🔎 Focus on game modes

Cyclades Legendary Edition offers 3 different game modes.

🎲 Classic mode

AKA the « Free for All » mode for 3 to 5 players.

🎁 At the head of a city and its army, each player makes offerings to the deities in order to benefit from important actions for their turn.

The aim is to conquer land and sea Areas and extend your influence individually.

🏛️ As soon as one of the players controls 3 Metropolises at the end of a cycle, they win the game and become the true Legendary Hero of the Cyclades Islands.

🤝 Cooperative mode

4️⃣ If there are 4 players around the table, they can decide to join forces and conquer the Cyclades islands in Classic mode (« Free for All ») or in teams of 2.

6️⃣ If there are 6 players around the table, only the latter cooperative mode (also in teams of 2) will be available to them.

🏛️ In this mode, the 2 allied cities must cooperate to build 3 Metropolises first, thus consolidating their alliance’s hegemony in the archipelago.

🤝 Although managed independently, the troops and fleets of the 2 players in the team must work together to achieve victory.

However, there are certain rules to be observed to avoid any diplomatic incidents:

Your ally’s base buildings can be used to build your Metropolis, and vice versa.
Gold Pieces income is shared by both players on a team. Be sure to discuss the actions you wish to take, so you don’t run out of resources too quickly.
Although allied, the troops of the 2 players on a team cannot share a common Area. However, it is permissible to cross an Area controlled by allied troops, as long as the second player does not end their move there.

⚔️ Duel mode

For Duel games, the 2 players follow the principle of a 4-player team game.

Each player embodies 2 cities, whose Gold management is pooled. The same rules for building a metropolis and controlling troops and fleets apply in this configuration.

💬 A word from the authors to explain the choice of these game modes

Bruno Cathala and Ludovic Maublanc explain their choices concerning the game modes relating to the number of players.

« We wanted this new version of Cyclades to be as in tune as possible with the way we like to play: by making the game more dynamic, and avoiding ‘downtime’ as much as possible. »

For 6 players

« It would have been perfectly possible to play with 6 players « individually », but… that would have required two additional terrain boards.

This would have meant that players on opposite sides of the board would never be in contact, which was not what we wanted.

It would also have led to much longer games, with much downtime.

So, in terms of our own tastes, the individual gaming experience remains acceptable up to 5 players, and we didn’t want to go beyond that.

That’s why we set up this team mode, which allows you to play with up to 6 players, while maintaining the tension and length of play we want… and offering a game experience combining cooperation with your partner and confrontation with other teams. »

For 2 players

« We weren’t totally satisfied with the 2-player version of the first edition of Cyclades.

Admittedly, it worked very well, but it regularly happened that one player took the Gold lead and suffocated his opponent. In such cases, the result was a game with a clear outcome, but with another 30 or 40 minutes to play, of little interest to the player on the receiving end.

The best thing to do is to concede the game.

Here, the two-player mode, which is ultimately based on the teamplay game mode (basically, each player is in charge of two factions), avoids this pitfall and leads to more dynamic and tense games. With real permanent dilemmas.

It’s a little more « technical – initiated player » than the initial version of Cyclades, but at the same time, it fits in well with our target audience. »