Grow Your Own Beard (Or Steal Someone Else's) in Beard Wizards

All the best wizards have epically long beards! Use powerful magic and ancient artifacts to grow out your own and become a mighty wizard.

Published by The Dusty Tophat, Beard Wizards is a 10-25 minute card game, designed for 2-5 players.

Gameplay

Each player starts the game with a golden beard hair card in front of them. There is a golden beard hair draw deck that is separate from the main draw deck. From the main deck, each player is dealt a starting hand of three cards.

On your turn, you draw two cards and then may perform two actions. An action is either playing a card or performing a ritual.

There are four types of cards you can play. There are spell cards which are one-time abilities, and there are beard and artifact cards. The beard cards are separate from the golden beard hair cards, and you can only have one beard card in play at a time. Both beards and artifacts have special abilities listed on them, and using them does not count as an action. You can have as many artifacts in play as you wish. There are also counter spell cards that you can play against another player when they use a spell card’s ability against you. Many cards will allow you to take one or more golden beard hair cards and place them in front of yourself.

Each card will be one of four colors. This is important when performing a ritual. Each player has a sheet that lists the five rituals in the game. Each ritual requires you to have a certain number of golden beard hair cards in front of yourself and requires you to discard a certain number of cards based on their color. For example, one requires you to discard two cards of the same color, while another one asks you to discard one purple and one green card. Different rituals will have different abilities.

In order to win the game, you must collect seven golden beard hair cards and then perform the final ritual, which requires you to discard three different colored cards.

Review

Beard Wizards is a very light game. There’s a lot of luck in it, the strength of the cards varies substantially, there’s a lot of back and forth between stealing beards and cards from other players, and teaming up on the player with the most golden beard hair cards while trying to sneak in your own win. It’s silly, it’s fast, and it’s fun.

The theme really speaks for itself: it’s not trying to be a very serious game. It’s colorful and quirky. The artwork is simple but nice. Turns move fast, and it’s the sort of game that is easy to have a laugh over.

Having the rituals unlock as your golden beard grows is a bit of a clever mechanic that fits nicely with the theme, and the player aid sheets that go with the rituals keep the game simple and easy to follow. They even list how many actions you’re allowed on your turn and how many cards to draw.

The rules are not completely clear, however. When it comes to the question of the golden beard hair cards, all the cards talk about ‘drawing them’ and it’s not obvious if, when you do so, you add them to your golden beard already on the table or you have to add them to your hand and play them from there. This is further complicated by the fact that there are the regular beard cards that you do play directly from your hand. We had to confirm online how it was intended to be played (all golden beard hair cards you acquire do go straight onto the table in front of you). A game this simple shouldn’t have such a vague rule, especially one that is so vital to the win condition.

Beard Wizards will not be for everyone. You can definitely lose due to bad luck, and you want to play with a group that doesn’t get too upset over take-that gameplay. But if you like this type of silly, light card game, Beard Wizards can be perfectly enjoyable.

Pros: Fun theme and presentation, plays fast, enjoyably light

Cons: The rules are unclear on key points, lots of luck

Disclosure: We received a complimentary review copy of this game.