Ilium (pré-joué) (EN)

The games in the L'As des jeux Bazar are pre-played games. They have been inspected by one of our game experts and are certified "Complete." You may find some minor imperfections, such as light wear on the box or on certain game components.

Troy has not given up all of its secrets yet. In Ilium, you step into the boots of an archaeologist following in the footsteps of Heinrich Schliemann at the excavation of the famous ancient city, which was also known as Ilium. The board shows several dig sites linked by paths of different lengths, and each site hides discovery tiles showing one of five types of artifacts.

On your turn, you draw a card from your own deck; it decides how many archaeologists (from one to three) you place on an empty path. When a path is filled, the player with the most archaeologists on it collects a tile from an adjacent site, but may only take the one with the fewest artifacts. The runner-up takes the tile the first player left behind. As the sites empty out, the more valuable tiles become available. The game ends once all five tiles showing five artifacts have been claimed. Each player must then discard the highest-value tile of the artifact type secretly assigned to them at the start, and whoever holds the most complete sets wins.

You will probably enjoy Ilium if you like accessible strategy games where the majority on a path makes all the difference, with a touch of collecting and bluffing about what your opponents are after. It plays 2 to 4 players in about 35 minutes, making it a good pick for a night with friends or family.

Ilium is a 2008 game by Reiner Knizia, a prolific designer who also created Tigris and Euphrates, Lost Cities and Ingenious. The artwork is by Eva Widermann and Malcolm McClinton.

BOX CONTENTS
1 game board with 13 dig sites and a scoring track
50 artifact tokens (10 coins, 10 horses, 10 armbands, 10 bottles, 10 helmets)
180 archaeologist tokens (45 per color: red, yellow, green and blue)
108 archaeologist assignment cards (27 per color)
12 supply cubes (3 per color)
4 scoring cubes (1 per color)
5 historian cards (one per artifact type)
3 closed markers

Number of players: 2 to 4
Duration: 35 minutes
Age: 8+