Mystic Lands, Card Crafting Evolved from AEG

Vale Map: Long Bay
7 months ago – Fri, Nov 21, 2025 at 07:06:08 AM

Hello Druids,

The final vale map, and the second map for the expansion, Tropical Tides, is the Long Bay. This is the last map John D Clair shared with the team back when we were making them, and shows how much further we can explore vale maps in the future!

I just received some of the latest art for the final map to share:

The Long Bay is unique because it focuses on the paths. The tide will ebb and flow allowing you to only travel the low tide (blue) paths when the tide is low. But high tide isn't all that bad, as thematically it leaves treasures that were washed up on those low tide paths. High tide also lets you manipulate your deck a bit, if you want to discard your on-deck card. 

Here are the rules. Note: the High Tide and Low Tide spaces are the blue boxes in the rules box at the top right of the prototype map above.

Long Bay
Setup: Place the tide token {tide token} on the low tide space.

All players have the optional ability: {day} If you Withered, you may change the tide by switching the {tide token} from the current tide to the other one. 

High Tide (space)
{day} Discard your on-deck card

Low Tide (space)
You may use {low tide blue paths}

Now, withering may be something you want to do if you need the tide a certain way on your turn. Note that you'll even get the benefits of both the Low and High tides that turn if you switch tides! 

For example, if the token is on High Tide, you can activate that day ability of discarding your on-deck card. Then activate the optional ability if you withered to switch the tides, you can now travel the low tide paths.

The Low Tide paths will grant you 2 types of resources, mana and rain tokens:

Sunrise Point is one of the vales printed on Long Bay, giving you an activation ability to change the tides when you choose, without having to wither. Get one of the advances that grants the power to refresh vale abilities, and you'll be in control of the tides!

Another printed vale is the Shallows. It's completely surrounded with water.

Every player who enchants here will have an activated ability of playing their on-deck card in the day phase, which avoids withering, and speeds through your deck faster. You also get the option to change the tide.

For everyone that reaches the Sunset Bay on the far-right bottom of the map you will get 2 scoring options that depends on what tide the game ended on:

Sunset Bay {ongoing} After you complete your final turn of the game, if it is High Tide gain 1 {vp} per 2 cards with at least 1 advance, if it is Low Tide gain 1 {vp} per card you own without an advance on it.

This makes it a struggle between players to finish on the tide that they want to match how they built their deck!

I hope you've enjoyed learning about the vale maps, we play tested even more ideas that may become a reality in the future.

Thank you to everyone who backed the campaign, from everyone at AEG!

-Kirk
AEG Development Team Member

Solo play, a sneak peek!
7 months ago – Thu, Nov 20, 2025 at 03:06:44 PM

Hello Druids,

A few of you have asked about solo play for Mystic Lands, and now that we've got a few dozen plays under our belts, collectively, I can share a little bit about how it will work! 

Note that all rules and artwork shared here are subject to change, but the general mechanics will remain the same. Let's start with game setup:

Setup:
Set up all your components as you normally would for a 2-player game. 

In a convenient place on your table set up your opponent’s area. Your opponent is called the Force of Nature, and they get a player board with a VP token starting at 0 and a Spirit token starting at 1. They get all of their Enchantment cubes. 

Use a mana token on the Force of Nature board to track the turn number (it does not gain Mana).

The rest of their player-color components are not needed.  

Shuffle the 14 card Challenge deck and place it “Face-up” on their Deck space. For normal difficulty these cards should all be brown-side face-up. 

If using the Works of Nature card, place it next to the Challenge Deck and place the green, yellow, and red tokens on it on their gray side.

Here is an example of 3 of the Challenge cards, which I will clarify in a bit:

Gameplay:
You go first. Your turns resolve the same as they would in a normal game, but with the Force of Nature taking their turn after your Dusk phase and before your next Night phase, the Force of Nature takes its turn.

Round Overview:
• Player Night phase
• Player Day phase
• Player Dusk Phase
• Force of Nature Turn
     • Flip all work of nature tokens to the gray side.
     • Resolve the on deck Challenge card.
     • Turn on TOKENS indicated
          • Green - Positive for you.
          • Yellow - Neutral for you.
          • Red - Negative for you.
     • Force of Nature gains any Spirit & VP indicated.
     • Force of Nature gains the Advances indicated.
     • Check to see if the Force of Nature can Enchant any Vales.
• End of Force of Nature’s turn
          • Discard their on deck Challenge card.
• End of round.

Here's what the Force of Nature board looks like in Tabletop Simulator. We will decide on what the final print version will be, if not just one of the other playerboards after all development is done.

We'll start with the normal difficulty rules without the Work of Nature card added:

Force of Nature turn detail:
On the Force of Nature turn, resolve the top card of the Challenge deck for the turn number you are on (1-4, 5-8, 9-11, or 12+).

After the Challenge card has been resolved, set it aside in a discard pile. If the Challenge deck is ever out of cards, reform it with the discarded cards.

Resolving the Challenge card in the following order:

• Give the Force of Nature VP and Spirits as indicated. If they cross and trigger the 5 or 15 VP threshold, discard the right-most level 1 advance to make room for the new level 2.

• The Force of Nature claims the advances in the market as indicated. These are placed into the “Discard” zone of their player board and only matter for end game scoring. 

• Check to see if the Force of Nature enchants a Vale using the following steps:

• Do they have enough Spirits to enchant 1 or more Vales (discounts apply)? If no, skip to the end of the Force of Nature turn. If Yes:

     • If there is only 1 possible Vale, they will enchant that one, and they always enchant the top-most spot.

     • If they could enchant several, their preference goes as follows. From top down, if ever one of these steps leaves you with only 1 viable option, that is the one they enchant:

1. Prefers to be the first cube at a Vale.
2. Prefers the greater endgame VP number.
3. Prefers the lower cost.
4. If there are still multiple possibilities, then you choose which one.

     • Now check to see if the Force of Nature has enough remaining Spirits to buy another Vale, and if they do, repeat this step.

End Game Scoring:
The game end triggers as normal, by a player reaching 25VP or placing their 10th Vale cube. The player triggering the end gains 5VP, and the other player then takes an additional turn.

Your score is calculated in the same way as a multi-player game. 

The Force of Nature scores as follows:
     • VP accrued on its VP track as normal.
     • All end-game VP on advances it has collected.
     • VP from its Vales. However, in this case, while the Force of Nature always places its cube at the highest available spot on each Vale card, it scores VP for that Vale equal to the Highest VP value at, or below, its spot.

Difficulty Scaling: 

The cards in the Challenge deck are double-sided, with the normal difficulty on the brown side and the Hard difficulty on the blue side. You can scale your difficulty by turning some portion of the cards over to the Hard side before the game.

     • Standard: All Brown.
     • Moderate: Set up the deck where every 3rd card (3rd, 6th, 9th, 12th) is flipped to Blue.
     • Hard: Set up the deck where every 2nd card is flipped to Blue.
     • Harder: Every 2nd and 3rd flipped to Blue.
     • Hardest: All cards flipped to blue.

Here are 3 cards as an example, the top are card fronts with the normal difficulty, and the bottom are their backsides with Hard Difficulty:

“Works of Nature” Scenario Modules:

There are 2 “Works of Nature" scenarios that you can optionally use on a double-sided card. One is a Basic scenario, and the other side will be an advanced scenario.

These cards may have standard “always-on” effects. They will also always have a Green, Yellow, and Red icon with rules text. 

On the Challenge cards you will see these color icons. If you are not using a scenario, they mean nothing. Otherwise the Challenge card will turn on the specific scenario effect shown. 

    • Green (circle): When on, this will be in effect during the phase shown. It is usually positive.
     • Yellow (hexagon): When on, this will be in effect during the phase shown. It is usually neutral. 
     • Red (square): When on, this will be in effect during the phase shown. It is usually negative. 

During end of game scoring, make sure to factor in the Work of Nature scenario score bonus.

Here's an example of the Basic Works of Nature card we are currently using to test the Challenge deck with the Green ability activated (it flips back to gray when not active):

Here's an example of the Force of Nature resolving its 5th turn while using the Work of Nature card:

They will use the second section of their top deck card. 

     • First they will move the mana token to track that is round 5.
     • Second they will flip the yellow token so that Mycorrhiza will be active during your turn.
     • Next they will gain 2 Spirit and 2 VP.
     • then they will gain the 5th advance from the Market.
     • And finally check if they can Enchant any vales with the 4 spirit they now have.

The Works of Nature card opens up some very cool possibilities for future releases. We're deciding how to expand the solo experience with them beyond this base game implementation, but the nice thing is they can be released on just double sided cards. John has some very cool ideas that lean into the flavor of each aspect color!

As always, thanks for backing!

-Kirk
AEG Development Team Member

 

Vale Map: Tropical Forest
7 months ago – Wed, Nov 19, 2025 at 07:58:27 AM

Hello Druids,

We are now about to dig into the 2 expansion Vale Maps, which come free with the deluxe Oran Mór edition offered here on Kickstarter with 36 additional advancement cards, 4 more druids, and 11 more Vale Cards.

The name of this expansion is Tropical Tides, so we're re-theming this prototype of a snowy cold map into a Tropical Forest with magic infused gems and crystals to collect.

Here's how the map we tested looked:

The Snowstars on this map will become Physalis Gems that grow on the tropical trees. Like the Physalis fruit, it sprouts inside gossamer leaves. This was the art direction we've given the amazing artists at Matt Paquette & Co. so I'm excited to see how it turns out.

The Iceblooms will become Bush Crystals, which are already scattered around the first sketch we have. Note that all names and art are subject to change as we work on it, and it begins to evolve and become part of the Mystic Lands world! Here is a sneak peek at the first sketch for the map illustration:

Now for the rules on the map, Physalis Gems will score endgame VP depending on how many you collect:

[Physalis Gem icon] End of Game: Score points for each Enchanted spot on a Vale card that is adjacent to a [Physalis Gem] as follows:

(Gems Collected = Endgame VP)
1 = 1
2 = 3
3 = 6
4 = 10
5 = 15
6 = 21
7 or more gems = +7 points per additional gem

Bush Crystals simply give you a choice during your Day phase on collecting Mana or immediate VP gained to your player board tracker:

[Bush Crystal icon]: {day} Gain 1 {mana} or 1 {vp} per enchanted spot you have adjacent to a [Bush Crystal].

There are different ways to collect these icons. Some paths lead to mini-vales you can enchant to collect them:

They are cheap in Spirit, but give no endgame VP for your placed cubes, other than what the Physalis Gems and Bush Crystals give as part of their powers.

While we're here, check out my ALL-TIME favorite Vale Card, Satyr Home! The only thing better than the Druid you get to start the game with is getting a 2nd druid from this vale!

The other way to collect these precious icons are by enchanting certain spots on the Vale cards. They are in different positions for different locations:

At the farthest reach of the map will be a renamed spot full of Bush Crystals:

Through the center of the Forest is a fast path with some different costs associated with it:

This path will cost you 4 Mana to cross, but it gives you access to a level 2 vale card straight from the starting circle with a 2 Spirit discount to boot! The example Vale card, Great Table, normally costs 6 Spirit to enchant, but here you can enchant it for 4 Spirit instead!

The path after it also costs 4 mana to traverse, but with a level 1 vale card there that also gives a 2 spirit discount, it's great for players heavier on Mana than Spirit in their deck build.

Here's a level 2 advance that loves to help you reuse vale card effects with activation arrows. This will let you refresh them to use again and again. Collect more green aspect icons to do it even more!

That's it for today, my next couple updates will include the Long Bay vale map and a report from our solo game testing!

-Kirk
AEG Development Team Member

 

Vale Map: Leap Frog Fen
7 months ago – Mon, Nov 17, 2025 at 01:36:22 PM

Hello Druids,

I'm back today with one of my favorite vales, Leap Frog Fen! We as a development team got to pitch some ideas for vale maps, and this was my pitch having just wrapped up development on Into the Machine. I wanted a little race featuring the leap frog aspect of that game and focusing on making the decision on what spaces to Enchant on vale cards even harder.

We're now getting into the last 3 vale maps, of which the commissioned art is still being made, so I can share sketches of what the background illustration will look like, but for the descriptions and examples I will show you the prototypes we were using (you get to see how the sausage is made!). Suffice it to say, all artwork and naming is not final, but development is pretty much done. We've been playing these maps for a couple years now.

Players on this vale map will be leaping frogs around the lily pads of a raised pond at the top-middle of the map! They count laps on another track at the top left of the map.

The rules for the map are:

Leap Frog Fen

Setup: Add a cube from your supply to one of the starting squares on the giant lily pad, and another to the lap counter track. In a 2 or 3 player game place permanent static cubes on the indicated spots from the unused player colors. The giant lily pad is just a starting space and not part of the lily pad loop. 

When you enchant a spot on a Vale card:
Leap your frog (move your cube) a number of lily pads equal to the number shown adjacent to the spot you enchanted. Frogs always leap over lily pads occupied by other frogs, only counting and landing on empty spaces.

Counting Laps:
Each time your frog lands on or passes the [pink lily pad], move your lap counter 1 space left and gain its reward. If you run off the lap counter, claim the highest place still available on the leaderboard. 

End of Game:
Move all cubes still on the lap counter track to the leader board in place order. In the case of ties, farthest 'round the lily pad wins. Claim VP equal to your spot.

In Leap Frog Fen, all of the vale spaces you can enchant have an icon next to them:

All of the vale card have their own best powers at the top, but if you want to leap your frog for more rewards and more endgame VP than other players, then the bottom spots will do that for you!

Here's an example of two moves. Let's say the red player enchanted a vale space that moves their frog 4 spaces:

On the blue player's turn, if they also enchant a vale that leaps them 4 lily pads, they will get to hop over the red player's frog!

Don't worry that blue got an extra space, because they'll return the favor on red's next move. If red really gets into the race and enchants a leap 5 vale space they'll not only sail past blue...

...they'll pass over the pink lily pad, getting to count 1 lap:

Red immediately gets to add 2 mana to their supply. Each step up the lap counter will grant the reward shown.

There are 2 special vales on the map that are just about leaping your frog and endgame VP:

If any player makes it to the end of the lap counter, they'll claim the top spot available on the leaderboard. Also, when the game ends, players will move from the lap counter track to the leaderboard with further players taking the top spots. Cubes do not leapfrog on the lap counter track, so player could be tied in laps. In that case, the player whose frog is farther along on the lily pad track breaks ties.

In this 4 player game, blue gains an additional 11 VP, red gets 5VP, yellow gets 3VP and green was left in 4th place, with no additional VP.

Next up, we'll get to explore a Tropical Forest! (Which was a little more icy and cold in out playtesting?)

-Kirk
AEG Development Team Member

Vale Map: Sand and Sails
7 months ago – Fri, Nov 14, 2025 at 01:29:28 PM

Hello Druids!

Sand and Sails is the next map we get to explore and enchant! The final name, and some details are subject to change as I just got the first draft of artwork for this about 20 minutes ago from the amazing Matt Paquette & Co.! 

Sand and Sails gets a little taste of icon collection and a bigger dose of player interaction as new icons have been added adjacent to certain spaces on the Vale cards. For example, when this level 2 Vale, Sunlight Valley, is discovered and flipped over you'll see that next to the bottom cube space is a Desert Sun icon:

Now when a player spends Spirit to enchant this vale, the decision on which space to place their cube isn't so obvious! If they have been collecting advances that add sun icons to their deck, they may want one of the top 2 spots to ensure they get the 7 end of game VP. If not, the first player here may want to collect Desert Suns!

But what does that do for you? I'm glad you asked!

These rules are on the Vale Map for quick reference. Desert Suns are all the rage in collectables in this region! The more you collect the more powers you gain. These do stack, so players who collect 5 or more will gain 1 Mana, gain 1 VP, get to play their on-deck card, and only wither when a 5th Sun is revealed, instead of 4. Fitting for the desert!

This map has special mini vales as well, like these 2 in the top left that allow 2 players to enchant here to gain some Desert Suns!

That covers the desert along the top of the map. Along the bottom is the coastline to the sea where there are Natural Harbors adjacent to Vale Spots. Meeting with other players in these Harbors will give you both an amazing prize:

Here's an example of some Vales with harbors:

The Natural Harbor in the Spiderwood aligns with the top two spaces. The first player to claim the top space next to the Harbor won't will gain the normal power of that Vale in getting 1 Mana when they want it, but nothing from the Harbor just yet.

As soon as another player claims the other harbor space, that player will have the 2 endgame VP as normal, but now both players at the same Harbor will each draw 1 random advance from the level 1 Advance deck! This is in addition to the two buys that the active player has, so they can sleeve any gained advances this turn in their Dusk phase. The other player will also have that extra advance to sleeve in their next Dusk phase if they like, or can hold it until a more opportune turn to sleeve.

The Natural Harbor in the Mother Oak aligns with the second and third space instead. This offers an interesting choice for players. The first player to enchant here could give up the 1 endgame VP of the first space to take the second space instead, hoping to pair up in the Harbor with another player later. 

The next player to enchant here also has a choice! They could take the first space that the first player left open, gaining access to 2 rain tokens, and forego meeting in the Harbor with the first player. But maybe they want the extra 1 VP and the random level 1 Advance card over the second rain token!

But let's get crazy!

The Amethyst Cliffs Bay is a giant harbor where 4 players can meet! The first player to enchant here could gain up to 3 random level 1 advance cards, if the other 3 players choose to also meet!

And finally...

...there is the Gathering Spires. It's a close trip from the starting circle, and a bargain cost at only 1 Spirit to enchant, but the trail has a cost. Players are going to need to have at least 3 VP already collected on their player board to spend as a payment to cross. Once there, you'll have a Desert Sun in your collection and a Natural Harbor to meet other players in!

While we're talking about gaining random Level 1 Advances, you could gain anything... 

...even an Advance that will gain you random Level 2 Advances!

Collect 3 more Yellow aspects on the card with your Aegisian Hummingbird and you'll be swimming in combos!

I hope you are enjoying these peaks into the Vale Maps. Next update, we're going to get a little froggy!

-Kirk
AEG Development Team Member