Veritas

About this board game

Veritas is a Euro-style board game for 3–6 players, with a play time of about 60 minutes, about preserving truth in Dark Ages France. Each player represents a different “truth” seeking to survive for posterity through the work of diligent book-copying monks.

Players place and copy book tokens in monasteries, then collect stacks of books and distribute them around France. This spread of books represents the effort to preserve each player’s ideology, but no monastery is safe. At the end of every turn, a monastery burns down, and the books inside it may be destroyed.

The fires also change the landscape of the game. Once the monasteries have burned down, players can move through their former locations, making travel across the board faster as the game progresses. Planning where to place books—and when to move them—becomes increasingly important as the map opens up.

• Place and copy book tokens in monasteries.
• Pick up stacks of books and spread them around France.
• Adapt to monasteries burning down each turn.
• Benefit from faster travel after burned monasteries become passable.
• Score when drawn chips determine which ideology dominates each region.

When scoring chips are drawn, each player whose ideology dominates a region scores points. The race ends when a player reaches 100 points, becoming the dominant truth as the Dark Ages end.

With its focus on copying, distribution, regional influence, and an ever-changing board, Veritas combines strategic planning with the constant threat of loss. Published in 2013, it challenges players to preserve their truth before fire and rival ideologies erase its influence.