Unboxing The Wind Gambit (Scythe Expansion)

Luke March 16, 2018 5 Comments

It is no mystery to anyone who follows this blog that I am a huge fan of the game Scythe. So far I have written seven articles about it, and have a fair few more planned in the future, exploring everything from unboxing the game to individual strategies for each of the five base factions in the game. Everything about it is insanely good, and everything about it screams to be played over and over again. It is just amazing.

Well, so far there are two expansions for Scythe, with a third in the works. The two that currently exist are Invaders from Afar, a box we unboxed just after Christmas, and the expansion we will be unboxing today – The Wind Gambit. Interestingly, a few days ago Scythe: The Wind’s Gambit was given the Golden Geek award for Best Expansion.

There is a really interesting story behind The Wind Gambit that I suggest you all look up. Jamey Stegmaier keeps a diary online of the process and you can read that here. That is now the fourth external link in the blog so I’m going to stop linking now.

Shall we unbox a game? Why yes…yes…I believe we shall.

Unboxing Scythe: The Wind Gambit

I thought I would take a more dynamic box picture this time around. This is what the box looks like.

Scythe: The Wind Gambit

As it can be seen, the box used for Scythe: The Wind Gambit is the same size as Invaders from Afar. This seems to be the standard box size for Scythe expansions, although the legacy expansion in the works will probably come in a bigger box.

Of course, the box stars the art of Jakub Rozalski, who is known for his awesome Scythe artwork. Interestingly, something worth noting is that The Wind Gambit is not just designed by Jamey Stegmaier, but also by Kai Starck. I seem to remember reading, although I may be incorrect as I can’t remember where now, Kai Starck created the rules unofficially before approaching Jamey Stegmaier and they created the official expansion together. If that is the story, it’s a really cool one as it shows how human game designers are as well as how resourceful the board game community is. When a great community join forces with an awesome designer then fantastical things can happen.

And we can end up with airships in Scythe.

The seven airships.

Opening the box we are immediately presented with the seven airships. The first thing that hits you is that this expansion includes the two additional expansions for Clan Albion and the Togawa Shogunate from Invaders from Afar. This is a nice touch as it means you don’t have to buy an additional pack at a later date.

Secondly, look how huge those ships are. I’ll post a few more pictures below so you can see them in all their glory next to the heroes and mechs of different nations, but these are big centre pieces to any Scythe nation.

The airships for the Crimean Khanate and the Nordic Kingdom.

As it can be seen – they are HUGE compared to the standard mech or hero. The whole airship is probably the size of three mechs in length, stretching across and over the edges of the normal size hexagon (not when the map is flipped and with the board extension added on).

These are really impressive minis. They are all identical, so don’t expect different designs per faction, but to be frank they don’t need to be different designs. They are truly awesome, in the literal sense of the word.

Stands and bags.

The next thing in the box are the incredibly pragmatic plastic stands and baggies. There are strong plastic bags supplied in every single Stonemaier Games game. This is a nice little touch. There is also a bag filled with six stands, each of which comes in two parts – base and…stick. These slot together with ease.

The stands are small, smaller than the usual Games Workshop flying bases, and yet are incredibly strong. They will not break easily.

Moving on – next we have the new rules as well as new cards for the airships.

New rules and cards, as well as how to play the Scythe: The Wind Gambit in the solo variant of the game.

As per always, there is a scoring sheet. This allows for you to track your achievements. The rules come in two formats – those are standard gameplay and autonomously. Both are very well presented. This is no surprise for a Stonemaier Games game, but it’s always nice to feel like time and effort was really put into the game to create it.

The final airship components…

This final set of components include 16 airship tiles (coloured, with pictures) of which three are put into play at the beginning of each round. Two aggressive tiles and one passive. They add additional conditions for the airships’ gameplay each game.

The other cards, underneath, are really curious. Those cards are resolution modules that, from the looks of them, alter gameplay again including cards that do things like forcing the Factory to explode mid-game, or changing the victory conditions to other…well…resolutions.

As you can see, these are still in their cardboard frames and haven’t been popped out yet. We haven’t actually played this expansion yet, but I am so looking forward to doing so. Scythe is a favourite amongst vast swathes of gamers (it was my #1 game we played in 2017, and it was my girlfriend’s #5), and for good reason. This expansion should be really fun to play, adding a whole new dynamic.

So, what’s your take on airships in Scythe? Have you played The Wind Gambit? Do you want to? Let me know in the comments below.