Mythologies Review
Transcript
Welcome to Allies or Enemies. Today, we are talking about mythologies. Our copy was provided, but the thoughts are all our own. Mythologies is a two-to-four-player game designed by Maxime Bot Bad and Mickael Gerson that has players drafting and placing cards to create their own pantheon made up of creatures and deities from different mythologies around the world. But, we will get back to that in a minute. First, let's look at how it plays.
You start the game with a pantheon board and three selection pawns and then choose four of the eight possible mythologies and place their boards in cards in the center of the table. With the boards placed together to create the rules for the game's two trials. The round starts by flipping the top destiny card, which will tell each player which mythology they can draft from that turn. And you will choose either to draft one of the cards by placing your pawn on top or to pass, which you can do twice as you need to draft two cards by the end of the round. Then, in player order, each player takes their two cards and adds them to their pantheon board. First, gaining the placement bonus depending on where they add the card to the board and perhaps also a row or column completion bonus. And then gaining the card power, which can either be immediate, ongoing, or end of game and will do different things like gaining new cards, getting rid of cards, moving cards, and crushing cards. Which means one card is placed on top of another. In the second round, deities will also become available for drafting, but at a cost of four gems. And in the third and fourth round, it will be possible to score the top and then the bottom trial. At the end of four rounds, everyone adds up all of their favor tokens, gains one more token for every
three gems they have, and then adds up the points from any end game powers they might have. And whoever has the most points has the greatest pantheon of all.
3 by 3 card tableau games have been popular recently, and Mythologies, while not super heavy, does add a new level of complexity to the genre. Every type of card can do something unique, and there is a lot of possibility here for creating interesting synergies and combos. With cards letting you move cards, rewarding you for crushing or being crushed, and providing ongoing bonuses for you, and sometimes negatives for your opponents. It's a big puzzle, but having all of those different powers also does mean a chunk of reading at the start of each round. As even with some duplicate creatures on the board, there will likely be 12-ish unique cards for everyone to take in each round. The good news is, we found everyone naturally does this together at the start of each round, but it is a hurdle, especially for more casual players. And on top of this, the many, many possibilities can also lead to min-max players taking a good chunk of time on a turn.
It is a cool puzzle, but it will take some investment.
Mythologies does feel different at different player counts. At three and four players, the drafting is a bit more stressful, and the interaction a lot more plentiful. Cards that gain something from all other players will, of course, be more powerful, and cards in your pantheon are more likely to be moved or removed or otherwise impacted by other players. And all of that chaos is fun, but it does make it harder to plan, and you have more people having to read all of those powers. At two players, you do still get that drafting tension as you will discard a card from each of the unused mythologies after each destiny card. Getting rid of the first one after the first card, the second after the second, and so on. This does create a bit of danger as you know cards will be leaving, but you don't know which mythologies you'll have access to in which order. There obviously will also be fewer shenanigans, which may be a plus or minus depending on what you want.
This is a big strength for this game as on top of being thematically cool, the eight different mythologies all play a little bit different with some being meaner and impacting your opponents more, and others being a little more friendly or even protective. And because you only see so many cards each game, it is likely that you will only go through roughly half of whatever deck you choose. So, that mix will change every game. Also, the fact that each mythology comes with its own board creates different rules for the third and fourth round trials, which will always impact your focus.
Mythologies is going to be a good fit for a couple of groups. First of all, the theme and artwork will appeal to a lot of folks, as will the ability to mishmash these different mythologies together. Also, for those that enjoy 3 by 3 tableau builders, this brings something with a bit more depth to the genre, as well as a good chunk of interaction. On the flip side of that, however, it is worth noting that there will be a decent amount of reading to do before each round. And those that need to find the perfect synergy every time might get a bit stuck. Also, that interaction can be a double-edged sword for some, but for folks that like a lot of big guard powers and don't mind a bit of rules overhead, mythology provides an interesting puzzle that may convert a few believers. And that is it. Have you played Mythologies? What did you think?
And what other tableau games have you enjoyed? Let us know in the comments, and please like and subscribe, and hopefully we'll see you all next time for another game.