Adding to Wondrous Creatures – Expansions Impressions
Wondrous Creatures was one of the best games we played in 2024, and for about a year I kept checking my local game stores to see if they had any of the expansions available for us to purchase and review. And I was always met with the same response: sold out. Thanks to our friends at Bad Comet Games, we finally ended up with both expansions for Wondrous Creatures, Gargantuan Beasts and the Crew Set.
Crew Set
The Crew Set is the smaller of the two expansions, adding in 5 new crew sets to choose from, as well as a bunch of crew cards that provide your crew with special abilities. Nothing here is groundbreaking, but that does make adding it into the base game really easy. The crew cards are single use, so it adds a nice strategic element of determine when you should use the cards. I like this as it allows players to trigger something fairly powerful at the most opportune time, and in my opinion it has always felt good to do what the card allows you to do. One specific card allows you to complete a trophy without using an action, another lets you recharge a card with energy, and another lets you unlock your captain ability from the start of the game. These are all powerful in their own way, and we never felt one was way more beneficial than another.
Gargantuan Beasts
The Gargantuan Beasts expansion adds a lot more gameplay wise than the Crew Set in my opinion, but like the Crew Set, it doesn’t take much to fold these elements into your game. There are 14 more creature cards to add into your base game deck, as well as a few new captains to choose from. It’s the Beast Cards that add a new action to the game, “Acquire a Beast Card” and these cards take a lot of work to fulfill, but provide outstanding benefits. Once gained, a beast token is placed on the card in the starting slot, and during the game you will slowly move that beast token along.
When players place a creature in their play area that matches the icon on the beast they have, they can move the beast token forward on the track. There are also creature cards that provide this as a benefit! Once you move the beast token to the end of the track, you unlock the beasts ability, as well as an end-game scoring opportunity. I loved grabbing a beast that helped my game, and these additions to the game just made the entire experience just a little more enjoyable overall.
Wondrous Creatures was one of our top games of 2024, and it’s still a favourite of mine a year later. These expansions are a great and inexpensive way to add to the overall experience, and we highly recommend them both!
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Article By Adam
