Ashes Reborn : Rise of the Phoenix is the 2021 relaunch of a competitive duelling card game originally from 2015, where players take the role of Phoenixborn demi gods who are protectors of their world, fighting off the Chimeras and freeing humanity. It is a pre build deckbuilding game, where you select your usable cards before you begin. Your character has its own health, board limitations and unique ability, and the thirty card deck you prepare will also represents your life force or energy, which once depleted will then cause fatigue wounds, bringing the end of the game closer.
Phoenixborn are spellcasters, and will have various spells in their deck to cast, along with various allies who support them, and a power conjuration of creatures they can also bring into play. Their ability to build their battle and spell play boards comes from a mana pool, which is a set of ten dice rolled at the start of each round, utilising symbols to play, activate cards or use abilities. Rounds are quite straighforward, drawing a hand of five cards, utilising the mana symbols to pay the cost of a main action and then an optional side action each turn. Rolled dice can also be manipulated by spending cards, but this will directly reduce your energy pool, which adds an element of long term risk.
Each Phoenixborn character comes with their own pre built deck, but this can be re-constructed by the player too. Mana dice will also be selected at the start, and you will need to match the dice you plan to roll with the action symbols needed within your card pool so you can utilise them. This combination works really well, and any fan of dice and card combo games should enjoy the mechanism. Phoenixborn characters do feel different, and choosing which one you play with will create the most variation.
The game became solo or co-operative in 2023 with the lauch of Red Rains, a series of expansions which will add a Chimera opponent to play against. This transforms and broadens the game scope, bringing it onto my own radar. These enemy fights are well done, each comes with two different attack decks but these can be mixed up for extra variety, plus there are different opponent difficulty levels which adjust the Chimera health points or the number of cards it will play against you each turn. The enemy response is dictated by a 12 sided dice roll, together with the general threat of an ultimate action which builds up through crystal dice being rolled each turn.
This is a really enjoyable solo game, fighting the chimera with a mix of dice rolling, manipulation and card playing, uncovering the way the different heroes play, which you will discover and learn. The artwork throughout is really neat, the white background to the cards looking clean and classy with great drawings throughout. Unlike most other deck builders this game gives the feeling that the enemy is fighting back against you. Collecting everything can be expensive but I was fortunate to buy a job lot which made it a cheaper purchase, however just the core set plus the Corpse of Viros solo expansion will give you a lot of gameplay variety.
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Expansions
There are many expansions you can add to enhance or change the gameplay from which i have collected the themes i like the best (my additions highlighted green = own, blue = part owned, red = not purchased) :
Deluxe Boxes
The more expensive deluxe expansions come with a new Phoenixborn plus a new set of dice and a premium deck box holder. These are Song of Soaksend (music), Law of Lions (righteous) and Breaker of Fate (time). These are ways to add new characters while also varying your magic dice pool combinations, but they are of course more costly compared to single characters boxes without dice.
Character Boxes
There are numerous single Phoenixborn deck boxes that are available, bringing new ideas and decks to the game but using existing dice available, and are great lower cost additions where you can pick the theme and artwork you like. There are four that only require the core set : Frostdale Giants (ice), Duchess of Deception (harlequin), Children of Blackcloud (rogue), Roaring Rose (psyche). The next ones use the dice from either Soaksend or Lions : King of Titans (dinosaur), Grave King (necromancer), Boy among Wolves (nature), Ghost Guardian (spirits), Demons of Darmas (vampire), Protector of Argaia (mind control), Spirits of Memoria (celestial), Masters of Gravity (cosmic), Goddess of Ishra (eurasian). The next wave of releases use time dice from Breaker of Fate : Queen of Lightening (storm), Gorrenrock Survivors (fire), Oceans Guard (oceanic), Scholar of Ruin (ceremonial), Artist of Dreams (dreamscape), Messenger of Peace (meditation).
Red Rains
These are solo or co-operative Chimera battle sets. The original and main set comes with the board and dice is called Corpse of Viros (serpent). Follow up sets are slightly cheaper and contain a new enemy with two decks each Frostwild Scourge (storm giant) and Blight of Neverset (organic plant). As a solo player, these are the most important additions for me and i will be looking to add all of these as they become available. In total seven different Chimeras are planned.