The Incan origin myth as a euro

We have something spicy for today!
☀️ Ayar: Children of the Sun, which is the third game in Osprey Games's historical Fabio Lopiano euro series. And of course, just like the previous games, Merv and Sankoré, Ayar is also illustrated by the legendary Ian O’Toole! 🤩

This game tackles the Inca origin myth, with players slipping into the shoes of early clans following the Ayars - the children of the Sun god and the Moon god - in search for fertile land. Only one pair of Ayars will arrive to found Tawantinsuyu and the Incan Empire, so who you choose to follow will be of great importance. ☝️

All of this is quite abstract in reality, but also very clever and interactive. ☺️ The game looks big and heavy, but we were pleasantly surprised how short and succinct the rules are. You can learn and get to playing quickly, but that doesn’t mean it’s all simple. Not at all! 🧐

As players select actions (which are basically 4 mini-games each with a different core game mechanic), the Ayar meeples progress on the board, with players influencing their speed. Each round one of them retires, constraining future choices and actions. Ayars also trigger scorings when they reach certain spots. Scoring in general is very interesting as you gather both Sun ☀️ points and Moon 🌙 points, (which depend on how well you are doing in the 4 different mini-games) and only your lower marker will be taken into account at the end. 😮 And when certain Ayars retire, certain scoring conditions become unavailable, so you have to plan what actions to focus on while keeping an eye on your opponents - and pivot if necessary depending on which Ayar retires.

💬Like I said, player interaction is substantial here, and wrapping your head around what actions to do and when is a real challenge, especially as things keep changing dynamically. There is definitely a learning curve to this despite the simple rules. The action selection is very clever, maybe even a bit reminiscent of Merv. But I think we need a future post to dive deeper into the inner workings of that. 😉 

For now suffice to say, we are definitely hooked!