Tabletop Game Review – Sagrada Artisans

Sagrada Artisans by Floodgate Games
Price: ~$75
Players: 2-4
Playtime: 45-60 minutes
Perfect for: Groups who love beautiful legacy games full of dice drafting and creative resource/tool allocation.

Sagrada Artisans is a game of crafting the most glorious stained-glass windows. Players are recruits into a special guild where they must prove their worth as skilled artists. Over the course of ten interconnected assignments (games), people will face increasingly difficult challenges. Fortunately, each rival family of artisans will upgrade their tool set along the way, giving them an advantage in certain situations. The craftworker who creates the finest masterpieces that will enamor generations to come will be the ultimate victor.

To begin Sagrada Artisans, two to four players retrieve their artisan booklet. In addition, the cathedral drafting board goes into a central location and the appropriate number of multicolored dice (based on player count) are placed into the provided bag. The starting player retrieves and rolls the dice and places them on the drafting board. In a snake draft, each player selects a dice and places it into their artisan booklet (essentially a multi-box grid).

To record the placement, artisans color in the space of their choice with the corresponding hue and number. Rules dictate that spaces containing the same color or value may not be adjacent. Therefore, players must be strategic in their draft, being wary not to make mistakes. In addition, certain patterns or collections may score the player points at the end of the round. Finally, artisans will collect power-ups over time they can use to alter dice rules to avoid placement issues. After twelve rounds of dice drafting and placement, players tabulate their points to determine the winner.

What works in Sagrada Artisans is the escalation and evolution of the creative gameplay while maintaining both a relaxing and engaging experience. While it requires strategic planning and execution Sagrada Artisans is a rather chill game. The mechanic of using the provided colored pencils to develop one’s own artisan board feels immensely satisfying and therapeutic. And for groups containing individuals who take their time on their turn, other players can optionally color in other sections of their books as a pastime.

Individuals who don’t enjoy turn-based games with minimal player interaction may not enjoy Sagrada Artisans as much as others. For the most part, Sagrada Artisans is about doing what is best given the options available. Players’ influence on decision-making is minimal in that they mostly prevent others from drafting specific dice. Furthermore, while it’s not a prerequisite, individuals who have familiarity with Sagrada (the original) may find Artisans easier to jump into. Artisans’ rules might feel slightly overwhelming without a solid understanding of the core mechanics native to previous games in the series.

Sagrada Artisans is a beautiful game that those with artistic minds especially will appreciate and relish. It’s the perfect game to cozy up with; warm drink in hand and close friends at the table.

Recommended if you like: Sagrada, Holi,

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Fox Troilo

Fox serves as an entertainment journalist in the Washington, D.C. When not covering cinematic news for LRM, he critiques films as a member of the Washington D.C. Area Film Critics Association. Fox also has a Ph.D. in Higher Education and Strategy from Indiana University Bloomington.

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