Coatl Review

You may be able to ascertain from my last name, Lopez, that I am at least some part Hispanic. In fact, I am half Mexican and half most of Europe, with 1% African (which I believe most people share). My Mexican heritage hails from Guanajuato, Mexico, and this location has had several ancient civilizations call it home. The Purepecha peoples lived here just to the west of another ancient peoples you may more readily recognize – The Aztecs. The Aztecs had several deities that they worshiped, and one of them was the Quetzalcoatl – a feathered serpent. I, unfortunately, do not know everything about my family history, nor of the entire history of Guanajuato, but I certainly don’t remember learning about the Coatl until I was in high school, when I started really getting into Final Fantasy games. Especially Final Fantasy VII, and later XI. But in FFVII there was something you could battle called the Quetzalcoatl. Anyone remember it? The goal was to destroy it, but in this game I am reviewing, we are attempting to build statues of their likenesses. May the best carver/builder/sculptor reign supreme!

Coatl is a hand management, set collection, puzzle game for 1-4 players, but for this review I will be playing the game for two players. In it, the players are trying to earn the most amount of points by the end of the game by assembling different colored coatl segments to fulfill as many Prophecy and Temple cards as possible. Once a player has completed their third coatl the game comes to a close and the best coatl maker will win the game!

To setup, place the Supply board on the table, populate it with head, tail, and body segments pulled randomly from the provided supply bags. Players choose a color of Player board upon which they will place coatl pieces, they receive three Sacrifice tokens, one Temple card, three Prophecy cards, and the first player marker to one of the players. Place the remaining Temple cards into two equal-sized decks, face-up. The remainder of the Prophecy cards are placed on the table as a deck, and a draft market of six of these are placed face-up nearby. The game is now setup and ready to begin with the first player!

Playing Coatl is very rules-light, but the tactical choices hit pretty hard. On a turn, the active player will choose one of three actions to perform. They may first choose to take coatl pieces from the Supply board. The decision here is that the player can take one head piece, one tail piece, or one of the pairs of body segments. Any piece(s) are placed on the Player board to be used on a future turn, with one piece per slot.

Instead a player may choose to collect Prophecy cards from those face-up in the drafting area. Any of the cards are available with no cost, but a hard 5-card hand limit. The player may choose any of the face-up cards or even draw from the top of the deck. These cards provide VP for the end of the game should their coatl segment requirements be met. These requirements could be as simple as earning VP for having one green piece. However, the card may also say that it will award the player seven VP for having five or more green pieces. Or perhaps the card may say that building a coatl featuring two yellows immediately followed by thee blues will be worth six VP. These color combinations can be found in both the body segments and can include the head and tail.

Finally, the active player may choose to Assemble a coatl. There are three distinct sub-actions that fall within this. Firstly, the player may begin a new coatl, assuming that there are not already two incomplete coatl being worked on. The coatl may be constructed from ANY starting point, not just from the head or tail piece. Secondly, you may add pieces to an incomplete existing coatl. Pieces can be added to the beginning, end, or both during this sub-action, as long as the player has the pieces on their Player board. Finally, the player may play a Prophecy card to be attached to a specific coatl being built, but not already completed. The catch here is that whichever scoring requirement is shown on the Prophecy needs to already be present within the coatl being considered. So if the coatl does not already have three blue attached to three black (like on the photo below) they may NOT add a Prophecy card to this coatl if the requirement is the three blue and three black. These sub-actions can all be taken on a turn assuming the requirements are met for each.

Upon setup, each player was given three Sacrifice tokens that can be used as an action instead of these listed. One token allows the player to wipe the Prophecy card market and deal out six new card. Another allows the player to look into the bag and draw out ANY one head or tail piece, or ANY two body segments from the bag. The final token allows the player to take one of the face-up Temple cards into hand instead of it being able to be scored as a common goal card.

Once a player has completed three coatl consisting of one head, one tail, and at least one body segment, it will signal the end of the game. Game end could also be triggered by depleting both the Supply bag and Supply board of body segments. Players then take one extra turn after the current round has completed and then scores are tallied. Flip over the Supply board to reveal the scoring circle, grab a body segment matching your color, and check all Prophecy and Temple cards attached to each coatl, awarding points for fulfilling their scoring requirements. The player with the highest score is the winner!

Components. This game has some pretty awesome coatl pieces. they are light plastic, and very colorful. The art style throughout the game is also extremely well-done and thematically appropriate. The bags are nice printed canvas bags, and the cards are good quality linen finish. I have absolutely zero qualms about the components here. Very good overall look and feel.

For a game so light in rules it definitely hits hard. There are just a few choices of things to do on a turn, but I’ll be darned if each and every turn doesn’t just tickle and heat up my gray matter just a little. Sometimes I will need tons of a specific color, only to have the Supply board be plum out of that color. And it can’t refill until all of the body segments or all of the head + tail pieces are gone. So I sometimes have to take pieces I don’t want and certainly don’t have room for on my Player board just to get closer to a refill. It is grounds for some crazy coatl combinations, as you just keep adding pieces and hoping that your combos will relate to some Prophecy card down the road.

And then committing these Prophecy cards to incomplete coatl are a little dicey as well. I mean, maybe there is one instance of a single black piece in this coatl, but then you neglect to work on that one more, and suddenly a different coatl you’re building now has four black pieces that could have given way more points had that original Prophecy card be placed on this one instead. It’s a risk, but some points is better than none points.

I really like the difficulty of the game being all in my mind and not in the rules. There are so many choices to be made, and going in with any kind of strategy will just be burnt to a crisp within the first few turns. This is an incredibly tactical game with some beautiful artwork and components and I’m definitely here for it. I feel like it’s a cross between Block Ness and even 7 Wonders in an odd way, but this does something completely different, so I can see myself keeping all three for different feelings and with different crowds. If you are looking for something absolutely stunning on the table with light rules and a plethora of decisions to be made, I highly recommend picking up a copy of Coatl. It is still in stock at many retailers for a really good price. Purple Phoenix Games gives this one an unexpected 5 / 6. The art, the choices, and feeling of accomplishment once the game is done gives us a great time every time.