Many of us are adventurers at heart, and it's safe to assume that we love treasure. We also know that dragons often have the nicest, and most plentiful treasure (as Smaug so beautifully demonstrated to us), so would it not make sense to partner with a dragon in a mutually beneficial arrangement?

You, an experienced adventurer, know how you would go about trying to steal treasure from a dragon, so surely you could use that knowledge to help defend it- for a price, of course.

Dragon Keeper - The Dungeon, is a cleaver little board game by Ilopeli on Kickstarter. In this game, players side with the Dragon trying to protect his treasure as they explore the depths of the dragon's dungeon. This is a game for 2-4 players and is based on a beautifully strategic and simple mechanic. It plays out in roughly 20 minutes and has one of the most creative boards I've ever seen.

The board itself is meant to be a multi-level dungeon and is essentially boxes within boxes to accomplish this feat. Each slightly smaller box stands on cylinders in the box below to support it, giving you the feel of descending into the dungeon. Players will populate their dungeon levels each game with individual room tiles that get placed throughout each level, which offers a nice degree of replayability.

Each player will assume the role of a classic dungeon delver, who's identity will remain secret until the game ends. Each player's color associates them with a particular guild of adventurers, and though you may be greedy, you're not heartless and you do not want to capture explorers from your guild.

Each turn players will perform 2 actions in the directions marked on the board- they'll collect one room in their row for themselves, and then give the player to the right a room from the row going the opposite direction. The dragon moves onto each vacant room as tiles are collected, limiting the moves the adventurers can make.

As a level is cleared, or no further moves can be made, the players must pay tribute to the dragon according to how many tiles are left on the board. Some tiles have special actions on them which can offer benefits and twists to game play. This simple mechanism becomes very strategic, as you are trying to collect tiles with the highest point value, but preferably not in your guild.

Tiles from your guild will have a minus ability at the end of the game where the others will be positive. The player with the highest point/treasure value at the end of the game wins.

Will you be taking on new work as a Dragon Keeper?