Vast: The Crystal Caverns

Today's review is of the 2016 release, Vast: The Crystal Caverns. For 1-5 players, it takes 75-150 minutes.

Overview

Vast is a dungeon crawler . . . with a twist. In this asymmetric game, your win condition depends on your role:

- Knight: slay the dragon

- Dragon: escape the caverns

- Goblins: slay the knight

- Cave: place all cave tiles, then collapse tiles until five crystal tiles are gone

- Thief: stash six treasure or dragon gems

Each role has a corresponding game board and rules summary sheet that outlines your turn structure, actions, and so forth. Note that one player is the cave itself!

game in progress; image from here

So will you be the goblin hordes, a sleepy dragon, the daring knight, a sneaky thief, or an unstable cavern? Whatever you choose, use your actions wisely . . . lest another take the crown.

Review

I enjoyed this asymmetric experience. As with any such game, there are a lot of rules, and it pays to be familiar not only with your role (and possibilities) but also everyone else's. That makes for a steep learning curve, and the game time does seem long. Those things aside, this is a winner.

Rating: B+