Kingdom Builder

Categories: Medieval, Territory Building

Mechanics: Area Majority/Influence, Chaining, Enclosure, Grid Movement, Hexagon Grid, Modular Board, Network and Route Building, Pattern Building, Tile Placement, Variable Set-up

Players: 2–4

Ages: 8+

Playtime: 45 Min

In Kingdom Builder, players craft their own kingdoms by strategically constructing settlements to accumulate the most gold by the end of the game. The variable game board features nine types of terrain, including locations and castles. On their turn, players use a terrain card to build three settlements on corresponding hexes. Settlements must be adjacent to one of the player’s existing ones whenever possible.

Building next to a location allows players to claim an extra action tile, which grants special actions such as relocating settlements. Building next to a castle earns gold at game’s end, but the highest rewards come from fulfilling the conditions on three Kingdom Builder cards. These cards (chosen randomly from a pool of ten) specify criteria like placing settlements next to water hexes or dominating a board sector to earn gold.

Each game is unique due to the random selection of Kingdom Builder cards (3 out of 10), special actions (4 out of 8), and terrain sectors (4 out of 8), ensuring no two games are alike!