YOU are the captain of an intergalactic crew of space hunters. Your prey? The legendary, elusive, and dangerous SPACE DRAGONS!
Players begin by building their “crew”. Each player is dealt a hand of 9 cards, out of which one is selected and placed face down to keep as a crew member. Players pass their remaining hand to the next player, out of which a second crew member is selected and placed face down. The process is repeated until each player has selected a crew of 9 members.
Crew members have different scoring advantages/disadvantages:
- Shields protect from future damage.
- Damage can be avoided by playing a shield. Without shields, players have to take a crew card for each damage symbol for negative end game points.
- Tools can remove damage cards.
- Crosshairs apply damage ONLY to the player who won the trick that round.
Other scoring symbols used for end game scoring are
- Mood
- Science
- Crime
- +/- Points
Seven dragon cards go in a face down stack next to the draw pile at the beginning of the game. Each round will end with the player who played the highest card taking the top dragon.
During the round, players lay down a single card and apply the immediate effects. After everyone has laid down a card, the player with the highest number gets any crosshair damage AND the dragon card.
Rounds are continued in this way until the last dragon card has been claimed and it’s time to score! Players tally points from shields/damage plus bonus points for all +/- symbols and the highest/lowest crime/mood/science totals. The player with the most points wins!
Space Dragons is a unique trick taking game because cards are hand picked at the very beginning of the game. Should you choose higher cards to win more tricks (that also have more crime/damage) or lower cards that have more positive bonus points and shields? If you don’t take any high cards, you can’t win any dragons…decisions, decisions!
This is a great game for practicing quick and logical decision making. It’s also a fun way to practice employing different strategies and testing out different methods of playing, all great brain skills for math and also some great life-skills training!
Thanks so much to Pegasus Spiele for sharing with us!
