In Edge of Darkness, coming to Kickstarter on February 20th, the Threat Tower inspires fear and awe in the people of Aegis!

No part of Edge of Darkness generates as much buzz as the Threat Tower. From the earliest prototypes to the current working model the Threat Tower has been a lurking presence that draws the eye and raises the stress of every Guild Leader who encounters it.

Something Wicked This Way Comes

When John D. Clair first proposed Edge of Darkness to the AEG team the Threat Tower was already a major component of the design. John builds meticulous handmade prototypes and his original Tower design clearly showed the direction he intended for the game to take.

The original prototype was a slanted cardboard box inside of which were obstacles that the Threat Cubes would bounce off of and be randomized, which fed into “the Demon board” which held the three cards in the tower.

For a period of time during initial development everyone who had an Edge of Darkness prototype made their own Threat towers. In the absence of an actual tower bags of dice were used (1-2 results went on card 1, 3-4 results went on card 2, 5-6 results on card 3).

By GenCon 2017 we had progressed the design far enough to have actual components printed at our factory in China and we arranged to have a series of Threat Towers made using a 3D printer. This system is fondly known as the Frankentower.

The Frankentowers were never intended as actual production samples, but they were large enough to allow us to get a sense for scale and space used on the tabletop. Edge of Darkness is a physically large game especially when played with the extended boards to hold the Advancements and we asked for and got a lot of feedback from players about how they felt about the amount of space required to play.

Our 3D modelling team worked on concepts for the Tower in late 2017, and eventually arrived at a new design. This version of the tower looked more like an actual tower than the previous prototypes. It was designed to eject the Threat Cubes on three sides of a 4 sided Tower. This version of the Tower was also 3D printed for prototype evaluation.

We really liked this design and we commissioned a facade to be developed that would “wrap” the tower and make it look like an ancient ruin. However the more we tested it, the more worried we became that it was taking up a excessive amount of space on the table. The Tower was big. And the way it ejected Threat Cubes meant that it needed to sit on an even bigger base to hold the cards in the Tower.

We reluctantly decided that we’d overshot the workable size and we needed to reconsider our options.

One idea was to reduce the size of the Tower we had and see if we could make something more reasonably sized without changing the design. We experimented with various sized mockups and they all were “just not right”. The smaller the Tower got the less menacing and cool it seemed. Eventually it was clear that we needed a total redesign.

Now we come to our final prototype, “The Big T”.

The Big T Tower is a hybrid. It retains a large 4-sided structure that we can wrap with a cool graphic to simulate a ruin. And it has something like the Frankentower’s bottom level which ejects Threat Cubes from three portals into a tray. The size of the tower is more reasonable and keeping the three cards in the Tower parallel avoids the “sprawl” of the big 4-sided Tower.

We’re now refining this design, working on the interior components to ensure that the Threat Cubes are evenly and randomly distributed to the tray, and redesigning the “wrapping graphic” that will make it look awesome.

The Tower now has a ledge just above the portals where the Threat Cubes emerge that will hold the three cards at the Tower. They’ll be vertical and easier for all the players to see.

This visualization is nowhere close to final but it is a good indication of the direction that we’re taking. The actual final Tower will have an amazing ruined look. We still haven’t made final determinations about colors and textures but we are certain we can make it AWESOME.

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(Art & Graphic Design not final and subject to change.)

In Edge of Darkness, coming to Kickstarter on February 20th, strategy begins before the first turn.

Edge of Darkness is played in a series of 8 rounds. But before the regular rounds, the players undertake the Prologue.

A Series of Important Events

The initial setup of the game provides each Guild Leader (player) with 4 cards owned by their Guild.

In the Prologue, Guild Leaders begin to make important strategic choices. To begin they determine who will be the first player to act. This Guild Leader then selects one of the 10 available Locations and sleeves its Advancement into one of their owned cards, and uses its Ability if allowed. The following effects may not be used during the Prologue: Effects that allow you to return Agents, draw cards, gain Battle Strength, confront Threats, claim Allegiance, or manipulate Threat Cubes or the Tower.

The Guild Leader then places one of their Player Aid tokens on the stack of Advancements they’ve selected. Player Aid tokens are helpful components that you can use to keep track of the order you are using abilities or any other record-keeping need that arises. In the Prologue Guild Leaders use them to mark Advancements that have been selected for use.

During the Prologue Guild Leaders are not allowed to use an Advancement previously selected – including the Guild Leader that selected one! Once the Prologue has ended these tokens are collected and returned to their owners, and then all Locations are available for use going forward. This limitation on use only applies during the Prologue.

The choice of which Advancement to select then passes to the next player to the left of the first player who selects and Advancement and marks it with a Player Aid token. When all Guild Leaders have made a selection, the last to choose chooses again, and then each Guild Leader selects a 2nd Advancement with the rotation now going to the right, so that the first player chooses their second Advancement last.

Guild Leaders can choose to sleeve Advancements in the Prologue into two different cards or into one card at their option. They can (as always) search the stack of Advancements for one in the position they desire, not being limited to whichever may be on top of the stack.

Finally, each Guild Leader selects one of the cards they own that has not had an Advancement sleeved into it, and places that card in their Guild Hall. This card will automatically be drawn first as they fill their hands when Round 1 begins. The other cards are combined with the starting cards from the other Guild Leaders and the neutral cards and shuffled to form the deck, from which 5 cards are dealt to form the Street.

It is then time to begin the play on Round 1.

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(Art & Graphic Design not final and subject to change.)

In Edge of Darkness, coming to Kickstarter on February 20th, your Agents (workers) can increase your hand size when the right Location is available.

As the game begins each player has a hand size of 3. Players fill their hands first from their Guild Hall, then by drafting from the Street. Each card has a maximum of three abilities: one Citizen or Patrician; and two added by sleeving Advancements. The more cards a player has in their hand the more abilities they could potentially use on their turn.

Millhollow Farm Town

The Millhollow Farm Town Location gives you +1 hand size for every 2 Agents you have assigned to that Location. This ability stacks so if you have 4 Agents there you’ll have +2 to your hand size.

The Millhollow Landowner gets you access to the Millhollow Farm Town. This Contact allows you to dispatch Agents to the Millhollow Farm Town Location, or to recall them to your player board.

When they’re dispatched you gain a Coin, so assigning an Agent using another Guild’s card has a net cost of zero. When you recall the Agent you will get 3 Coins, reflecting the labor they did while on assignment.

You’ll have to use this ability at least twice before your hand size will increase. And the size of your hand only remains increased while your Agents are on assignment at the Millhollow Farm Town. The price you pay for an increased hand size is that those Agents won’t be available for use in other Locations until you recall them and dispatch them elsewhere.

The Power of the Blight

The Blight is represented at this Location by the Spirits of Decay. Similar to the threat facing the Druids of the Mystic Vale, these malevolent Spirits corrupt nature and spread their corruption through the land.

When defeated the Spirits of Decay produce either 2 Reputation, or 1 Reputation and convert an untrained Agent to a trained Agent.

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(Art & Graphic Design not final and subject to change.)

In Edge of Darkness, coming to Kickstarter on February 20th, converting cards that aren’t immediately useful for effects that are is a major strategic choice.

A tableau of card draw options called  the “Street” is filled from the shared deck. 6 cards are available in the Street, and each Guild Leader (Player) will draft from the Street to fill their hand, refilling Street for the next player after drafting their hand. Players must draw the first cards in the Street unless they pay Influence to skip over undesired cards in favor of better option on the Street.

Accessing the Street

It is not uncommon, especially in the early Rounds, for a Guild Leader to be forced to draft cards that are not immediately useful. Sometimes, on your turn during the draft the powerful advanced cards are at the bottom of the deck and the Street is full of mostly less powerful unadvanced cards.When that occurs the you have a discard option that is always available.  You may discard two cards before using any of the abilities on those cards to use an ability on a card in the Street.

The Guild Leader doesn’t draft that card, and it isn’t discarded. If the card is owned by another Guild, the Guild Leader must pay the 1 coin tax as normal.

A 2-card for 1-ability trade might seem a poor choice but often in the early to mid-game the ability to generate a synergy or make connections with other effects can give a Guild Leader a significant momentum boost. This option minimizes  “bad draws” by turning weaker cards into seudo wild-card effects.

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(Art & Graphic Design not final and subject to change.)

In Edge of Darkness, coming to Kickstarter on February 20th, some Locations are impacted by the allocation of Agents (workers) the Guild Leaders (players) make to their domains.

Some Locations have no intrinsic abilities. Others have abilities that require Guild Leaders to dispatch Agents or retrieve Agents to trigger. Some Locations change their conditions based on how many Agents have been assigned to their domains.

This is a very strategic choice. Dispatching an Agent to a Location not for an immediate purpose but to leave it on that Location so that it changes the Location’s ability means that the Guild Leader is forgoing the ability to use that Agent elsewhere (at least until the Agent is recalled).

Guildmark University

The University Professor is the contact associated with the Guildmark University Location, and his  ability is improved based on the number of Agents the Guild Leader has assigned to the University Location. For each Agent assigned the cost to use the Professor’s ability  is reduced by 1.

The University Professor’s ability allows the Guild Leader to assign an Agent to the Guildmark University Location. It also allows the Guild Leader to pay 4 Coins to convert an Untrained Agent to a Trained Agent, and as stated, this cost is reduced for each Agent currently at the University Location. Thus, the more Agents the Guild Leader has assigned to the University the cheaper training Agents becomes. However, Agents are a limited resource, and if you are assigning Agents to the University simply to make training new agents cheaper you are not actually netting more available agents. You only really get an increased Agent force if you pay more coin and forgo the discount, or if you can bring home the the Agents you’ve assigned to the University.

So, how do Agents assigned to the University return to your Guild and become available for use elsewhere?

Neither the University Location nor the Professor Contact provide for a means of returning Agents .  Therefore, you will have to make use of the discard rule:  Before you use any effects on a card, you may discard it to return an Agent from any Location to your Trained Agents Pool. It could be a big sacrifice to forgo an entire card’s worth of abilities, or it might be a great use for a card that otherwise would do nothing for you in the current turn.

You’ll notice that the Guildmark University is similar to the Fairhollow Academy. Both provide a mechanism to upgrade untrained Agents to trained Agents; the Academy being more action intensive and requiring the use of Agents; the University being more Coin intensive but not requiring Agents, simply offering them as a means to a discount. Depending on which of these effects are included in the setup for your game, you will want to adjust your strategy. For example, if the University is the Location in use, and at the same time the other Locations in use offer only limited access to Coin, then training Agents may prove difficult–you may want to try and identify a strategy that can get by with fewer Agents.

The Power of the Blight

Knowledge can be twisted to evil ends as well as good. The Chimera is a cursed and corrupted thing made by those who should know better and who know too much. Escaped from some closed laboratory it now stalks the land terrorizing the people and hunting scouts and outriders of the Aegis’ defenses.

When defeated the Chimera gives the victor the choice of gaining Reputation or of sending a Trained Agent to any Location.

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(Art & Graphic Design not final and subject to change.)

In Edge of Darkness, coming to Kickstarter on February 20th, Guild Leaders can send a Dispatcher to call others to their aide!

The City of Aegis is not just buildings. It is also connected by roadways and the teamsters who connect the city together can form an important strategic asset for the Guilds as they vie for the population’s acclaim.

Because Edge of Darkness uses a common deck that all the players are altering each round getting the right cards into a hand can be the critical difference between generating synergies that lead to victory and a difficult turn that slows down the accumulation of Goodwill, Coin and Reputation.

The City Streets

When the City Streets Location is in the game players have access to a very powerful Contact. The Location itself has no intrinsic ability. Its power comes from its provision of the Dispatchers.

The Dispatcher has a flexible ability set that is worthwhile to parse.

First, when used it generates a Coin. So even on a turn when you are forced to use a rival’s card and pay the tax, the Dispatcher won’t set back your coffers. This also means if the Dispatcher is on your card, when other players draw that card, they will usually pay you to use it.

Second, the Dispatcher allows you to draw a card. By default you’ll be drawing the first card in the Street (Tableau). But if you pay 2 Influence you can draw that card from your Guild Hall instead.

It’s usually always good to have another card in hand; there’s no downside and there may be an ability on that card that is useful to you. But the synergy with the Guild Hall provides some very interesting strategic choices. For example, you might conduct a Hunt, and send force to the Threat Tower to confront a pending Threat that happens to be one of your cards. That card is discarded to your Guild Hall when defeated. Using the Dispatcher you could then bring that card into your hand and immediately use it in the same turn.

The Power of the Blight

The threat of the War Chariot is obvious. The guards and militia of Aegis tremble when the thunder of the hooves of the War Chariot’s beasts are heard on the battlefield. Few can withstand its charge and none who confront it are ever truly freed of the memories of the encounter.

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(Art & Graphic Design not final and subject to change.)