Be ready to march across the regions of Amanaar, building your forces and defending the lands you control. Using trusty allies in the form of anthropomorphic animals, all with their own skills to aid you in battle, march upon your opponent in a mission to gain more control across the lands.
This is Lost Lumina.
What do the lands offer…
This is a compact little game. You have a very small board, so small, it could arguably fit on most coffee tables. Yet still, it has the map, a place to discard cards, and room to place your ani-meeples. The board feels good quality card and feels like it will last, but if you feel like splashing out, there is an official neoprene mat you can get to use instead.
The map is simply illustrated, but contains 3 regions, identified by a bold white line, each containing 3 areas, outlined with dotted lines.
The ani-meeples (known as followers in the game) are very cute and are good quality. You get 30 in total, 15 for each player, all with a printed animal design.
There are 27 unique character cards (28 if you buy the bonus one), all with very characterful illustrations which act as multi-use cards throughout the game. Each card has a battle strength, an action points value, an ability, and a series of icons under the ability, indicating the timing where in battle it is activated.
Finally, you also get 8 dice, clear and glittery, which just rounds out a nice little set of components.
Ready the forces!
Set up is quick! So quick that certain video game wildlife known for their speed would be impressed. It goes like this… Place the board, shuffle and place the deck of cards on the board, place the meeples in a pile on the board, and keep the dice nearby.
The reason for the speed, is the clever way in which part of the set-up is actually included as ‘gameplay’.
The game is completed over 2 phases, and it is in phase 1 that set-up is completed.
Phase one starts by each player drafting 2 cards. They pick one and hand the other one to their opponent to keep. This is repeated 5 times, at which point both players will then have 10 cards in total. This means, players always know 5 out of the 10 cards their opponent has… well assuming they actually remember that is! The remaining undrafted cards are returned to the box.
Then, players take in turn to place followers on the map. You get to place one follower at a time, in an area not occupied by an opponent follower. This is repeated until one player has 3 followers in place, and the other player has 2. The player with only 2 gets to go first.
Once more unto the breach dear friends!
Phase 2 is where the action is. The active player gets to discard a card for action points. The action points gained are equal to value indicated on the card. With those points, the active player gets to chose whether to reinforce their followers, or march across the land.
Each action costs 1 point. So, for example, if a player had 4 action points, they might reinforce 2 times, adding 2 new followers to an area they already have followers, and then move any number of those followers to an adjacent area, and finally add 1 more follower to the new area occupied. You can choose to do these actions in any order and as many times as you have points. So, you might just move, or you might just reinforce. This is an area control game at heart, so having more followers dotted around is going to help, assuming they can survive!
If, once all actions are completed, the active player has followers in an area occupied by enemy followers; battle commences!
In battle, the players both get to follow a set of steps. They start by choosing a card in their hand to play face down, reveal that card and then activate abilities in the order indicated on the cards. If you have the eye, it is activated upon revealing the card, if you have lightning bolt, that ability goes next. Then you roll dice. You roll the number of dice equalling the number of followers you have, then you pick the best dice (you can discard a follower from your supply to commit to a reroll if you wish). At this point, you then activate abilities timed by the image of the dice. Then you calculate your battle strength, which is done by adding your chosen dice roll to the strength of your chosen card, plus the number of followers you have in battle. Then abilities indicated by the sword activate. These ones can really swing the battle in your favour, by making you stronger, the opponent weaker, or literally cancelling out other abilities all together.
Finally, once battle outcomes have been calculated, the icon that looks like a chequered flag activate abilities for this timing point. The loser gets to take the followers back into their main supply, which is a nice, not so punishing, outcome, albeit still leaving you noticeably weakened on the board.
Once battle is done, that player’s turn is over and the next player becomes the active player.
The end is nigh!
Play continues until either one player has no followers on the board or both players have no cards to play.
Once this happens, you then calculate the spoils of war. You get 1 point for each follower, but if you control 2 or more areas in a region, they are then worth 2 points in that region only.
This means players have a choice… play the area majority game or play the “Attaaaaaaaack!” game. Either way, the game is likely to be over in around 20-25 minutes tops.
Final thoughts
If someone asked us to describe this game, we’d say it’s like mini-Root for 2 players only, but with the art style closer to Everdell, so… Ever-root Duel. Lost Lumina is a fun little game, and
really simple to learn. It’s not steeped in tactical depth, but there is enough in it to enjoy the jeopardy of choice; do you reinforce and spread your control, or charge in to battle to reduce the control of your opponent? With its speedy start to finish set up and play time, this makes it a really great weekday worknight game, where time is limited, so a game like Root is just too long to fit in. It could also work for a game night where you can have multiple rounds and do a best of type overall victory, where you can try different tactics to beat your opponent.
The size means it is easily played on most tables, and prevents the game becoming intimidating to new players, younger players or those who are not usually into these types of games. If they enjoy this, it is not too far fetched to consider Root as a progression to a more complex game, or Everdell if the artwork captures their imagination.
This is definitely a game we can see making its way to the table over and over again, when we don’t want something to tax our brains, but still want that feeling of challenge and choice.
It sits at a great little price point, and given the quality feel of the components and lovely artwork, this game would make a lovely little gift for that gamer in your life, or something to try out with a younger member of the family to experience what the hobby can have to offer.
Go out and try it, and as long as you don’t expect the next critically acclaimed masterpiece, with complex and deep decisions, just simple and honest competitive fun… you will not be disappointed.
About the author:
We are Peaches and Meeples, busy professionals who love to chill out to fun table top games. We love board games, card games, miniatures games, competitive or co-operative. Put some dice in our hands and we are in our happy place.
We are also proud guinea pig parents to two lovely fluffballs of joy.
