Review of Elden Ring: The Board Game

Few titles in the last ten years have captured the gaming world’s attention like FromSoftware’s Elden Ring. As video games increasingly inspire board games, it seemed inevitable that this gaming giant would find its way to the tabletop. Enter Steamforged Games, known for adapting popular video games such as Resident Evil, Monster Hunter World, and FromSoftware’s own Dark Souls, who have bravely taken on the task. Following a hugely successful crowdfunding campaign in 2022, Elden Ring: The Board Game is now heading to backers and available for preorder. Time to rise, Tarnished, and prepare for battle once more.

Elden Ring is a campaign-style board game, where you and your friends undertake a series of scenarios, enhancing your characters and unfolding the story as you progress. There are three distinct campaigns crafted by Steamforged Games for you to dive into—Realm of the Grafted King, The Weeping Peninsula, and Stormveil Castle. The Grafted King serves as the main feature, while the others are standalone expansions. You can enjoy them independently or as continuations from the Grafted King, letting you carry over your character’s journey, growing in power along the way. Within these boxes, you can pick from various classes, such as the Vagabond, Samurai, Astrologer, and Prophet in the base game; the Hero, Prophet, Astrologer, and Bandit in the Weeping Peninsula; and the Confessor, Prisoner, Samurai, and Vagabond in Stormveil Castle.

This game lands with a presence, arriving in hefty boxes packed with formidable monster miniatures, countless cards, cardboard tokens, tiles, and a slew of manuals detailing rules, combat maps, and scenarios. It’s daunting, particularly since I only own one campaign. The production value is exceptional, with Steamforged delivering intricate miniatures and components that are robust and satisfying to handle.

The scenarios offer varied experiences, cleverly designed to keep the gameplay fresh. Not every scenario hits a home run, though. Narrative scenarios involve reading chunks of story, making choices, possibly rolling for skill checks, and drawing cards based on your decisions. Although they’re well-penned, if narrative immersion is what you’re after, you might prefer a novel or a game of Dungeons & Dragons.

Personally, I find Exploration scenarios the most engaging, as they beautifully convey the thrill of adventure and the mystery of what lies ahead—central themes of the original game. These scenarios have you reveal tiles in an unknown region, uncovering enemies, items, Sites of Grace, or unexpected elements along the way. This style of discovery is a characteristic I love in board games, enhancing both the sense of uncovering new territories and the replayability through random tile placements. These scenarios blend combat, story, and exploration harmoniously without overwhelming the player.

The last three types—Gauntlet, Dungeon, and Boss—shift focus purely to combat. Gauntlets throw you into fiercely challenging battles with groups of foes and unique rules. Dungeons are similar but conclude with a powerful boss showdown. Boss scenarios, where you confront the ultimate challenges, really test your strategies and teamwork. Combat is front and center, which is great because it’s impressively executed.

Fights are conducted on grids created from ring-bound notebooks that accompany the game, sometimes expanding over several pages for more complex battles. The battlefield is where tactics truly shine, with characters and foes maneuvering strategically. Every spell and strike has a set range, and positioning can grant bonuses such as increased damage, priority in the turn order, or enhanced defense. My friends and I found ourselves constantly evaluating our positions, trying to dodge inevitable attacks. Yet, even with careful planning, the game’s enemies proved formidable foes.

Each foe type features a card summarizing their actions and movement mechanics, adorned with symbols that need some getting used to. Once an enemy exhausts its moves or cannot perform an action, its turn concludes. Straightforward and manageable for the most part. Bosses, however, are a whole different beast with entire decks dictating their attacks, sorted into the initiative order. Sometimes they attack last, giving you a chance to breathe, but often they strike first, leaving no moment to spare. Intense and demanding, these skirmishes scale well no matter your party size, ensuring fairness. Boss encounters pulse with thrill as each move might turn the tide, creating an unexpectedly strategic experience.

Interestingly, Elden Ring eschews dice in favor of a card-based, deck-building system. Players use cards from decks built around their chosen gear and skills. Damage and special effects like Bleed are resolved through an Attribute deck, aligning with different symbols for Strength, Dexterity, and other stats.

Character progression lies at the heart of Elden Ring’s appeal. Like the video game, not only do you enhance your main class, but you can also refine your character’s equipment, stats, and abilities via Trait cards. The Rune system, determining equipment load, manages this customization. As you progress, expanding your Rune count allows for more varied setups, though tracking them poses a logistical issue. Steamforged’s Rune cards are insufficient, making manual inventory management necessary—a cumbersome task that could benefit from a community-driven or official fix.

Initially, my journey with Elden Ring was rocky—largely due to starting with the Stormveil Castle, a standalone expansion assuming prior knowledge of the game. Navigating these hurdles is easier when beginning with Realm of the Grafted King. Starting there ensures a smoother and more immersive onboarding.

If you’re interested in diving into more board games inspired by video games, there’s an exciting variety out there to explore.