The Lost Ruins of Arnak: Expedition Leaders Review - An Essential Expansion!

BoardGameCo Patreon - / boardgameco
Exclusive Patreon Videos Every Monday!
Amazon Affiliate Link - amzn.to/3Kc2eqj
Return to the mysterious island of Arnak in Lost Ruins of Arnak: Expedition Leaders!
Give your expedition an edge by choosing one of six unique leaders, each equipped with different abilities, skills, and starting decks that offer different strategies and styles of play for you to explore.
In addition to the leader abilities, which bring a new element of asymmetry to the game, this expansion contains alternative research tracks that offer even more variety and a bigger challenge, new item and artifact cards to create new combos and synergies, along with more guardians & assistants to meet and sites to explore.
BGG Link - boardgamegeek.com/boardgameex...
TimeStamps:
0:00:00 - Introduction
0:00:35 - What The Expansion Adds
0:03:00 - The New Leaders
0:06:57 - Review
0:08:48 - Should You Get This Expansion?
0:09:30 - Final Thoughts
5.0 - My absolutely favorite games. You can pry them out of my cold dead hands.
4.5 - Love this game! At the same time missing something that would make it a 5. Could be hard to table, lacking variability, a little light, etc.
4.0 - Really great game, almost always keeping, although has meaningful complaints as to what takes away from the experience.
3.5 - Really enjoyed, don't love it, may lose out to better games but the idea of never playing again is a bit sad.
3.0 - A good game, would play and suggest with the right people, if I never played it again wouldn't lose any sleep.
2.5 - A game I'd play again , but will never suggest it myself
2.0 - A game I don't want to play again
1.5 - A game I can't find any reason to recommend
1.0 - A game that is just bad.
My Review Board - bit.ly/2Y9PFJF
Explanation of Review Board - • BoardGameCo Review Boa...
Upgrade Your Game At Top Shelf Gamer (Referral Link)
bit.ly/3siD0PL
My Game Table (Non Referral)
bit.ly/3aYUdpp
For media inquiries, please email me at [e-mail]

[@smoothrivera1928]

This expansion makes an already great game even more incredible! A definite recommendation to add to the base set =)

[@arronthrossell3434]

Really has grown on me with more plays. The expansion is awesome aswell love the leaders.

[@VikingKittens]

Excellent video and info regarding the new expansion. Looking forward to picking this up! Cheers

[@BoardGameCo]

Thanks Nicole :)

[@starshocker]

Love your vids. Just bought the expansion recently and love what it adds up to the base game and I feel like bringing it onto the table more often. Also highly expecting the next one to come.

[@BoardGameCo]

Thanks!

[@wicaksonoadi1035]

I've played 40-ish times with just the base game and haven't got tired of it. This expansion will make everything even better.

[@TheLuminousCleric]

It wasn't even a question whether I'm going to get this :D

[@magnusjakobsson7424]

Yep, an amazing exp to an amazing game! 👌

[@jeffm840]

Not sure if anyone has mentioned (don't believe so), but you forgot to mention that there are also new monsters in the expansion. Love your vids!

[@BoardGameCo]

Thanks :)

[@williamblack6912]

Another essential addition is a proper insert.

[@TheLuminousCleric]

Then you need a 3rd party insert, because there won't be one from CGE.

[@joeferreti9442]

I made one for my own needs from foamcore. But it's not easy because of the board when you want your sleeved cards be stored well in the box. Now the lid doesn't close accurately because the board lies on top but it doesn't matter much to me.

[@ScytheNoire]

Get a 3D printer. They are cheap, and if you get something like the AnyCubic Vyper, it's ready to go right away. Then you can print all the inserts you could want, and also print other custom components for games. It's a great $350 investment.

[@kumanight]

I bought the eraptor insert and it was pricey ($50 CAD) but I wouldn't go back to no insert. Setup is so quick now. Warning to anyone wanting the insert though: it was not designed for the expansion so there's a good amount of lid lift

[@jensherbert1]

Even though I just picked up Dune Imperium because my playgroup typically likes more conflict/player interaction... my wife likes a bit less player interaction/conflict which is yet another factor pushing me to ALSO pick up Arnak... not to mention the gorgeous artwork and interesting gameplay. I know Dune and Arnak are similar enough that I'll enjoy either one, but also different enough that I won't mind owning both! Thanks for the great content as always!

[@Kelferaz]

Same here as well, I have yet to get Arnak but I think the theme would appeal more to my wife plus Arnak plays fine with 2 but Dune Imperium requires at least 3 unless you use the app or fake 3rd player option

[@stevekozlowski5963]

Yeah, this expansion is great. I love asymmetrical powers

[@ghstrdio]

Arnak looks great, yet I'm still on the fence on getting it or not.

[@andrewclifton1233]

I'm liking the review format. I have no opinion on lost ruins + expansion. I think I have enough games for now. Maybe after I sell some to free up some space I'll look into it

[@BoardGameCo]

Fair enough :-) As long as you don't feel a need for the game, there's no need to get the game :-)

[@konstantin5526]

The more I play, the more I dislike leaders. Asymmetric powers are cool, but here they kinda dictate how you should play the game, at least to some extent. For example, if you play as leader with a hawk - you kinda expected to do monster hunting. With professor- your focus is on artifact’s. And so on. Game without leaders feels more open and you can just do what you want, without worrying of being suboptimal with your leader powers.

[@BoardGameCo]

Totally fair, but I can't say I felt that constrained....rather a drop directed into one pathway...and I get to do more with the game.

[@maxf.7262]

🐐🥁👍

[@smoothrivera1928]

I’ve seen this post before, but what does it mean?

[@fightingkitchen7960]

What does this mean?

[@maxf.7262]

@@fightingkitchen7960 goat rithm 👍(for the algorithm)

[@fightingkitchen7960]

@@maxf.7262 Ok.

[@pillinjer]

I would say the only criticism I have with this expansion is that the leaders are more powerful than the base game decks. You either have to have all players use leaders, or none. However this is a minor niggle, but the only one I have.

[@BoardGameCo]

Absolutely agreed, although I don't know that I've ever thought to mix them, for me it's all leaders all the time.

[@christopherleary7934]

Frustrating to me when expansions are released so soon after the core game where most player feedback is "I won't play without the expansion." Seems like something publishers should've included as part of the base game, but I'm sure the decisions for their approach are driven by economics (e.g., including expansion content in the base game and price increase would drive away a lot of initial customers).

[@BoardGameCo]

To be very clear. I loved the base game as is. The expansion just makes it inherently better at the same time.

[@kumanight]

This and the Dune expansion are essential IMO. They turn great games into fantastic games! Honestly couldn't play without either expansion now.

[@smoothrivera1928]

I just got Dune but haven’t played it yet- it’s next in line to get tabled! I figured I would play the base game a few times before considering the expansion, but you feel that the expansion is pretty solid? Any other context that you recommend adding to make the base game a better experience? For Arnak, which is one of my favorites, I ended up getting an insert as well as upgrading the compasses and coins =)

[@grog3514]

@@smoothrivera1928 use the same worm variant for the card row.

[@smoothrivera1928]

@@grog3514 what do you mean by “worm variant”?

[@grog3514]

@@smoothrivera1928 make 2 rows of 4 cards for the market. Everytime you buy something, everything shifts toward the worm token. After every combat phase, the worm eats the two cards closest to it and two more cards are drawn.

[@smoothrivera1928]

@@grog3514 awesome, I’ll do just that! Thanks!!

[@joeferreti9442]

For me the expansion turned "Lost Ruins of Arnak" from a mediocre game into a reasonably good game. I bought it only after the expansion was released, wouldn't have bought it without the expansion. The base game had not enough replayability and was overpriced for what it is. In addition the expansion adds nicely designed asymmetric player powers. Even if you don't want to play asymmetrically most of the time, they're a nice option to have. It might even be a feature that you can play the game either symmetrically or asymmetrically.

[@hotdoggington6962]

The $40 it's going for on Amazon right now seems like the price it should've been. For $55 there are many other games I'd go for, but $65 for base+exp makes it competitive for that range to me

[@zmollon]

Any game with a mandatory expansion is a game I will never buy. Thankfully I have plenty of ways to spend money.