Sandstorms in My Pocket!

It's time to go down under....to Egypt? Archaelogy is an Australian card game about digging up ancient treasures and making huge profits, that is if you can make it out of the desert! There are sandstorms and thieves about, just waiting to make for a stressful day at the digsite!

The majority of cards in Archaelogy represent treasures which can be sold to the museum, Most of the cards you'll see look like this.

During a player's turn, there are three options:

1) Trade (unlimited times) with the marketplace
2) Sell a set of treasures to the museum
3) Discard Map cards, and take cards from a treasure chamber.

Each treasure has a trade value on the top, which tells you its value when traded to the marketplace. A Pharaoh’s Mask is worth 4, which means it can be traded for 2 coins (each have a value of 2), or 4 Pot Shards (each have a value of 1).

The lone number on the bottom right tells you how many treasures of that type can be found in the deck. As you can see, there are less Pharaoh's Masks (4) than Pot Shards (18).

The risk of sandstorms and thieves make Archaelogy a press-your-luck game. Should I sell my cards to the museum and get less points? Or should I wait and endure the looming sandstorm and thief threats?

Finally, the numbers at the bottom tell you how many points the treasures are worth when sold to the museum in a set. The more cards in a set are collected, the more points are gained, and any cards in the museum are protected from danger. However, you cannot add on to a set you’ve sold already.

Let's take a Pot Shard as an example. If you have 4 Pot Shards and sell them to the museum at the same time, you get 4 points. However, a set of 5 Pot Shards jumps up to 10 points!

Completing a full set is much more enticing than selling early. However, there are risks of holding out on selling to the museum.

Depending on the number of players, there are a number of sandstorm cards shuffled in the deck. When a sandstorm is drawn, players must discard half the cards in their hand to the marketplace, where they can be acquired by other players! No fun...

There are also 8 nasty thief cards. When drawn, the player who drew it must steal a random card from another player's hand.

The risk of sandstorms and thieves make Archaelogy a press-your-luck game. Should I sell my cards to the museum and get less points? Or should I wait and endure the looming sandstorm and thief threats?

Occasionally you’ll come across a Map card, which give players access to the treasure chambers! There is a small, medium and large chamber, each with 3-5-7 random treasures each. When you discard 1-2-or 3 maps, you get access to the pyramid’s treasures! In addition, maps can be traded to the marketplace, and can also be sold to the museum for 3 points.

The game ends when there are no more cards left, and players can’t sell or trade anymore. The player with the most points wins!!

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THOUGHTS

As far as quick card games though, Archaelogy is the perfect game to share with the family when you need to burn 20 minutes, or you want to play something light. I use Archaelogy to start or finish out my game nights as a warm-up to the meatier games of my game nights (so it's like bruschetta or a scoop of ice cream at the beginning/end of a big meal! And who doesn't want that?)

Quick: Once everyone knows what they’re doing, the game can be finished in 20-30 minutes.

Great Theme: I don’t know about you, but I’d much rather dig for treasure than play around with a silly King of Hearts or Queen of Diamonds. As far as card games go, very few make you feel like you’re digging up talismans under the scorching Egyptian sun – in this area, Archaelogy is a winner.

Luck-based: While it’s important to learn when to trade and when to sell, a player who draws nothing but parchment scraps and sandstorms is generally going to be behind a player who draws more valuable cards. The game is very light, and sandstorms/thieves are an inevitable fact of life. That being said, I feel like the game is a serious improvement over Uno (also a lot quicker!)

Portable: The box is the size of two decks of cards put together. Need I say anything else?

If you're looking for a quick game that's more adventurous than anything you can find in a standard deck of cards, you can't go wrong with Archaeology! Learn more about how to play at BGG.com, and pick this one up at Amazon. Don't wait! The treasures of Egypt won't be lying around in the marketplace forever! Until next time...