Designer: Ronald Halliday (Psychomania, Revanche)

Artists: Ronald Halliday, Michael T. Schroeder (The Abandons, A Note for Murder)

Publisher: Puzzling Pixel Games (The Abandons, A Note for Murder)

Genre/Mechanisms: card drafting, dice rolling, line drawing, network and route building, paper and pencil, puzzle, variable phase order

Funding Status: At the time of this posting, Seven Bridges is already fully-funded. In fact, pledges currently total almost 1.5x the initial funding goal, with less than 2 days to go on the campaign.

Player Count: 1-6

Solo Mode: yes

Complexity: medium-light

Risk: high

What It’s About:  “A roll-and-write dice drafting game in which players explore the historic city of Königsberg by colouring in connecting streets on their map. Points are earned by seeing different parts of the city, but the various ways to earn these points are only unlocked by crossing the city’s seven bridges.”

How It Works:  A game of Seven Bridges takes place over 5 rounds, with 6 dice drafted each round, for a total of 30 dice over the course of a game. On a given turn, the first player rolls all six dice; then, in clockwise order, each player drafts one die until all dice have been drafted. Drafted dice need to follow several rules: they must connect the player’s existing network of lines in at least one spot; in cases where a player can draft more than one die per turn, the lines from the drafted dice must be added to their map in the order the dice were drafted; players can cross old drawn lines, but can never draw OVER old drawn lines; footpaths (dashed lines) can only be drawn using the footpath bonus; if not usable, dice can be downgraded; and lines can only be added to one square on the map, unless the player drafts the 2 or 3 sides that trigger the “Get On Your Horse!” ability.

After all players have drafted dice and added the appropriate markings to their player maps, the first player token passes to the left, and a new round begins. There are 11 landmarks on the map; whenever a player draws a line passing by one, the active player triggers either an Immediate Use or Reserved Use bonus. Immediate Use bonuses give the player an additional line to draw on their map; Reserved Use bonuses allow a player to re-roll dice during the dice drafting phase, or to distribute all of the dice as they see fit.

At the end of the game, players score points the following ways: 1) closed loops score the number of right angles they contain multiplied by the number of bridges they’ve crossed (if haven’t crossed any, they simply score a point per right angle); 2&3) for each bridge crossed (or landmark visited), the player fills out a segment of the bridges crossed scale bar (or landmarks visited scale bar), and then scores the associated points; 4&5) one point for each building and tree passed; 6) any point values on the edges of the map next to where the player drew a line to the edge of a map; and 7) the sum of all bonuses used during the game. Players then count the number of bridges they crossed during the game, and score that many of their highest sub-totals. For instance, if a player crossed over 5 bridges during the course of the game, they’ll add together the highest 5 of their 7 subtotals. The player with the highest score wins.

Comparisons:  Some other popular roll & write games include Cartographers: A Roll Player Tale, Railroad Ink, Roll Through the Ages: The Bronze Age, That’s Pretty Clever, Twice As Clever, and Welcome To….

What Should I Pledge?:
$24 Take a Stroll With Us: a copy of Seven Bridges with all unlocked stretch goals, plus the print-and-play version and access to the pledge manager.
$39 The Cartographer’s Bundle: everything in the Take a Stroll With Us pledge, plus an 11″ x 17″ wall map of historic Konigsberg on matte paper.

Add-Ons:
None.

KS Exclusives:
None listed, but I can’t imagine the wall map will be going to retail.

All-In Total: In the continental U.S. (and if you’re not interested in the wall map), you’re looking at $24 for the Take a Stroll With Us pledge plus $5 in shipping for a total of $29.

Seven Bridges completes its Kickstarter on Friday, November 22nd and tentatively ships in September 2020.