Participate

Lead your army into battle and defeat your opponent with superior tactics or sheer force!

Each player commands a faction on a battle map, exploring the land, building camps and barracks, attacking enemy areas, and defending their own. As the game progresses, stronger units appear on the field, even renowned conquerors may join the fray. Press your advantage, outmaneuver your opponent, and lay siege to their capital. Destroy your opponent's capital or completely wipe out their army to be declared the victor of this battle.

Echoes of Emperors is a strategic board game focused on 1v1 gameplay. At the start of the game, you choose a map to play on and each player selects a civilization deck to command. On your turn, you move your units, explore new map tiles, build camps to manage your economy, and attack your enemies. Utilize your civilization’s unique deck to activate units, employ tactics, and research technologies. Victory is achieved by destroying your opponent’s capital or defeating all their active units.

Quick to learn mechanics and a depth of strategy

Historical accuracy

We put great effort into making Echoes of Emperors historically accurate. Our goal is to authentically depict each civilization. We conducted extensive research and collaborated with historical experts to ensure accuracy in every aspect of the game, from maps and cards to gameplay. Each card includes a flavor text explaining its historical context. Additionally, we created hand-crafted figures based on authentic designs, available as resin cast replicas in our Emperor Edition. The lighter figures are inspired by Mongolian Khun Chuluu and Yuan Dynasty art, while the darker figures are based on the Lewis Chessmen and Torslunda plates.

Replayability

Expand to your own needs

Echoes of Emperors is primarily designed for 1v1 gameplay, but it can be expanded for any number of players, provided you have the time for a longer session! You can expand the map using additional map tiles and include more players by adding other sets. We encourage creativity and look forward to seeing what campaigns you can create! 

Authentic looking art

We paid a lot of attention to our art style to ensure all art has an authentic look. Many components were even hand-crafted before being digitized! The Emperor-edition pieces are also replicas of hand-carved figures. Rest assured, the quality of the components will honor the artistry perfectly!

Since we designed Echoes of Emperors to be competitive, no gameplay elements will be exclusive. However, the Kickstarter components will feature a 'first edition' mark exclusive to Kickstarter prints. This edition will be the only one with the first edition stamp.

The objective is to reduce your opponent’s capital lifepoints to zero or destroy all their active units.

The Setup

During the first turns, you'll typically scout the map and build camps to collect resources. However, you could also choose to start with an early attack. But be careful not to lose all your active units! Or you'll lose the game.

The Gameplay

The game is played in turns, each comprising four phases: Turn Start, the Mobilization phase, the Drafting phase and Turn End.

Start Turn
You start by 'unexhausting' all your resources and units, meaning they are ready to be put to action during your turn.

Mobilization
This phase focuses on the map. Explore tiles and build your economy to afford units and technologies from your hand. Outmaneuver your opponents using chess-style movement, attack their units and buildings, or build barracks to seize control of certain parts of the map.

Drafting
This phase focuses on card play. Utilize your gathered resources to play cards from your hand. Activate unit cards onto a unit figure and place it on your barracks or capital. Research technologies or tactics to upgrade your units or enhance your economy.

Turn End
At the end of your turn, draw a card and the next player can start their turn.

This cycle continues until one player loses all their active units or their capital's life points reach zero, losing the game.

2+ Player Games and Team Games

A 4-player game can be played as 1v1v1v1 or 2v2. Free-for-all games are chaotic with frequent backstabbings, while team games offer interesting synergies between civilizations. In team games, you can share resources, but if one teammate loses their capital, both lose the game. 3-player games, and 2-player games with the 4-player edition are also possible!

The rulebook is still being finalized for improved readability, but the rules themselves will remain unchanged.

The diminutive soldier: “It’s a piece of art”.

Nox' Spellenzolder: "How you can best control your unique faction you play is the challenge that Echoes of Emperors offers, and in my opinion it does that very well."

Retail

Selling Echoes of Emperors in retail would be amazing! If you're a business and want to purchase Echoes of Emperors, Please contact us by mailing info@volcabanstudio.com

If you're a strategic mastermind who loves mastering games, the Armies and War Maps Expansion is for you!

Timeline

Before starting production and delivery, we will have to finish any stretch goals that are reached. This may include making extra art and collaborating with historians. We believe this will be finished by October 2024.

• July 26th 2024 - End Kickstarter
• August 16th 2024 - Pledge Manager Surveys
• November 2024 - Start production
• March 2025 - Shipment to Backers

Please be aware of the following list of expected shipping costs for the base pledges (including forecasted Stretch Goals). Keep in mind that the ranges presented are for most regions/countries within each hub and that specific costs will be calculated in the Pledge Manager system according to your address.

Unfortunately, import laws prohibit us from shipping games to certain countries. We are not able to ship to the following countries: Iran, Kazakhstan, Russia, Ukraine, Venezuela, Afghanistan, and Cuba.

We are Stef and Niel, 2 friends who met each other in middle school. We quickly realized we both had a love for games and could talk hours and hours about games we liked like Runescape, Age of Empires, Minecraft, etc. After middle school, we both studied game design with the dream of making our own games in the future. During this period, the original idea of Echoes of Emperors was formed as a school project. After both of us graduated, we decided to continue working together which eventually resulted in us making a small company called Volcaban Studio.

Echoes of Emperors was originally one of Niel’s school projects, back then it was called ‘Inverness’ and you could only play as a Scottish clan. Falling in love with the base concept and theme of the game, he continued to work on it throughout his school years during his free time. After the formation of Volcaban Studio, we decided to finally finish Echoes of Emperors and make it our main project. With already a very good base to start from, we mainly focused on streamlining the game, by removing or reworking overly complicated mechanics. The main challenge with this was that we wanted the game to be easier to pick up for new players while still maintaining a highly competitive gameplay.

We were hardly the only 2 people who worked on Echoes of Emperors. Many friends and family members supported us throughout the development in many different ways ranging from playtests to prototyping of the different game components and for that we can't thank them enough!

In the end, we hope that you enjoy playing our board game as much as we enjoyed making it.