Principes

About this board game

Principes is a strategy board game for 1–4 players, with games lasting about 160 minutes, set in Poland in the year 1202. Players lead four branches of the Piast dynasty as the divided kingdom enters an age of confusion, conflict, and growth.

Across a maximum of six rounds and three periods, each player seeks control of their part of the kingdom and aims to crown their prince. Every round begins with a revealed History Card, bringing historical developments into the game and potentially introducing forces such as the Teutonic Knights and the Mongols onto the board.

At the heart of Principes is a secret programming system. From six available actions, players secretly choose and arrange three to guide their plans for the round:

• Progress to develop your position
• Taxes to support your ambitions
• Assembly and Politics to influence the kingdom
• Movement to shape your presence across the board
• Building to expand your lands

Success depends on climbing three tracks: Power, Support of the People, and the Clergy. Reach the highest position on these tracks and you can crown your prince, immediately ending the game in a glorious victory.

Develop and expand your lands, wage wars, and form alliances with neighboring factions while responding to a turbulent historical setting. Created with support from a scholarship from Poland’s Minister of Culture and National Heritage, Principes explores the key period known as the time of great disruption—an era of division after which rebirth may finally come.