Designers:  Jacques Bariot (Give Me Five, Kemet, Nefertiti), Guillaume Montiage (Death Wears White, Kemet, Nefertiti)

Artists:  Arnaud Boudiron (Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood of Venice, Bloodborne: The Card Game), Pierre Santamaria (Unlock! The Formula, Unlock! The House on the Hill, Unlock! In Pursuit of Cabrakan)

Publisher:  Matagot (13 Days: The Cuban Missile Crisis, Aeon’s End, Aquasphere, Between Two Castles of Mad King Ludwig, Captain Sonar, Charterstone, Concordia Venus, Crown of Emara, Cyclades, Dice Town, Everdell, Fields of Green, Herbaceous, Inis, Istanbul, Istanbul: The Dice Game, Jump Drive, Kemet, Lanterns: The Harvest Festival, Meeple Circus, Modern Art, My Little Scythe, The Oracle of Delphi, Orleans, Race for the Galaxy, Parks, Port Royal, Raptor, Root, Sagrada, Scythe, Shadow Hunters, Takenoko, Tapestry, Tigris & Euphrates, Treasure Island, Viticulture Essential Edition, Western Legends, Wingspan)

Genre/Mechanisms:  action points, area majority/influence, area movement, card drafting, fighting, hand management, miniatures

Funding Status: At the time of this posting, Kemet: Blood and Sand is already fully-funded. In fact, pledges currently total more than 8x the initial funding goal with 4 days left to go on the campaign!

Player Count:  2-5

Solo Mode:  no

Complexity:  medium-heavy

Risk:  medium-high

What It’s About:  “Play one of the Egyptian gods, aiming to stamp your dominance on the parched land. Build pyramids and combine godly powers to create powerful asymmetric combinations and lead your followers in glorious battles.”

How It Works:  “A game of Kemet: Blood and Sand is played over a series of Rounds. Each Round consists of one Day Phase followed by one Night Phase. Each player takes control of an Egyptian divinity: Anubis, Bastet, Horus, Ouadjet, or Sobek, as they struggle for power using their armies.”

“During the Day Phase, in turn order, each player takes their turn as the active player and plays and resolves 1 of their 5 Action tokens. This continues until each player has placed and resolved all 5 of their Action tokens, at which point the Day Phase is over.” This means that each player will be taking all 5 Actions, but when and in what order they take these actions is up to each individual player. The 5 Actions include: Praying (gaining 2 Prayer Points), Buying a Power Tile (in Prayer Points, of the same color as the Pyramid they control), Raising a Pyramid (Pyramids can be 4 Levels, and each Level costs Prayer Points equal to that Level, so Raising a Pyramid from Level 1 to 3 would cost 5 PP– 2 to Raise it to Level 2 and another 3 to Raise it to Level 3), Recruiting Units (paying Prayer Points), and Moving Units.

Battles trigger when one faction’s units move into the same space as another faction’s units, and battles are resolved by each party playing 2 Battle Cards. If the Attacker wins, they gain 1 VP. If the Defender wins, they gains a Veteran token. Any party involved in the battle who doesn’t gain VP will also gain a Veteran Token (meaning the defending party will gain a Veteran Token either way, and the attacking party will gain 1 VP if they win and a Veteran Token if they lose).

“The Night Phase is divided into 9 steps which are resolved in order. During these steps, nocturnal Powers activate, Divine Intervention (DI) cards are allocated, and Victory Points (VP) and Prayer Points (PP) are awarded.”

“If a player has at least 9VP (sum of their Temporary VP and Permanent VP) on their turn before playing an action token, and no other player has more VP than them, they immediately win the game.”

Comparisons:  Cyclades and Inis are usually the first two games mentioned alongside Kemet. Some other similar entries in the Dudes on a Map sub-genre include Blood Rage; Chaos in the Old World; Clash of Cultures; Clockwork Wars; A Game of Thrones: The Board Game; Heroes of Land, Air & Sea; Lords of Hellas; Nexus Ops; and Rising Sun.

What Should I Pledge?:
$29 Veteran Pledge: includes update packs for owners of the previous printing of Kemet: 64 upgraded tiles, the new Divine Interventions Deck, the new Kemet: Blood and Sand rulebook and player aids, 5 player bags, and 3 creature bags.
$79 God Pledge: includes the new Kemet: Blood and Sand with all unlocked stretch goals.
$111 All-In Veteran (only available in the Pledge Manager): includes everything in the Veteran Pledge, plus the Playmat, Emerald Pyramid Expansion, the Great Old Ones Game Up Pack, 5 “old school” green pyramids, and 4/5 of the campaign’s stretch goals: the Bags for Players & Monsters, The Sacred Bull Game Up Pack, The Sand Worm Game Up Pack, and the 10 Obelisks + DI Cards Game Up Pack. Does NOT include the new core box of Kemet: Blood and Sand, the Plastic Tray for Powers, or Sleeves.
$146 All-In God Bundle (only available in the Pledge manager): includes everything in the God Pledge (and all 5/5 of the campaign’s stretch goals), plus the Playmat, Sleeves, Emerald Pyramid Expansion, and Great Old Ones Game Up Pack. Does NOT include the 5 “old school” green pyramids or the Upgrade Pack, both intended for users of the the first printing of Kemet to upgrade their old version to the current one.

Add-Ons:
$23 Emerald Pyramid Expansion
$8 Cthulhu & Nyarlathotep: originally intend to be the theme of the new expansion before Matagot shifted gears, you can add on these miniatures and a few tiles to still be able to play the new expansion with these gods and theme.
$11 Sleeves: in (2) sizes, 63 x 88 mm & 44 x 68 mm.
$34 Playmat: Board Size + 10%, or 691 x 1025 mm.
$6 “Old School” Green Pyramids (5): for use with the first printing of Kemet.

KS Exclusives
None.

All-In Total: In the continental U.S., you’re looking at $146 for the All-In God Bundle plus $16 in shipping for a total of $162.

Kemet: Blood and Sand completes its Kickstarter on Tuesday, June 16th and tentatively ships in August 2021.