Disney Lorcana is a trading card game that features Disney characters with original and reimagined art. The game is set in the world of Lorcana, a place with a combination of lore and arcana. Players take on the mantle of Illumineer, a powerful sorcerer, and band together Disney characters from Lorcana’s “The Great Illusionary”, a treasury of all Disney songs and stories ever made. There are several packages and bundles for Lorcana. I was sent a copy of Shimmering Skies with the Illumineer’s Trove, portfolios to keep cards organized, and booster packs to see what surprises I could find in this Disney world.
How’s it Play?
You will be playing down cards looking to discover lore throughout Lorcana and using them to summon Disney characters, items, and locations to help you on this quest. You want to hinder your opponent and challenge any of the opposing characters using your cards to do that. The first player to gain 20 or more lore wins the game. The best way to get lore is playing down Disney characters and sending them on quests.
Each card has a cost; some have an inkwell mark around their cost that can also be used for ink. Not all cards can be used for ink. The bottom of the card in text shows its ability or effect. Some cards, like character cards, show strength, which is how much damage they can deal during a challenge, willpower, which is how much damage it takes to banish that character, or a location and lore value, the latter of which is how much lore you gain when they quest. If they have a location, it indicates how much lore you gain at the beginning of your turn.
Each player starts the game with their own deck, and each player has their own damage counter and a way to track their lore. Players each shuffle their decks and draw 7 cards to begin. At the beginning of the game you can alter you starting hand by discarding cards you don’t want to start with to draw new cards.
Players then take turns by first readying any exerted cards by turning them back upright, trigger any effects that happen at the beginning of your turn from cards you have, and draw 1 card from the top of your deck.
Next, once per turn you can put a card facedown into your inkwell at any time and then perform a list of other actions as many times as you’d like. This consists of playing down cards, using an ability from one of your cards, moving a character to a location, or taking an action with a character who has been in play since the start of your turn like questing, or challenging your opponent.
The cards you place down in your inkwell are used to pay costs like playing down additional cards from your hand. Each card in your inkwell is the same, and will stay there for the remaining of the game. When using the ink to play down cards from your hand you “exert” it, tilting it to the side. The character card is placed out, but can’t do anything until the next turn.
Whenever you play a card, read the text and do what it says. Items and locations can be placed down and used right away, unlike characters. Song cards are like action cards but there is a rule for an extra way to pay for them, like exerting a character to trigger that card.
If you already have the same character out you can pay the shift cost instead of the ink cost to then cover the old card with the new one. Questing is done by exerting your character to gain lore shown on their card. Challenging involves stopping your opponent by exerting your character to face off against one of your opponent’s character. Each character deals damage to each other, and if the damage exceeds their willpower, they are discarded.
You can move characters to locations and take bonuses when doing that. Locations can be discarded by challenging from the other player as well, but also if it remains out, you potentially can gain from it at the beginning of your turns.
Play continues by taking turns until a player reaches 20 lore or more, and when that happens, that player wins the game.
The Verdict
Lorcana continues to ignite the trading card world. This game in particular is interesting to me and my family due to the Disney theme. We all know these characters, items, and locations because we have seen the movies already, so we get excited when we see what we know already. But what we don’t know is the effects or abilities of the cards, so it is fun to read them and see what each card does.
The game is a 1 vs 1 battle. You want to get to 20 lore before your opponent, but you need to find the right combination of cards to do this. If you see your opponent with the right cards out, then you need to challenge them to get rid of those cards to mess up their combination. They then need to search for the right combination again with the other cards they have.
The beauty of this design is finding those combinations, not just once, but again and again because your opponent will be messing you up. You will be making choices as to which cards to use for ink instead of for their abilities. You also need to strategize which cards should be placed out and when, and, ultimately, figure out how to get to 20 lore before your opponent does.
The cards are fun to read and explore, just like other trading card games. And, like many other trading card games, there are rareness tiers and you can build up your deck by purchasing packs of cards. There are common cards, uncommon cards, rare cards, super rare cards, legendary cards, and enchanted cards. Each time you buy a new pack, you get excited to open it up and see what cards you get and how you can change your deck.
I can see how tournaments would be fun as you get new cards, too. Getting to play to see if you can piece together a good combination and then do this over and over again in a high energy environment. That mixed with a Disney theme is a recipe for success.
Images via Ravensburger
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