Board Games Top 10: Featuring Cloudspire

Mixing elements from classic tower defense games and modern MOBA style games, Cloudspire seeks to bring a new genre of game to the table.

The Weekly Board Games Top 10

“The Hotness” on BoardGameGeek is a list of the currently most popular games, as based on views. This week brings us these winners:

We haven’t seen Spirit Island on the Hotness list for a little while. But it’s no surprise that it’s jumped up this week considering they have a huge expansion coming which is getting a lot of buzz. Other than that, we have Gloomhaven, Dice Settlers (which we looked at last week) and Root all sticking out for this week as well. Everyone else on the list is a newcomer, so there’s not a whole lot to dictate which to feature this week. However, Cloudspire is unsurprisingly taking the top spot this week. There’s not a whole lot of information out there currently, but what we do know makes this game look very exciting. So let’s take a look at Cloudspire.

Cloudspire

Cloudspire is a tactical strategy game which takes its influences from tower defense games and MOBA video games (like DOTA, LoL and Heroes of the Storm). Based on what information the publisher has released so far, it will have multiple story driven narratives to play through as well.

The official Kickstarter pages goes into details about the world building and the theme of the game. There are four factions each attempting to control The Source, which is a mystical entity which powers the machines the these people as well as keeps their flying landmasses aloft. Each of the aforementioned story narratives will allow players to play through the game in either solo mode or multiplayer through the eyes of each of these factions: The Brawnen, an industrious race of giants; Grovetenders, cousins to plantlife and perhaps created by The Source itself;

The Heirs, a bird-like race that believe controlling each island is their birthright;

and the Narora, who believe controlling The Source is their calling and worship it almost to fanaticism.

As stated earlier, there is not a whole lot of detailed gameplay information readily available yet, but the Kickstarter gives some basics.

In competitive mode, the main objective of each player is to destroy their fortress. In solo or cooperative mode, the player will play through a scenario book which will dictate how the game will play.

Each round in broken up into multiple phases: Event, Market, Building, Preparation and Onslaught.

The Event phase creates a random event which sets the tone for that round and will create some prohibitions the players must adhere to.

In the Market phase, players will purchase mercenaries, supplies, unique heroes and equipment and all manner of tools to help them in their battles. The Building phase is where players will (shocker) build their structures to aid them and control the battlefield. In the Preparation phase, players will spend the Command Points they gained during the Event phase to perform actions with their heroes and minions.

Then the Onslaught begins! The actions dictated during the Preparation phase commence and minions will attack automatically based on the orders they were given.

The game continues in this fashion repeating the rounds (or “waves”) until one player’s fortress is destroyed.

From Chip Theory Games

Cloudspire – $100 on Kickstarter – KS Ends Nov 8th

Cloudspire is a medium-weight MOBA-style tower defense hybrid set on the islands of Ankar, high above the world. The energy keeping these islands apart is waning and as these floating land masses join, war breaks out between their inhabitants. Four factions stand at the heart of this conflict, each ready to assert or protect their claims to Ankar.

Author: Matt Sall

Matt has loved games of all kinds his whole life: board, video, war, roleplaying. He's worked as a writer for BoLS since 2017. He's worked as freelance editor for board game rulebooks and has designed many of his own games as well.