Tabletopia News

The American Tabletop Awards are an award given to various board games released over the previous calendar year by a committee of tabletop media professionals all based in the United States. Today, the 4 winners for 2021 were announced, representing a wide variety of excellent games that span genres, player counts, and themes.

All 4 of these games are available to play on Tabletopia if you want to see what all the fuss is about, and we'd like to offer a massive congratulations to all the winners as well as the recommended and nominated games!



Designer: Emma Larkins
Artist: Bonnie Pang
Publisher: Gamewright





Designer: Thomas Sing
Artist: Marco Armbruster
Publisher: KOSMOS





Designer: Kevin Russ
Artist: Beth Sobel
Publisher: Flatout Games





Designer: Éric Dubus, Olivier Melison
Artist: Loïc Muzy, Agathe Pitié, Amber Scharf, Florian Stitz
Publisher: Holy Grail Games

In Dealt!, first released as Krass Kariert (Checkered Combos), you don't necessarily win by going out first, but at least you don't lose the game.

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To start, each player receives three life tokens and two reserve cards at random, which they place face up in front of themselves. They then receive a hand of cards, the order of which they cannot change. The start player for a round leads by playing a combination of up to three cards, and these cards must be next to one another in that player's hand. A player can lay down a single card, a pair, a triple, or a run of two or three consecutive cards. Each player in turn must beat the combination, with a pair being beaten by a higher pair or a triple. If you cannot or will not play, you instead pick up one of your reserve cards, placing it where you choose within your hand. If you have no more reserve cards, then you must discard a life token.

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Once each player has played or passed, whoever played the highest combination wins that round and begins the next round. If a player must discard a life token but has none, this player loses the game and everyone else wins.

The Old Ones have risen. Monsters walk the Earth. Humanity is finished, but the struggle continues. Which Great Old One will rule the ruins of Earth? Now, you take charge!

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Cthulhu Wars: Duel is a fast-moving two-player strategy game in which you play as Great Cthulhu himself or the Black Goat, a cosmic goddess of hideous fertility. Each side is strikingly different with unique units, abilities, and strategies available.

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In Cthulhu Wars: Duel, the giant plastic miniatures have been replaced with cardboard standees. This not only allows the game to be more affordable but also makes it travel-friendly and saves table space. This means you can drop a box of Cthulhu Wars: Duel in a bag and take it to your game night with minimal space requirements. Cthulhu Wars: Duel also doesn't take up as much table space as the original, allowing it to be played in smaller spaces. In short, this is the most accessible version of Cthulhu wars ever made!

The year is 2104. The machines dominate the planet Earth trying to wipe out the human race. You have been chosen to stop them.



Cyberdoom Tower is a solo and co-op futuristic dungeon delve experience where you try to collect the pass-codes to unlock the top floor of the Cyberdoom Tower and defeat the AI who controls the machines. Only you can save the world!



Explore the Cyberdoom Tower by moving your piece between the different floors of the tower. Fight the sentries guarding her by spending AP and rolling dice to determine your skills. Upgrade your gear deck to be ready for the final fight. The more time you spend collecting access codes, the harder it becomes.

Hero Realms is a fantasy-themed deck-building game that is an adaptation of the award-winning Star Realms game - designed by Robert Dougherty & Darwin Kastle, and published by Wise Wizard Games. The game includes basic rules for two-player games.

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Each player starts the game with a ten-card personal deck containing gold (for buying) and weapons (for combat). You start each turn with a new hand of five cards from your personal deck. When your deck runs out of cards, you shuffle your discard pile into your new deck. An 80-card Market deck is shared by all players, with five cards being revealed from that deck to create the Market Row. As you play, you use gold to buy champion cards and action cards from the Market. These champions and actions can generate large amounts of gold, combat, or other powerful effects. You use combat to attack your opponent and their champions. When you reduce your opponent's score (called health) to zero, you win!

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Now there are even more ways to play on Tabletopia, with the following improvements added:

[h2]Character Packs[/h2]
Play Hero Realms as a Cleric, Fighter, Ranger, Thief, or Wizard! Character Packs add a cool new dimension to player vs player games - giving each player asymmetrical starting decks and unique powers. Each match-up is a unique challenge that will require different strategies.



[h2]Ancestry Pack[/h2]
The 20-card Ancestry pack allows you to play Hero Realms as a Dwarf, Elf, Ogre, Orc, or Smallfolk. You may use any race with a generic starting deck, or combine them with any character pack. So you could play as an ogre wizard, an elven ranger, a dwarven fighter, or any one of the 30 new race/class combinations.



[h2]Hidden Areas[/h2]
Our recently announced Hidden Areas feature has now been added to Hero Realms. This will give you a space on the board to place your cards directly from the deck rather than constantly moving cards in and out of your hand. This leads to a much smoother gameplay experience when playing a constantly moving deckbuilder like Hero Realms!



[h2]3-4 Player Mode[/h2]
Hero Realms offers multiple options for play at higher player counts, including Free-For-All, Hunter (First Blood), Hunter (Last One Standing), and Hydra. Read more about these multiplayer rules here!