The 10 Most Epic and Complex Board Games

 The 10 Most Epic and Complex Board Games

The tabletop gaming hobby has been around for a long time and has only burgeoned over recent years. With more games released, and the hobby becoming more mainstream, it’s harder for newcomers to the hobby to find more complex experiences.

With game designers often trying to create smaller, less dense experiences, large and often inaccessible games are becoming more niche among board gamers. These examples aim to provide those who may not have played many complex games with a good place to start.

10.Star Wars: Rebellion

Star Wars: Rebellion is a 2-4 player game from publishers Fantasy Flight Games that, arguably, works better with two. Star Wars: Rebellion is one of many Star Wars tabletop games, and it could be argued that it's one of the best.

The game has players control either the Empire, commanding a large military, or the titular Rebellion, with a humble, weaker military, relying more on subterfuge, intrigue, and sabotage to defeat the Empire. Star Wars: Rebellion gives both sides plenty of decisions to make, and the asymmetric nature of the game makes it one of the more complex Star Wars board games on the market.

9.Gloomhaven

Gloomhaven's monumental scope and size immediately give away its complexity. While some may assume Gloomhaven's masses of cardboard miniatures, tiles, and cards make the game more convoluted than it is complex, Gloomhaven's core card-based combat is an easy-to-learn, hard-to-master system that constantly forces players to make tough decisions.

Gloomhaven has players customize and learn decks of cards unique to their characters, taking them into missions and battling monsters with various strengths and weaknesses using two cards at a time. Each card has two sides (the top and the bottom), meaning they can all be played in two different ways. Cards can also combo with other cards in different ways, depending on the decisions players make when playing them. Combine this with the strategy of customizing a deck and choosing what equipment to buy before embarking on a mission, and Gloomhaven becomes a deep, engaging dungeon-crawler that only expands on its complexity over time.

8.Dune (2019)

This long-awaited reprint of the classic Dune board game, originally released in 1979, is a sprawling asymmetric strategy game on an epic scale, allowing players to take control of one of six factions from Frank Herbert's classic sci-fi novels, each with their own strengths and weaknesses.

dune  has players vying for control over various strategic locations on the map, as well as the iconic "spice" resource. Players have to juggle several things at once, managing their military and spice economy simultaneously as they contest for control over various objectives. Due to the game's asymmetric nature, it can be extremely complex, especially for new players. This, coupled with the long play time (especially at larger player counts), makes it a very complex game, especially when playing with every faction.

7.Spirit Island

This cooperative game for 1-4 players offers a surprising amount of depth, complexity, and challenge. Each player controls one of eight different Spirits, each with their unique powers that can have both short and long-term effects. Because of this, players have to make strategic decisions in advance and cooperate to defeat the Invaders.

What makes Spirit Island even more complex is its asymmetry, both with its eight unique Spirits, and the three unique Invader cards that each have their challenges, and force players to change up their strategy.

6.Oath: Chronicles Of Empire & Exile

This game for 1-6 players was designed by Cole Wehrle, designer of the hit tabletop war game, Root. One player takes control of the Chancellor, the leader of the land attempting to keep an "Oath," while the other players take control of the Exiles, who are generally a lot weaker than the Chancellor but can win the game in a larger variety of ways. Players control a character, as well as war bands represented by wooden miniatures, traveling to various locations to take specific actions that evolve throughout the game.

It's these multiple victory conditions that add to Oath's themes, narrative, and more importantly its mechanical complexity. Not only this, but the Chancellor can also offer Citizenship to Exiles, transforming them into Citizens that work for the Chancellor and are tasked with completing their own "Successor" goal, which also changes depending on the "Oath" that's currently in play. Furthermore, the winner of each game becomes the Chancellor for the next, even keeping their key locations on the board, as well as influencing what cards are added to the pool in Legacy-game fashion. The game's Legacy mechanics complicate things even further, bleeding into its gameplay over time and changing the strategies and decisions that players make in the future.

5.War Of The Ring: Second Edition

This Lord of the Rings game is a thematic tabletop experience that's tremendously faithful to the source material. Players will take control as the Free People of Middle-earth and the Shadow Armies of Sauron, battling with each other over control of Middle-earth. However, the Free People must be attacked by Sauron's armies or convinced to join the fight by one of the Fellowship before their armies can be of any use to the Free People player. Although the player of the Free People must make some effort to gather a military and defend their territory, or else risk losing the game, their main focus is secretly getting the One Ring to Mount Doom.
This unique and thematic victory condition adds an extra layer of strategic depth and complexity to War of the Ring that heightens both the gameplay and the narrative. While the player of the Free People has their attention divided between defending Middle Earth and protecting the Ringbearer, the Sauron player must divide their own attention between obtaining a military victory and preventing the Ringbearer from destroying the One Ring.

4.Food Chain Magnate

This heavy strategy game from revered publisher Splotter Spellen tasks players with controlling competing fast-food chains, and growing to be the biggest and most successful on the board using card-based resource management.

Food Chain Magnate takes place on a city map, allowing players to purchase real estate and affect the gameplay in different ways. However, a lot of the game's focus is on hiring and managing staff, all with their specific uses, with each player building and managing their own engine. Food Chain Magnate is one of the most complex board games available and takes a notoriously long time to play, but for fans of heavy strategy and engine-building games, it can be a rewarding experience.

3.Twilight Imperium

Twilight Imperium has been around for years. Now in its fourth edition, the game was originally released in 1997 and has been an iconic part of the tabletop scene ever since. The game is revered for its mechanical complexity, asymmetry, social deduction and diplomacy, and long playtime. Twilight Imperium's complexity, depth, and general inaccessibility can turn players away, but for those that put in the time to learn the game's mechanics, it can be a deeply rewarding experience.

Twilight Imperium has players take control of one of seventeen unique factions, vying for control over various planets across a large map that can change every game. The game features various resources to manage, action cards, objectives to complete (both shared and secret), a technology tree, and unique locations that act as strategic objectives for players to fight over.

2.Mage Knight

In Mage Knight, players build and lead armies, using a customizable deck packed with spells and actions to build a different and unique character every time. Each character also has a variety of tokens that represent abilities, which can also change from game to game.

Mage Knight sees players exploring a hexagonal map, discovering different locations to conquer. Although the game is epic in its proportions and allows for immense diversity in its strategies and character builds, the game's complexity and the density of its ruleset make it one of the hardest games to learn.

1.Gaia Project

This sequel to the popular Terra Mystica features fourteen unique factions and seven planet types, with each faction only being able to inhabit a specific environment. Gaia Project's design is relatively similar to Terra Mystica, and tasks players with competing with each other in terraforming planets to suit their different environments.

Gaia Project doubles down on its planet-focused mechanics, allowing players to expand throughout the galaxy and colonize various planets. However, the titular "Gaia" planets can be colonized by all factions, and players can transform a unique planet type - "Transdimensional" planets - into Gaia planets, changing the landscape of the galaxy dramatically. Furthermore, players can focus on several skills, including Terraforming, AI, and Research, among others, allowing for plenty of strategic choices that affect how each player moves forward. The density of Gaia Project's mechanics and its variable game board make it one of the most complex strategy games in the tabletop scene.

 the 10 most epic and complex board games