Cardboard Corner: Review of Earthborne Rangers

Since the early 90s, expandable card games have become a major niche of table top gaming. But it wasn't until 2011 that the first cooperative game of the type came onto the market, Lord of the Rings: The Card Game. Slow to take off and slow to see iterations in other games, to date there are still very few cooperative card games using the expandable model. That being said, what few games that are available are extremely popular, Marvel Champions and Arkham Horror: The Card Game among them. Looking to expand this sub-genre in a unique way is Earthborne Rangers (2023).

A cooperative game for 1-4 players, Earthborne Rangers uses the base model of almost all expandable card games (deckbuilding, resource management, heroes, events, upgrades, etc.) but injects its own identity in a few key ways. First is the emphasis on storytelling. Where Lord of the Rings and Marvel Champions are primarily about using the game's mechanisms in effective and intelligent fashion, Earthborne Rangers gives players open-world choices for the direction in which they want to take the game/story. Like Choose Your Own Adventure, each round in the game is a day in which players encounter various beings, features, and obstacles as they try to complete main and side missions. Yes, Arkham Horror is also a narrative-based cooperative card game, but Earthborne provides more of an open world feel. It also places more emphasis on exploration and discovery.

The second key way in which Earthborne Rangers distinguishes itself is its core of nature, and the manner in which nature manifests itself in the experience, real-time to meta. The game's story is set thousands of years in Earth's future after humanity has confronted the environmental challenges it faces today, come together through mega projects, and solved them. The result is a semi-utopian game setting. Exploring Earthborne Ranger's world is thus more about discovering this future and overcoming the terrain challenges, including flora and fauna, than killing everything in sight. There are dangers and conflict is possible, but so is avoidance, evasion, connection, and other ways of navigating the challenges the game places in front of players.

The fact the environment interacts with itself adds a layer of novelty I haven't seen elsewhere. There are predators, prey, and features, and depending on challenge effects when taking tests, these things will interact not only with players but with each other. A wolf may chase away a deer, a lair may give birth to new animals, a deer may steal/eat some of the plants that players discover, and so on. For people who enjoy spending time hiking and in nature, the game offers a huge degree of pastoral satisfaction.

The third key way in Earthborne Rangers separates itself from the market is production. Where cards, tokens, art, rulebook, and the overall package are on par with the other major cooperative card games on the market, it was produced sustainably. This means recycled paper, biodegradable materials, no plastic, and produced/printed in the region it was sold to reduce the carbon footprint of logistics. (The exception is North America, which at the time of production did not have a facility capable of acquiring the relevant materials and printing sustainably.) Where bits of plastic will exist hundreds and hundreds of years into the future, Eathborne Rangers, true to the game's environmental theme, will have faded back into the Earth.

But the real question is, is Earthborne Rangers fun? Beyond the ways in which it distinguishes itself from other such games, does it have substance to engage gamers' sense of enjoyment? Does it provide the deep satisfaction of games like Marvel Champions and Arkham Horror? For this gamer and his family, yes. Earthborne Rangers was created and designed by former employees of Fantasy Flight Games, arguably the best producer of such games. They brought this pedigree to a concept undoubtedly percolating for years in their minds and developed it in a work environment unfettered by corporate management. It's a passion project from a small group of guys with years of experience, and it bears fruit on the table. Seeing the game's world come to life and exploring it to learn its history is a delight.

There are challenges to the game, or things some players may not like. A few of the core rules are a bit fiddly, i.e. the game's first principles are a degree more complex than Marvel or Arkham. If you combine this with the freedom players have to explore, then (ironically) the learning curve might be a touch—just a touch—steeper than those aforementioned games. The counter argument to this is: once players have their heads around the rules and game flow, it has the potential to be a richer, more sophisticated experience for it.

The second potential challenge for players is the diminutization of conflict. Conflict is such an innate element to so many board game experiences, even cooperative games, most players take it for granted. Swords, shields, and battlefields abound, victory through defeat has become part and parcel, and for many has likely also become, the expectation. That is not what Earthborne Rangers is about. Where's the tension? Where's the drama? Where's the motivation? Some people may ask such questions learning conflict is minimized. The answer is conflict is present, but it's not at the forefront. Instead, players will be exploring, traversing, connecting, and combining their cards and actions in a variety of other ways to overcome the challenges the game throws their way. There is no shortage of ways players can spin up mental CPUs to achieve the goals they want to achieve—to play cards and actions in combo-tastic ways—by themselves and with others.

I would be remiss not to discuss the game's art before closing this review. It's generally excellent. There are couple inconsistencies, for example the four character aspects are characterized by FOC for focus, FIT for fitness, etc. rather than symbols, which I think was a wasted opportunity. But the rest of the game shines. The box art, iconography, and art on the attribute and moment cards is loosely (loosely!) in the vein of old school Lord of the Rings, whereas the creatures, features, locations, rangers, and other cards feature a vibrant style loosely (loosely!) in the world of Studio Ghibli or Japanese manga in general. This makes for a unique combination that will either be seen as synergistic or incongruous, no middle ground. Regardless of opinion, it's clear significant effort was put into the game's graphics.

In the end, Earthborne Rangers is an excellent evolution of the expandable, cooperative card game market. Despite being from a new company, it's on par with the other big players in the genre. It enters the running alongside Lord of the Rings: The Card Game, Marvel Champions, and other such cooperative games for “best of”. It borrows elements from those games and others but has its own distinct identity. It adds a unique spin in terms of its open world rpg approach to heroes/characters and the emphasis on exploration and branching story (as opposed to direct combat). I would be remiss not to mention that the designers' attention to sustainabilty and environmental protection not only comes through in gameplay, but has zero effect on production quality. If you like the outdoors, are of a curious temperament, and likewise enjoy table top games, this is for you. There is a imaginative, optimistic world to explore in fun, card-playing ways.