Archeos Society Review

Paolo Mori is quickly becoming a must-follow board game designer for me, with several intriguing board game designs under his belt (like Caesar! Seize Rome in 20 Minutes, which I glowingly reviewed).

Back in 2017, he gave us Ethnos, an area control game driven by brilliant set collection card play that felt like a positive evolution on Ticket to Ride. But Ethnos sort of flew under the radar for its ugly production. So, in 2023, Ethnos was remade into Archeos Society, featuring the same brilliant card play but rejiggered from confrontational area control to non-confrontational track advancement, plus its own production blunders.

I'm so hot and cold on this game. Here's why I love it so much, why I hate it equally as much, and what you need to know about it to decide whether this is the kind of game you need in your own collection.

This review is based on my own personal copy of Archeos Society, which I bought used from BGG's GeekMarket. Not a free review copy.

Overview

Archeos Society is primarily a set collection card game, but the sets you collect also double as actions and bonuses depending on their makeup. In other words, the card play is more than just card play—you're using those cards to make progress across various tracks for points.

The game centers on a deck of 156 cards, divided into 12 roles. There are 12 cards of each role, except the Student of which there are 24. Each role's cards are divided into 6 colors: Red, Blue, Green, Purple, Orange, Pink. (That means 2 of each color per role, except the Student which has 4 of each color.)

Only six of the roles are chosen at the start of a game, which get shuffled together into one big draw deck. Next to the draw deck is a central market of cards, which starts off empty. There are also six location boards, each one corresponding to one of the six colors, and each player has their own marker on each location board. This mixture of roles, colors, and locations is key to the card play in Archeos Society.

On your turn, you can do one of two actions:

• Draw a card. You can either draw blind from the top of the draw deck OR take any one card in the card market. (No cards in the market? You can draw TWO blind cards.) You can have a max of 10 cards in your hand.
• Play a set. A set is any group of cards that are all the same role OR all the same color. A set can consist of any number of cards, even just one single card. When you play a set, it stays on the table in front of you. Then, the remaining cards in your hand—the ones that weren't played as part of the set—are all returned to the card market.

When playing a set, there are three vital details in play:

• The front card matters. The card at the front of every set is called the "leader," and the leader's color determines which location board you can advance on. You choose which card is leader whenever you play a set.
• The size of the set matters. You can only advance on the leader's corresponding location board if your set is large enough to move to the next step (as shown on the board). The size of a set is determined by how many cards are in it when you play it. You can always play a set of any size, but you won't move if it's too small.
• Every role has a unique leader ability. Whereas the color of the leader determines the location board, the role of the leader gives you a special action or bonus. For example, the Pilot lets you move on any location board instead, while the Cartographer lets you play another set before returning the rest of your hand to the card market, while the Physician lets you keep some cards when returning to the card market.

So, when does it end? Well, at the start of the game, the draw deck also has three Monkey cards shuffled into the bottom half. As soon as the third Monkey card is drawn, the round ends and scores are tallied.

In Archeos Society, points come from two sources:

• Every set you played is scored. A 1-card set is 0 points, 2-card set is 1 point, 3-card set is 3 points, 4-card set is 5 points, 5-card set is 8 points, 6-card set or larger is 12 points. In other words, the value of a set grows exponentially with more cards (0, 1, 3, 5, 8, 12).
• Every location board is scored. Each spot on every location board has a fixed point value, and that's how many points you earn for being there at the end of a round. Some of the spots have zero or negative points, so you want to avoid being there at round's end.

When the round ends, you stay where you are on each location board. The cards are shuffled back up, the Monkeys are shuffled back into the bottom half, and you play again. You'll go through two or three rounds (depending on player count), at which point the game ends and highest score wins.

Each location board is double-sided, with a Basic side that only has points and an Advanced side that has points as well as special rules. For example, the Blue location grants more points if you're the only one in a particular spot, while the Green location grants extra points to whoever's furthest along but also resets that player to the start of the track.

Setup and Table Footprint

Despite it mainly being a card game, Archeos Society is kind of annoying to take out and set up. That's because you have to choose 6 roles at the start of the game, and 5 of the 12 roles come with extra, unique components. Going through the box and pulling out the role cards is easy enough, but pulling out those special components is a bit... meh.

That's on top of having to set up the location boards, plus the score tracker, plus shuffling the roles together, then shuffling the Monkeys into the bottom half of the deck. And if you opt for the draft setup variant—players take turns choosing which roles get added and which side of each location board is played—then the process is further lengthened.

It takes 5 minutes at the absolute least, but closer to 10 minutes if you aren't just blitzing through everything. Keep all this in mind if you decide to play again after the first game, as you have to go through it all again.

For a game that's essentially just set collection, Archeos Society sure does take up a ton of table space. The draw deck and central card market don't need much room, but the six different location boards and the score tracker are excessively large. Plus, with players amassing their own sets of cards played on the table, they each need a good amount of personal space.

Honestly, the table footprint of Archeos Society is annoying. My standard 3-foot-by-3-foot table can barely support a two-player game without edging into uncomfortable territory.

Learning Curve

Archeos Society is an easy game to play, but an annoying one to learn. The core gameplay of collecting and playing sets is actually very simple and I'm sure anyone could pick it up fast. The concept of returning unplayed cards to the central card market is easy to grasp, too. But once you throw in leaders and location boards, things go sideways.

With every role having its own action or bonus when played as leader, and with 6 roles in play during the game, you have to learn what each of those 6 roles does. It'd be helpful if each card had an explanation of what it does as leader, but all you get is an ambiguous icon... and most of the icons aren't self-explanatory. Even after knowing what every role does, I find it hard to quickly understand what the icons are trying to convey.

And you also have to learn the unique behaviors of each location board. In a basic game, you only play with one advanced location board, so it's not too bad. But the game is way more interesting with multiple advanced sides in play. The trade-off there? You have to know how each one works.

Fortunately, the rulebook comes with a player aid on the back that explains all the roles and the location boards. Expect players to constantly be referencing that player aid, passing it back and forth, until you've played the game several times—and even then, you'll likely still need it.

Game Experience

Decision Space

Everything in Archeos Society is rooted in the card play, where you collect cards to play sets and return all remaining cards (that aren't part of the set you played) back to the central card market. This "return unplayed cards" mechanism is so dang interesting for two reasons:

First, it's the only way to unclog your hand of cards you no longer want. There's no discarding in Archeos Society. And with a hand limit of 10 cards, you may eventually find yourself unable to complete the set you're building—in which case you must play a less-than-ideal set, lose the rest of your hand, and flood the market with cards for everyone else. To avoid flooding the market, you have to walk a fine line between fishing for more cards and playing sets before you accumulate too much waste in your hand.

Second, you can hate-draft from the card market without it being a huge drag on your own hand. If you know someone else is gunning for Reds, then you can just swipe that open Red from the market and deny it to them for several turns. It's not like you're stuck with it forever. You'll eventually have to return it to the card market when you play your own set. But you can hinder that opponent's progress for a while, and clogging up your hand with that card may not affect you at all. Knowing that cards always return to market gives you more flexibility in taking unneeded cards.

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As you play around that "return unplayed cards" mechanism, what you're ultimately aiming to do is maximize the value of every set you play. I'm not necessarily talking about point value, though. You have several reasons to play varying sets of varying sizes and shapes:

• Play a big set for pure points. Normally, to move along a location track, you need to play a set that meets a minimum size. If you play a larger set, you can still move... but you can't move more than one spot per turn. So, playing a 6-card set does not let you move across the 1-card threshold and the following 2-card and 3-card thresholds. You only move across that first one, effectively "wasting" 5 cards. But with the exponential points of bigger sets, this sacrifice can be worth it.
• Play a small set for its leader action. You may need to trigger certain role abilities often for your given strategy, which might mean playing lots of smaller sets even though they're too small to advance you up certain location tracks.
• Play a small set to empty your hand. Again, there's no discarding in Archeos Society. If you suddenly realize that there aren't enough cards left for the set you're building, or if you need to switch gears for whatever reason, then you might just play a small set now to free up your hand and start building a different set.
• Play exact sets to race up location tracks. Instead of scoring big points from big sets, you might focus on the location tracks. Every location has its own unique pattern of sets needed, so the types of sets you play will vary all over the place depending.
• Play multicolored sets to preserve needed colors. Remember, the set leader's color determines which location track you move along. If you're prioritizing the Green track, for example, you need to preserve Green cards so you have Green leaders for your sets.
• Play single-colored sets to deny colors to others. If you see an opponent gunning for the Pink track, you might gobble up the Pink cards—and not just hold onto them for a while, but actually play them as a set so they're out of the game, hindering their chances at Pink movement.

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On one level, Archeos Society is about assessing the given makeup of roles and location boards to figure out what path will net you the most points. But on another level, the game is about constantly pivoting your strategy based on what cards come out, what cards people take, and what cards still remain in the deck to support your strategies. If someone plays a 6-card set of Reds, you might have to give up on the Red location track and focus your efforts elsewhere. You can't stubbornly stick to one path.

Because of this, there's a bit of a card counting feel to Archeos Society. But you don't actually have to count and memorize cards played. All sets are played face-up to each player's tableau, so you can always see what's been played and extrapolate what remains in the deck.

Overall, Archeos Society is a game that keeps you thinking on your feet and adjusting to changing circumstances. Don't worry about analysis paralysis here, though. Your turns essentially boil down to one decision: which card are you going to take? It's impossible to math out the best possible card every turn (you don't have enough information to do that), and you generally have an idea of which card is potentially the best for you on any given turn.

Archeos Society is played with your head and with your gut. It's engaging and thoughtful without being brain burny. It's far from a heavy game. In fact, I find it to be both strategic and breezy.

Luck Factor

Obviously, there's luck in Archeos Society. You're drawing from a shuffled deck, so you aren't always going to get what you need. And while there is a central card market that helps mitigate a lot of that luck, there are times when nothing in the market appeals, at which point you have no choice but to draw from the deck and hope for the best.

But since most of the action does take place in the card market, I wouldn't say that Archeos Society is a lucky game. It's less about top-decking and more about carefully selecting from the available cards, and you have full control over your destiny as far as that part's concerned.

The only other aspect that's non-trivially lucky is the distribution of Monkey cards in the bottom half of the draw deck. It's possible for all three Monkey cards to bunch up near the top, or bunch up near the bottom, or spread out throughout. That means some rounds are way longer or shorter than others for no reason but chance, and that can affect some strategies. (But that's not a knock against the game. It is what it is and you have to play around it.)

Fun Factor

When you think about it, Archeos Society is basically rummy that's been punched up with a few mechanisms for gamers. If you like rummy and if you like the idea of special actions based on the sets you collect, then you understand the kind of fun that awaits you in Archeos Society.

Yeah, most of the game is just drawing cards. You either take known cards from the card market or unknown cards from the draw deck. It's satisfying to finish the sets you've been aiming for, and it's exciting to push your luck when you forego the card market for the draw deck.

But there's strategy to Archeos Society, and there's enough of it to keep it engaging. Between evaluating the best path to scoring points given the current game setup, managing your hand of cards to execute that path, and shifting gears when it's apparent your strategy isn't working, Archeos Society is fun in a "classic card game" sense but with extra layers.

Pacing

Archeos Society has real snappy turns. I mean, you only have two possible actions—draw a card or play a set—and usually you know what you want to do by the time it's your turn again, so it moves along. You'll have occasional turns where you need to think, but even those rarely take long.

What's interesting is that each player determines their own tempo. When you're gunning for large sets, you spend most of your turns drawing from the card market, trying to amass the exact colors and roles you need, and only slamming down those juicy big sets every so often. Meanwhile, others might be playing a small set every few turns, constantly making progress or taking special actions, replenishing the card market as they do. This creates an interesting dynamic where timing your sets—and ensuring you don't flood the card market when your opponents can capitalize—is just as important as collecting your sets and making your own progress.

And there's a rising tension as you play through the round. The first half of the draw deck has no Monkeys, so you can focus on cycling through cards and acquiring the exact cards you need, whether for big sets or specific locations or comboing special actions. But as soon as that first Monkey comes out, you have to shift gears. You can't just wait around anymore. You have to start making suboptimal plays. Then when the second Monkey comes out, you're basically swinging by a thread. Every card drawn could be your last, and that push-your-luck element is surprisingly suspenseful.

I also enjoy the reprieve between rounds, where you spend a few minutes shuffling up all the cards again. It gives you a moment to regroup, to re-assess everyone's situations, and tweak your own strategies. Seeing everyone's progress and your own relative standing adds extra tension, and that keeps things interesting through to the end.

Player Interaction

There's barely any player interaction in Archeos Society. You never impact anyone's track progress, you never affect anyone's hand of cards, and you never negate any of the sets they've collected. But there is some interaction that happens in the central card market.

If you're attentive, you can see what strategy someone is going for—and based on that, you can block them by hate-drafting. Players going for large sets and players going all in on one or two locations are particularly susceptible to this, as they're easy to read and therefore easy to block. This doesn't feel mean, though it can be frustrating at times.

That's the only real way to interact in Archeos Society. But don't get me wrong! It's far from boring, and I think there's enough going on here to preclude this from being called a "multiplayer solitaire" game.

Player Counts

Archeos Society is very much the same experience at all player counts, except the draw deck and card market cycle faster with every added player. You see the same amount of cards regardless of player count (i.e., no cards are removed from the game at lower counts), but the card market changes more often between your turns at higher counts.

As with any game that has a central card market, Archeos Society is slightly more chaotic with more players. It's harder to execute any particular strategy because the cards you need may come and go before you can snatch them. To compensate, you play an extra round at higher counts.

All of this is pretty minor, though. Archeos Society scales quite well, and I find it to be equally enjoyable at two as it is at six. In fact, I might prefer it at lower player counts simply for table space reasons.

Replayability

The clever card play sits at the heart of Archeos Society, and that card play is what makes the game so engaging from session to session. The rich, puzzly, and satisfying decision space keeps you on your toes while leaving you with outs when you're stuck. You're constantly pivoting your strategies and figuring out the best way forward with the cards in your hand.

The depth of Archeos Society is bolstered by the huge number of role-and-location-board combos. I'm normally lukewarm on "replayability through variable setup" because it often feels like a crutch for an otherwise stale design. Not the case here. Every role and location board twists the gameplay in its own way; they're more than simple number tweaks or mere starting configurations.

Any given combination of roles and location boards gives rise to a unique puzzle that paves fresh new paths to victory. Understanding how those roles and location boards play off each other is key to edging out an advantage, and that's what keeps Archeos Society fresh across repeat plays. I may have complaints about this game, but I'm still always happy to play it—and it's all because of its fantastic core gameplay.

There are 18,480 possible combinations of roles and locations, assuming you're playing with 6 out of 12 roles (= 924 combinations) and 3 out of 6 advanced locations (= 20 combinations). Even if you never repeated a single exact set of roles and locations, Archeos Society would be fresh every time for years and years. How's that for replayability?

Production Quality

I'm so, so peeved by Archeos Society because it feels simultaneously overproduced and underproduced. Overproduced because it feels gratuitously big with its excessive table footprint. Underproduced because the quality of the various components is downright miserable.

The theme is boring and the player colors even more boring. While I like the idea of exploring exotic archeological dig sites, none of it comes through in the gameplay. If the theme is going to be pasted on like this, at least make it visually appealing. Instead, Archeos Society is drab and lifeless. I especially hate that the player colors are just variations of brown, black, and gray. Seriously? It honestly couldn't get any duller.

The location boards and score tracker are way too big. I get that Archeos Society is meant to play up to 6 players, so each location board needs to support up to 6 player markers. But do they really need to be this big? They could've been drastically smaller if the player markers were, say, stackable.

And don't get me started on the score tracker, which is comically large and poorly designed. Why does it wind around in such a nonsensical way? It's ugly and it's prone to errors. It's so bad that it actually makes me mad.

The cards are also too big, and they warp easily. Given how little information is on each card (including the role ability icons), I don't see why they couldn't have been of the diminutive variety. You know, the mini-sized cards used in games like Ticket to Ride and Codenames. That would've freed up a lot of the table space taken up by sets collected.

On top of that, the cards in Archeos Society tend to warp more than cards in other games. They aren't linen-finished, so maybe that's a factor? Or it could be how they sit in the box insert, on their sides so that they bend over time with gravity's pressure. Either way, it happens and I don't like it.

The iconography on the cards is unhelpful at best. In leaning too far into the archeology theme, the role ability icons sacrificed intuitiveness for nothing. It's hard to know what a given role ability does without referencing the player aid, which is an iconographic failure, if you ask me—and it's a big enough deal that it drags down the experience.

The rulebook is okay. I just wish the player aid was separate with multiple copies. For something that needs to be referenced so often by everyone, it doesn't make sense to have only one copy. Multiple player references would've been fire, especially if they were sized down.

The box is organized, but the size is absurd. All of my above complaints about Archeos Society being "too big" and "overproduced" really boil down to this: I want the box to be much, much smaller. It's a small game in an oversized box, and that's a problem for people like me who have limited shelf space.

The Bottom Line

I'm such a fan of Archeos Society's card play, but I can't stand the production missteps. They seriously drag down an otherwise fantastic game, and I often find myself reluctant to pull it out because of those issues. To be clear, I have tons of fun when I do play! But there's just a mental barrier that sits between me and getting it to the table, so I don't play it as often as I'd like to.

If you don't care about things like that and you're just looking for a brilliant rummy-esque card game with indirect player interactions, then definitely check out Archeos Society. The core gameplay is tense and engaging, and there's a lot of replayability packed into the box.

Buy it from:
Amazon • Miniature Market • Noble Knight Games

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