Become a gold-hungry dragon stealing from your friends’ hoards in board game Pillage the Village! (Sponsored)
No need to wait your turn, either.
This article is sponsored by Stone Age Entertainment. Find out more and buy Pillage the Village! directly from Stone Age Entertainment and Amazon.
Smaug, Tiamat, Shenron, Nidhogg. It is a truth universally acknowledged that dragons are cool as heck. So why do so many games insist on putting us in the boots of bland knights obsessed with slaying the incredible fire-breathing lizards? Upcoming board game Pillage the Village! flips the script by giving players the chance to sprout wings, breath fire and amass their own pile of treasure - as long as they can defend it from their rival dragons, that is.
Each player’s dragon is hungry for gold and treasure, which they can obtain in different ways. As the name suggests, you can pillage the local village to pick up the amount of gold you roll on dice and potentially draw treasure cards - providing ways to twist the game’s rules to your advantage. Over-pillaging comes with the risk of building up threat and earning the attention of a pesky knight, however, impacting your standing at the end of the game. (No dragon wants to be slayed.)
If you’d rather avoid upsetting the villagers, how about upsetting your fellow dragons instead? While your rival dragons are away from their lairs, you can sneak in and steal from their pile, The Hobbit-style - if Bilbo was, erm, another dragon. Stealing from other dragons doesn’t frighten or quell the fears of the villagers, but you’ll have to time your heist to get away with the goods.
While you won’t get any more gold by sitting atop your pile, you can stay at home and protect your lair to fend off rival dragons - and help the villagers to calm their nerves if you’ve pillaged their home, reducing your threat level.
Pillage the Village!’s gameplay plays out across simultaneous turns, meaning nobody has to wait on their turn during each 20 to 40-minute match - even with the maximum player count of six. The players must try to predict what their rival dragons are up to, plotting to gather as much gold as they can without raising the threat of the village too high or leaving their hoard at risk of being pilfered. The jostling competition is given even more excitement by treasure cards that grant powerful single-use abilities, such as passing your threat to another dragon to let you pillage without worry or forcing an opponent to reroll their dice.
Pillage the Village! offers six different dragons for you to play as, each based on a legendary dragon or monster from around the globe and illustrated by artist Nil Lopez. Representing the classic Western dragon is Svötlar, the Molten Ravager, alongside its traditional Eastern counterpart in Riguru, the Imperial Lord. Out of Greek mythology comes Lerny, the Scaled Maelstom, a multi-headed dragon inspired by the legend of Hercules, while Machi, the Root Biter reimagines the world tree-chewing Norse lindworm Nidhogg. Meanwhile, Itzamot, the Plumed King takes inspiration from the South American folklore of the Aztec, Inca and Maya in the vision of a feathered serpent able to create storms as it flies. Completing the roster is a dragon that combines elements of many other legends and myths from around the world: Gula, the Winged Terror, drawing from stories of creatures from Africa to France and beyond.
Pillage the Village! is the debut game from designer Jesse Stone and publisher Stone Age Entertainment, who aim to offer gaming experiences that harken back to the memorable nostalgia of classic childhood favourites while introducing fresh, modern gameplay for players aged 10 and up.
Pillage the Village! is available now, costing $30 directly from Stone Age Entertainment and Amazon.