Ludus Magnus Studio are on Kickstarter right now with the launch of their big new Viking board game, Runar! As fans of all things Viking, this one certainly caught our eye. Band together with your warband of Viking heroes and hunt down Runic Gems and other relics whilst battling fierce monsters.

Runar Kickstarter // Ludus Magnus Studio

Runar is a competitive board game which can be played by one-to-four players. You'll be heading off into the icy northern lands where you'll need to deal with deadly creatures whilst looking to recover the aforementioned gems and other relics.

Runar Gameplay // Ludus Magnus Studio

During your adventures, you'll be seeing to prove how worthy you are in the view of the Asgardian Gods. A full campaign of Runar takes place over the course of five games where you will face more complex and deadly scenarios whilst also having to deal with the opposing heroes of other players that are getting in your way.

Download The Runar Rulebook

Players make use of an Action Deck which is made up of cards defined by the three heroes that you choose. During play, you'll be using their unique skills and talents in order to win victory. So, there's a nice element of "combo" play built into each turn that you take.

Runar Gameplay // Ludus Magnus Studio

The core of gameplay revolved around the use of that Action Deck but also spending cubes (see above). Cubes are used to activate the various actions on a hero's card and from there you'll be able to mighty attacks and maybe even summon magic!

During the course of the five-game campaign, you will be able to develop and upgrade your heroes with the addition of more magical items and artefacts. By the end, you'll have created the mightiest team of Viking heroes that you can and will have to prove your worth to truly win the favour of the Viking Gods.

Just because there is a campaign element built into Runar doesn't mean you have to go down that route. You can also choose to just dive into casual games and play one or two games a night to see who comes out on top. The initial five-game campaign also works a little bit like a guide and once you're done with that, you can start to mix and match as you see fit.

Runar Kickstarter Options

So with a quick look at gameplay, it's worth having a look at what's actually included within the box for Runar and beyond.

Runar Box Contents // Ludus Magnus Studio

As you can see, you get a whole bunch of cardboard and plastic within Runar. Each of the different heroes that you can use to make your warbands has been realised in lovely plastic form plus you have all of those epic enemies as well! Most of the miniatures are coming in at the bigger end of the scale with most being around the 45mm mark. So, pretty big!

Talking of miniatures, have a look at some of the stunning painted miniatures...

Runar Miniatures Gallery // Ludus Magnus Studio

Who would have thought that the one and only Angel Giraldez would do a great job when it came to miniature painting? It certainly gives you a good idea of the fun you could have turning Runar into more of a hobby project rather than just seeing them as board game components.

As a bonus to the Core Box there are also some expansions waiting in the wings that could be added to your Runar experience to enhance it even more.

Hel Expansion // Runar

Jarl Expansion // Runar

Both of the expansions add new enemies and heroes into the mix to help spice up your games and offer up more options to choose from. They look suitably fun and interesting with a mix of unique Viking characters. I really like the Draugr and creepy heroes that you get to choose from in the Hel Expansion.

What game of Viking adventure would be complete without the addition of a Troll? Well, you can get one of those as an exclusive addition to Runar with the Kickstarter.

Troll Expansion // Runar

It seems like Ludus Magnus Studio has had a lot of fun bringing Runar to life and offering up an interesting way to play out Viking sagas on the tabletop. I like the idea of asymmetrical team building worked into the mechanics from the start and the ways that start to already play with cool tactics and choice when you sit down to play Runar. Tie that into a mini-campaign and a set of "easy to learn but hard to master" mechanics and you've got a board game that seems worth returning to!

Runar Kickstarter // Ludus Magnus Studio

It's worth diving deeper into the Kickstarter campaign to have a look at the videos and such surrounding the game. Maybe you'll end up getting drawn into a new Viking adventure.

Will you be giving Runar a look on Kickstarter?