that area. Now, if we had wanted to plant in this area here where the flood is, we are able to do so, and that is one of the ways you're able to get rid of those as well. So, you are able to plant in those areas wherever there is an empty spot. Now, alternatively, if you are next to a tree that is already there, it is existed, it's already been planted, then you are able to grow it instead. So, you would be able to grow a plant that you are tree that you are next to with one of your actions. And then another action that players are able to do is cut. And when you cut, you would take all segments of a tree into your supply, and they would stay connected. So, for

example, this is a current stack of four here for this tree. We would be able to cut it down and place it over here into our supply. So, where this card has example where you're able to leave one segment behind, if we had played that card this turn, we would be able to leave a segment behind when cutting. So, that would be useful for when flooding is happening as well as growing these trees, because when the weather happens and it rains in certain regions, they are going to grow. So, that could have been very useful for us to cut only three pieces from that tree so that it can potentially grow in the future as well, but I'll have us cut all four of these over here for now. Now, an action that only artisans or samurais are able to do is create a rice paddy, and that's going to be with these tiles here where you're able to use an action to flip it over, and you have now created a rice paddy, which will then produce rice for you in the future when it rains in those regions. So, another action that players have available to them is harvesting, and when you harvest, you have to be next to a rice paddy that you've already created, and then you're able to gain one rice or two if you have built a farm structure. So, to move on to what building is going to look like, as you can see here, there's going to be different costs for your structures and they're going to go up depending on how many structures you've built. So, you're going to take a build action with either your artisans or your samurai. And in a region that is empty, you're able to build. So, for example, if we had these

trees here, this first building is one orange and one of the light green. So, we do have four here of the green and one of the orange. And we are able to uh split the segments that are in our inventory as a free action. So, we're able to uh split that out here so that we have just these two one pieces. And then if we wanted to as an action, we would be able to build in one of these areas. So, we'd be able to build a structure. And when doing so, we would be able to build either a fortress in one of these areas, which is going to provide military tokens for us, and that's going to be these structures here, or we're able to create a a farm for our rice patties, which is going to mean that they create two rice for us instead of just one. So, I am going to leave both of those out on our province so you can see what that looks like toward the end of the round, but just know that that would have only allowed us to build just one structure. And then building structures is going to be really beneficial because when you complete a row, you're going to gain the worker benefits here. The first one is a samurai, which is great because those are ongoing for each round. The next one is two artisans, but the last one is four villagers, which can still be a very, very useful. And then for each of the columns, you're also going to gain bonuses as well. And then additionally, when you complete certain buildings that are higher up on this track, you're going to gain the benefits that are between them as well, which can be

really, really helpful. Now, finally, at the end of the game, for any buildings that you have built, you're going to gain victory points as well. So, that's another reason why they're going to be super useful because here you can see this one is worth one victory point, but the more that you are able to build, then they're going to escalate in points as well, making them more and more helpful for you to build out. Now, if you do have a fortress, which is this building here, you're also able to do an action with your samurai to muster, which is going to gain you military tokens. So, that's something that you're able to do, but again, keep in mind that your samurai are only able to perform two actions. So, where I am going over all of the actions, you would only be able to perform two of these each turn per samurai that you're placing out.

Now, the final worker action the players are able to do is study, and that's how you're going to move up on this forestry track here. So, for that, you're actually not paying the forest, which you are doing on this track here. Instead, you're simply studying them. So, you do need to be next to the particular type of tree that you're trying to study, and they're going to escalate in height as you get higher and higher up on the track, but you need to be a next to them, and then you're able to advance on this. So, for example, if this samurai hasn't taken any actions yet, we would be able to place him to move up on this track. So, we'd be able to place him over here, for example, and we'd be able to study this spot here with this current tree to move over to here, and that's going to gain us the bonus in the center here, which is looking at one of the weather cards. So, we'll be able to look at this one here.

I'm just going to leave it flipped over for the example, but we now know that one of the weathers that's going to take effect this round is C, which is going to be determined by the card that is currently here, and that one is going to be the light green area. So, that's going to be these spots here. We know that weather is going to be happening in those areas. Now, additionally, with this samurai, since he has two actions, he would be able to study again. So, there is a two-height dark green right here next to him, and that is on this next spot on the chart. As you can see, this branches, so depending on where you are, you have to move forward up the chart.

[snorts]

So, that's why we need to meet these requirements as opposed to something on this side. But, once we are able to do so, that's going to gain us two of these forestry tokens, which we'll be able to either use in the future for these shogun demands to hopefully beat out other players, or we're also able to spend them to look at the weather cards. So, if we did want to know what weather was going to be happening this round, we would be able to spend these to peek at those instead. Now, those are all of the actions that players have available to them, but there are a couple of special actions as well. So, one of them I already noted, which is going to be splitting up your trees that you have in your inventory that you are able to do at any point. And you're also able to spend one rice to join two trees together. So, if you had cut down trees from two different areas, and you needed a bigger tree to pay for something, you are able to spend rice to join them together as well.

You're also able to spend two rice to hire a villager worker. So, that's going to be really important for players to be able to do any final actions that they feel they need to do before the end of the round. So, you are able to hire as many workers as you can afford based on the rice that you were able to pay. And then additionally, you're also able to expand your province. So, that is going to be these tiles over here, and in order to do that, you're going to have to spend three military tokens. So, if you have three, you are able to place them out, and they are going to have different things on them as well. So, for example, this one here has a three orange tree that would start on it. So, you would have the tree already, and then you'd place it out into your province. Once players are done with all of their worker placement for the province phase, that's when you're going to move on to the weather phase. So, you take all of the actions that you feel you need to do so for that current round, and then after that you're going to have the weather affect everyone. So, where some players may have seen some of the weather cards and know what is happening, this is when they're all going to be revealed and affect everyone. So, where weather can be good because raining is going to help your trees grow, it can also cause your province to flood, which is going to be bad bad and affect your trees as well.

So, at first during the weather phase, players are going to gain a military token for every fortress in their province. So, here we would gain one military token for having that in our province. And then the weather cards would be revealed. So, I'll flip this back over because they would be revealed one at a time, but this one would flip over and I'm just going to leave our province how it is currently, but the beach would currently have weather, meaning that any of our yellow trees are going to grow up to a height of five. Our yellow one over here is going to create two rice for us, but this one over here is going to flood. So, that's going to cause a flood over here, and then we'll move on to the next weather card. And that one's going to be A, which is yellow again. So, again our trees would grow, we would gain rice from this, and this one would flood again, but where it's in the bottom, nothing is going to happen. So, I will have us move on to this one just so you can see what that's going to look like, but for C, we're going to grow trees just in these two spots here. So, both of those would grow. We have a flood here already, meaning that it would flood down to this area here. So, between these two, you're going to look at the card that's up here for the priority order, and yellow is higher in the priority order. So, where this weather is currently happening, it would flood down to this area here. We would lose these trees, unfortunately, and a flood would be caused down here.

So, you can see where it's really important to try to either grow different trees in the flood areas or turn them into rice paddies for yourself so that there's something useful instead of something harmful. So, again, over here, this one would gain a flood token, but where it is at the bottom, in the future, those at least wouldn't flood any further down. Now, finally, after this is the Shogun's demand phase that I already went over. So, in player order, starting with the blue player, which is us, you'd be able to accomplish one of these. And if you're able to accomplish multiple different demands, you would first place one out. All players would have an option to accomplish what they're able to, and then you would be able to place another one out. So, if, for example, both you and another player were able to meet two different demands, you may get one, and then they may get first place for the other because you have to go in turn order before you're able to a bank another demand. Now, again, these are just going to be end game scoring for you, but that's going to be a huge amount of points for you depending on which demands you were able to accomplish.

Now, over the course of five rounds, players are going to follow this general phasing where you're going to choose your diplomats to determine player order, as well as perhaps a benefit for yourself that you were hoping to gain. And then after that, you're going to go through your province phase where you are placing out your different workers simultaneously and trying to grow up your forest. Perhaps you're cutting it down to create structures, perhaps you are studying it, or a balance of both. But either way, you're going to be working within your provinces before everyone tries to fight for those demands and then move on to the next round. So, you're going to do this over the course of five rounds where you are constantly growing up your trees, cutting them down, growing them again, while keeping in mind the end game goals that you have as well. Because there are going to be goals that you are able to score. So, with that, I'm going to go over what end game scoring is going to look like and what players are trying to work toward. So, of the two cards that we have here, we do have our forestry card, which we did already go over what these do generally, but for example, this one is this round whenever your samurai create a rice paddy, immediately gain two rice, which can be very useful.

But, there's also going to be your shogun's favor cards, and these are going to be victory points for you at the end of the game when everyone is scoring. So, for example, this one is dense forests, three plus height trees in the largest connected group in your province. So, if you have three to five, you would get two points, six would be eight points, and my nine plus would be 14 points. So, players are able to achieve up to a three of these cards. You're able to gain more, but then you would choose which three are going to score at the end of the game. But, at the end of those five rounds, you're going to look at your victory points not only for the buildings that you have built out, but the shogun favors that you have as well, as well as the shogun's demands points, and then finally, players are going to gain points for the trees that are left in their forest depending on what they have accomplished on their forestry track.

So, here you can see this is gaining a victory point for the four plus. This one is a victory point for the three plus, and this is a victory point for the two plus, meaning that the number of stack pieces in the stack. So, you're going to gain more and more victory points the higher you get up on that track, especially if you leave trees out in your forest and gain new territory tiles that have trees on them as well. Overall, I really is going to be a very fast-paced simultaneous game where everyone is working on their own personal puzzle. So, you are interacting with other players in the sense that you really want to advise for those diplomats that you are sending out. You want to be highest on that priority track so that you're able to accomplish the different demands before other players, and you want to gain those different favors that are very, very good. But, you're going to be working on your own forest where no one is really going to come in and affect that. So, you're able to grow your own trees, cut them down, perhaps save them for scoring, and you're going to be mitigating these different floods that are happening because the weather is going to happen each round. So, that will really affect players, and losing trees can be really detrimental. So, once you experience that, you're going to be sure to make sure that you don't have it happen again in the future because it can really hurt to lose your trees. So, depending on the different strategy that you go for, there are multiple ways for you to gain victory in this game. You can build a bunch of buildings. You can go up on the forestry track. You can find a balance of both.

There's a whole bunch of things that you're able to do, and with these Shogun's favorite cards, you can either go for a diversity and finding a lot of victory points in different things that you're able to accomplish, or some some of them will synergize together where you're trying to have different types of trees and then perhaps pairs of those trees. So, it all kind of works hand in hand for you. So, with that, you can check out the link down below for everything that Power Swing Games has planned for Ringyo. I've been Professor Meg. Thank you all for watching the Board Game Channel, and I'll see you next time. Bye.

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