Luis Brueh is probably best known for the Dwar7s series, which, like all of his games, he not only designed, but also did the illustration work for. Dwar7s Fall, Winter, Spring, and Duels were all released by Vesuvius Media along with Brueh’s other game Covil: The Dark Overlords. Valknut is Brueh’s first self-published release and was funded via a Kickstarter campaign in April of 2020. Valknut is an asymmetrical skirmish game for 2-4 players featuring factions made up of some of the more iconic creatures from Norse Mythology including Ice Giants, Valkyries, Goblins, and more! Much like with the art and illustration in his other games so far, I find Brueh’s illustrations for Valknut to be bright, colorful and possessing a cartoonish cuteness that is unique and easily recognizable as being his.

Like most wargames, Valknut seems to have been designed for two players, but Brueh left room to include the option for more players and their factions. For the purposes of this review, we only played the game as a two-player though at some point I would like to try the three or four-player mode. For the most part, the basics of the set up remain the same regardless of the number of players. First, the Terrain Cards are shuffled. The top card is dealt face-down to the center of the play space to be used as the Parley Area of the Battlefield. Shuffle terrain cards. Reveal 3 Terrain cards for Terrain Pool. Each player chooses a Warband and receives their respective units and Ambush card. They then place up to 4 units in the Parley Area of the Battlefield. The player with the Warband with the fewest units is the first player.

As a skirmish game, Valknut is meant to be played quickly, with players moving across the board, engaging the enemy, and strategically eliminating their opponents. What makes this game different, however, is that the battlefield grows and changes as the game progresses! At the beginning of a player’s turn, they refill the Terrain Pool back up to three cards, choose one of those cards, and place their chosen card adjacent to a previously placed card. Terrains Cards grant movement points and certain ones bestow game effects when placed. A player may also discard one of the Terrain Cards from the pool and use their Ambush card instead (there is terrain on the back of the card). The active player then spends their movement points to move their units. Should they manage to orthogonally flank an opponent on adjacent sides (either between their unit and unpassable terrain or two of their units), the opponent dies immediately. Players can also pass on their turn, should they choose. There are two ways to trigger the end of the game. If the last Terrain card is placed and there are still units from both factions on the Battlefield, the game ends and players add up victory points from their surviving units, ignoring any units still in the Parley Area of the Battlefield. However, if there are no enemy units on the board at any point, the surviving Warband is the winner and the game is over.

In addition to offering several other game modes, Valknut also comes with a Gods & Monsters expansion for even more content. The Gjallarhorn cards contain easily recognizable characters from Norse mythology such as Fenrir, Jörmungandr, Hel, Thor, and several others! These cards affect gameplay when used and offer an end game bonus or penalty to the player possessing them. When adding this expansion to the game, it is best to use it during 4-player Mode or when playing with the Ragnarok rules.

Vikings?! Skirmish game?! Practically fits in my pocket?! Sign me up! As someone who really got her start in modern gaming by playing skirmish games such as Summoner Wars, Malifaux, X-Wing, and Ogre, I was immediately drawn to Valknut when I saw it during a random browsing session on Kickstarter. With only a few short hours left of the campaign, I decided the price point was right to take a gamble (don’t worry, I did make sure to read through the updates, available rulebook, and several of the reviews beforehand) and backed it. Valknut is pretty quick to play, offers a lot of variety for players of varying skill levels, and even expands flawlessly to include more players! The core mechanics of the game are simple enough to learn yet the asymmetrical nature of each faction playing completely different from one another means that learning not only how your unique units work to your advantage, but also knowing what the opponent’s faction(s) brings to the table will leave a learning curve to be overcome beyond the scope of the basic rules. In addition to the theme being an attention grabber (I am a fool for Vikings and/or pirates…), the small scale of the game had my attention as it is played on a modular board utilizing standard sized playing cards. I can literally set this up almost anywhere there’s a flat surface and play it and, as someone who is often on the go or traveling, this is a huge selling point for me. After several games since my rewards arrived, I am still thrilled I managed to get in on this one last minute!

All photos of Brueh Games products were taken and edited by Krista