presentation

The Witches of Cernégula

Brewing potions in the coven

In the coven of Cernégula you brew potions in your cauldron on your herb board; you select a witch with a special ability and affiliation to one branch of magic: White Magic, Black Magic, Love Magic or Health Magic. Four of 16 potion cards are on display, and two more are displayed as reserve. A turn comprises mandatory collecting of herbs and facultative potion brewing.

To collect herbs, you position your cauldron on the herb board in a way that the cauldron’s three symbols points to the intended herbs; but only to herbs whose day/night symbol corresponds to the day/night symbol currently visible on the starting player token. Then you take one marker for the herb next to the ladle, two markers for the one next to the carrot leaves and steal one marker from another player for the herb next to the snake. If this gives you more than three markers for a herb, you take a permanent penalty marker.

To brew, you discard the markers for the corresponding herbs and take the potion card; one from the reserve moves into the display and a new card goes to the reserve. For a potion majority in a branch of magic you take the corresponding domain card. At the end of the round the starting player token is flipped over. You can use the ability of your witch once in a game and immediately use the ability of a newly brewed potion, but using turns the value of the potion into penalty points. When the last card is placed into the reserve, you win with most points from potion and domain cards minus used potion cards and penalty points.

A game with a standard topic and a few nice details; the fun in playing, however, is a bit diminished by unclear rules and a somewhat repetitive, monotonous flow of the game.

Players: 2-4

Age: 10+

Time: 45+

Designer: José Antonio Abascal

Art: Pedro A. Alberto

Price: ca. 20 Euro

Publisher: GenX Games 2017

Web: www.genxgames.es

Genre: Set collecting

Users: For families

Version: multi

Rules: en es

In-game text: no

Comments:

Nice graphics, a bit too much of it

Rules not easily accessible

All in all, a nice standard game

Compares to:

Set collecting games

Other editions:

Currently none

Chance (pink): 1

Tactic (turquoise): 3

Strategy (blue): 0

Creativity (dark blue): 0

Knowledge (yellow): 0

Memory (orange): 0

Communication (red): 0

Interaction (brown): 3

Dexterity (green): 0

Action (dark green): 0