Arcadia Quest: Frost Dragon
Arcadia Quest: Frost Dragon Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Introduction
The Frost Dragon expansion is an epic encounter against the most formidable enemy the Heroes of Arcadia have ever faced! It requires the Arcadia Quest base game to play, either the original or Inferno. After a group of players has completed a regular campaign, they may choose to extend it by facing the Dragon. This two-scenario encounter features epic upgrades and several new rules, including a cooperative mode for the finale. It is recommended that players who face the Dragon already have experience with the regular Arcadia Quest game.
The Campaign: The Risk Beyond
The Dragon encounter must be played after the conclusion of a regular campaign (which includes Beyond the Grave, Pets, or any other campaign), although players may also use the rules for Episodic Mode if they wish to play the Dragon encounter in isolation. Once the campaign ends, the players go through another Upgrade Phase, following all the standard rules, with the following exceptions:
- The players reinforce their decks with the Level 6 Upgrade cards included in this expansion.
- To buy Upgrades, the players use the coins they earned during the Final Showdown, but they also receive a bonus of 3 coins for each Medal won during the campaign.
Once this Upgrade Phase has been resolved, the players are ready to begin the Dragon encounter's Part I scenario.
Facing More Dragons
If you own other Dragon boxes (sold separately), you may choose to play one Dragon encounter after another. Once a Dragon encounter (the Part I and Part II scenarios) ends, the players go through another Upgrade Phase, using the standard rules and the Level 6 Upgrade deck cards included in the next Dragon expansion. The players use the coins they earned during the previous Dragon encounter (the Part I and Part II scenarios) to buy their Upgrades.
If the players face several Dragon scenarios, their Heroes become even more powerful. To account for this, they face the Young version of the Dragons in the first two encounters they play, but from the third encounter onward they face the Older version of the Dragons.
(Translation note: the Spanish source uses "Mayor" for the second version of the Dragon card. It is rendered here as "Older", the literal sense; the printed English name may differ.)
The Dragon Encounter
The Dragon encounter can be played using either the base Arcadia Quest game or Inferno. Either option presents the same scenario, but with different challenges due to the nature of each game. Each of the two scenario entries shows two maps: one for use with the original Arcadia Quest components and the other for use with Inferno. The Monsters used in the scenario are those of the chosen base game.
Note: Although the Dragon scenarios take place after the sixth scenario of the campaign, all Monsters use their Level 6 cards.
Part I: Bringing the Dragon Down
In the first Dragon scenario, the Dragon is flying over the city, and the players compete with one another to be the one who finally brings the Dragon down, so that they can properly claim it. The Heroes do this by firing the city's harpoons at the Dragon and attacking it while it is on the ground. Meanwhile, they still have to deal with the Monsters that appear during the chaos, and with rival Heroes who want the Dragon's power for themselves and are not above manipulating the Dragon against their opponents.
While the first Dragon scenario has only 1 Feat card, the players still need to complete 3 Feats in order to win and advance to Part II.
(Source note: the Spanish here reads "1 carta de Gesta" followed by a word, "JCE", that could not be recovered. It is omitted.)
For Part I, only the "Initial" side of the Dragon card is used. Use the "Young" version of the card if this is your 1st or 2nd time facing the Dragon. Otherwise, use the "Older" version.
Using the Harpoons
The Dragon begins the scenario off the board, where it is considered to be Flying. The 4 Feat tokens on the board represent single-use harpoons that wound the Dragon and force it to land. If the active Hero is on the same Space as a Feat token, and there are no enemies in that Space, discard the token to fire the harpoon at the Flying Dragon, placing the Dragon figure on the Spaces next to the harpoon just used (as shown on the map).
Important: If the Dragon is currently on the ground, it is impossible to use harpoons.
When the Dragon lands, it immediately attacks the Hero who fired the harpoon (if the door between them is closed, the Dragon opens it automatically). The Dragon then remains on the board and behaves like a normal Monster until it is hurt enough to fly again.
Wounding the Dragon
During the first scenario, the Dragon cannot be killed. The wounds it receives only count toward tracking when it will fly again. The Heroes need only wound the Dragon enough times to ground it for good and complete the Feat card "Ground the Dragon". The Heroes can wound the Dragon in two ways:
- When a harpoon is fired, the Dragon is hurt once.
- When an attack inflicts any number of Wounds on the Dragon, it is Wounded once.
When the Dragon is hurt, the player who did it places one of their Feat tokens on the Feat card to mark how many times the Dragon has been hurt. A player needs to Wound the Dragon 4 times to complete the Feat "Ground the Dragon". It is possible for several players to complete this Feat.
Remember that while one attack can inflict several Wounds on the Dragon, each successful attack wounds it only once. Also note that only a critical result rolled on the Attack die actually counts as a Hit against the Dragon.
Translator's note, as written in the Spanish source: "What I understand is that each time you wound the dragon, you place your Feat token on one of the gravestones and also place a heart on the heart track. If the heart track fills, the dragon flies again. With several players the heart track fills faster, but each player's blow to the Dragon advances their Feat token one step along the gravestone track. That is, with 4 players, each player needs to wound it 4 times to win the Feat card. Suppose each one wounded it 3 times: 3 x 4 = 12 wounds, enough for the dragon to have taken off several times. Whoever makes the 4th wound wins the Feat, Ground the Dragon."
Taking Flight Again
When the Dragon receives Wound tokens, place them on the bottom of the Quest card "Ground the Dragon". They track how long the Dragon stays on the ground before flying again. When there are 4 or more Wound tokens on the Feat card, the Dragon resolves its Recovery Reaction and then takes off immediately. Remove its figure from the board and remove all Wound tokens from the Feat card. The Dragon flies again, and a different harpoon can now be used to bring it down once more.
Important: once the 4th harpoon has been fired (and none remain), the Dragon stays on the board until the end and no longer flies.
The Dragon Power Card
The first player to complete the Quest card "Ground the Dragon" in the Dragon Part I scenario obtains the Frost Breath card as a reward. This card is assigned to any one of the Guild Heroes and grants a permanent bonus and an additional Attack. The Dragon Power card does not occupy an inventory slot; it is placed on top of the Hero card. The Fire Breath card must be exhausted to perform an attack, just like a normal Attack Upgrade card.
(Source note: the source names this card "Frost Breath" in its heading and "Fire Breath" in the body text, as printed. The bonus value is not stated in the preview.)
Between Scenarios
The transition between the Part I and Part II scenarios of a Dragon encounter is a little different from the usual transition between scenarios in a campaign. Although it is the same in most respects, with a new map being set up, Wound and Death tokens being discarded, and so on, there are two major differences:
No Death Curses: while current Death Curse cards are discarded, no new Death Curse cards are drawn for the Heroes who go from Part I to Part II.
No new Upgrades: the players cannot acquire new Upgrade cards after completing the Part I scenario. All they can do is rearrange their inventories if they wish.
Part II: Alliance to Slay the Dragon
With the Dragon on the ground at the end of Part I, the true battle begins in Part II. The Guilds realize they are not strong enough to defeat the Dragon alone, so an unlikely Alliance is declared: only for this battle, the Heroes of all the Guilds will refrain from attacking one another, cooperating to kill the Dragon! Either all will win against the Dragon, or the Dragon will defeat them all.
Players' Victory
Part II has no Quests at all: to be victorious, the Heroes must defeat the Dragon twice. In the second Dragon scenario, the Dragon can be attacked, wounded and slain like any other Monster (remembering that only a critical result on the Attack die counts as a Hit against it). First, the players face the Dragon with its card on the "Initial" side. When they manage to kill it, its card is flipped to the "Final" side. All Wounds and other tokens are removed from the Dragon, and its figure stays where it was.
As a villain, all players who contribute to the defeat of the Dragon, in both its initial and final forms, receive the coin Reward shown on each side of its card. Mark the Guilds that succeed in Wounding the Dragon by placing their Guild token on the Dragon's card. When that form of the Dragon is defeated, all players who had a Guild token on the Dragon's card receive the coin Reward.
If the players manage to kill the Final form of the Dragon before the Dragon's victory conditions occur, all players win the Dragon scenario. As a reward, all players receive a Dragon Trophy to use should they have a later encounter with another dragon (see page 13 of the English manual, as cited in the source).
(Source note: "Como un villano" is printed at the start of this paragraph in the Spanish source and is kept as printed; it may be a translation artifact.)
Dragon's Victory
The Part II scenario entry describes what must happen for the Dragon to defeat the players. As soon as one of the Dragon's victory conditions is met, the scenario ends with all players defeated. If a Dragon victory condition occurs at exactly the same time as the Final Dragon is slain, the Dragon is defeated and the players win!
(Gap: the list of Dragon victory conditions is in the scenario entry, which the preview does not include. See the gap notes.)
Cooperative Mode
The Part II Dragon scenario changes a fundamental aspect of Arcadia Quest by having the Heroes work together against the Dragon and its minions. This changes the game in two ways:
Allied Heroes: all Heroes are considered allies of one another, not enemies, for all rules and effects of the game. That means they cannot attack each other, and effects that refer to Allies will work on any Hero.
Controlling Monsters: when a player controls a Monster (including the Dragon) due to an Activation Reaction, or due to the effect of a Dragon turn card, that player must do everything possible to attack the target Hero.
- The Monster should move only when necessary to be able to attack its target (so if it can attack without moving, it will not move).
- If the Monster cannot attack its target, it must move as far as possible toward it.
The player may choose between multiple targets that meet the criteria given, and choose how to move the Monster, as long as they follow the parameters above.
Example 1: The Ice Dragon must attack the nearest Hero in line of sight. Both Grom and Diva are in line of sight, and both are 2 Spaces away (diagonals do not count), so the players decide that the Fire Dragon attacks Diva (it can do so). Because the Dragon can attack, it does not move to the Space occupied by the Orc and the Goblin Archer.
(Source note: the example names the "Ice Dragon" and then the "Fire Dragon" for the same creature, as printed in the source. Diagram 1 is not reproduced.)
Gaps in this transcription
The copy of the Spanish translation used here is a partial Scribd preview. The following are NOT in this file and must not be assumed from it:
- The rest of Part II: the Dragon turn cards and the Dragon's special attacks.
- The Part II setup, the scenario maps and tables for both the original and Inferno versions.
- The Dragon card text, including the Young and Older stat values and the Initial and Final reward values.
- The Dragon victory conditions listed in the Part II scenario entry.
- The Frost Breath card's permanent bonus value.
- The rest of the cooperative-mode example and the remaining example diagrams.
- The Dragon Trophy's effect text (only "a trophy to use in case of a later dragon encounter" is given).
- The "JCE" word in the Part I sentence about the Feat card.
The English-language Frost Dragon rulebook was not retrieved. A French translation listed on BGG (a Kickstarter-contributor translation, "Le Dragon de Glace : Règles de l'Extension") is gated on BGG and was not used. A complete transcription should be made from that document or from the official English rules when they can be obtained.