PAX East 2017: Dragoon’s New Expansion Is Worth Every Penny

We tried out a lot of tabletop games at PAX East 2017, and one of our favorites was Dragoon. If you haven’t heard about it before, Dragoon is a game where four dragons (played by humans) travel around a map and either raid towns for gold, or capture them and force the towns to pay tribute. The object of the game is to attain more gold than all the other dragons in play, and to screw your friends every chance you get to take their hard-earned cash.

One thing you might notice, right off the rip, is that Dragoon isn’t your ordinary board game… Cause there’s no board. Dragoon is crafted entirely by sustainable metals, fabrics, and paper – giving it a gorgeous, unique look to compliment the impeccable graphics and artwork all over the box and play materials. That being said, Dragoon’s unique materials clearly add some heft to the game’s price tag – running it up to $90 for the base game, and $40 for the expansion – which we’ll talk more about right here.

Lay Waste Games has released an expansion for their flagship title, known as The Rogue And Barbarian Expansion. This set adds two new playable characters to the base game – the rogue and the barbarian – who each have a completely unique playstyle to offset the four dragons from the base game. The barbarian has some more tactical cards in his deck, as well as a ship to hoard his loot instead of the dragon’s caves – and the thief has access to a series of tunnels that allow him to move about the board more nimbly than all other characters in the game.

Dragoon’s gameplay is fast, frantic, fun, and fucking frustrating if you play with greedy bastards like Rob, Chris, and myself. I’d argue that it’s pretty accessible for players of all ages (so long as you can read) and if you’ve got the scratch to pony up for the Gold Edition of the game and/or it’s expansion, the gorgeous, unique materials are well worth the price tag. Dragoon is currently only sold at trade shows, but fortunately for you – Lay Waste Games currently has a Kickstarter going for their new expansion WITH the full game, which has about a week left (at the time of writing this article). You’ve got a great opportunity to head over there and throw your money at them, so go do that and tell ’em Papa Dom sent you.

Let us know what you think about Dragoon on Twitter and listen into the podcast every week for more degenerate journalism.