Empyreal: Spells & Steam

EvEvanstar5,9

On your turn, you move your action pawn 1 to 4 spaces along your player mat, then activate 1-3 actions located below where you ended your pawn's movement. Each step and each action beyond the first require you spend some amount of a replenishing pool of mana crystals. Most of the actions involve placing trains on the central hex map. The map starts out with a resource actin on each space. As players build their trains, they gain the possibility of being the first to claim those resources as points. The rightmost action on your board is deliver. This lets you pick up any number of goods your trains are sitting on, and score them if you have a train next to the city token that wants that type of good. If you deliver enough good, you also claim a bonus token that is worth nearly as many vp as goods you picked up. This also acts as a game timer. Players bump elbows for resources a lot, since up to three players can share the same space. In addition, there are few but still unwelcome take-that actions that can come up. For example, an action tile that can be purchased will when activated destroy an action tile from each other player. There are also abilities that can deliver or destroy goods outside of the normal delivery cycle which can make knowing what you'll have access to when its time to deliver difficult. Overall the game is enjoyable, but most of the interesting choices in the game are those made right at the start in terms of choosing your starting ability, map position and actions. Much of the remaining game is mild tactical choices executing the strategy you planned for. I had hoped there would be a compelling endgame where you resolve powerful stacks of three action combos, but in reality by the time you are getting stacks of three, the game is close to ending anyway, and you wind up rushing past your action stacks to make it to the delivery space one turn faster. ★ Art, Iconography and components functional ★ Clever or interesting mechanisms ★ Reasonably low downtime between turns with mildly AP players ★ Multiple plays stay interesting ★ Low or mitigatable luck elements ★★☆☆☆ Raw enjoyment