Age of Reason

About this board game

Age of Reason is a strategy board game for 3–7 players, with games lasting about 150 minutes. Set in the latter half of the 18th century, it places players in the role of regents directing the ambitions of major European powers.

Each player seeks to increase their home country’s power in Europe while establishing a colonial empire across Africa, India, and the Western Hemisphere. Success requires more than pursuing national goals alone, however: no country can achieve everything without support.

The game’s central tension comes from shifting alliances. Players must decide when cooperation will help advance their plans and when an alliance is needed to prevent direct competition from a potential enemy. Partnerships can therefore be essential to both expansion and survival.

The available powers are:

• Great Britain
• The Netherlands
• France
• Spain
• Prussia
• Austria
• Russia

As regents, players balance their country’s position in Europe with its wider colonial ambitions. The changing political landscape encourages players to respond to the plans of others while looking for opportunities to strengthen their own position.

Age of Reason can be played with two players using the existing rules, but its publisher recommends against that player count. With three to seven participants, the game presents a broader contest of influence, competition, and cooperation among the powers of the 18th-century world.