Cities of Darkscorch

In the brave tradition of George and Charles Parker, Milton Bradley, and Gary Gygax comes Cities of Darkscorch—the Numero Group’s embattled first attempt at board game creation. Cities is the playable companion to Warfaring Strangers: Darkscorch Canticles, the label’s 48th mainline release and a harrowing dive into the Stygian caverns of the American hard rock underground. A dice-rolling, card-driven, heavy rock band van ride through a fantasy landscape, Cities of Darkscorch could not begin to exist without Robert Soden, who, in 1975, set about creating a tapestry of maps, floorplans, and dungeon schema—the D&D-based lands of Eldara. Expanding upon Soden’s meticulous vision, Cities of Darkscorch required newly commissioned card art and band logos to summon up a gravely themed mythical land of desolate outposts, warring bands, and the familiar ills that befall them.

Roleplaying as any of Darkscorch Canticles’ sixteen determined bands, one to six players traverse the broken roads of Darkscorch—battling such forbidding quartets as Grimsword, Narcissus, Ass-Centaur and 97 more—to collect city banners from such pits of hard rock competition as Afterdath, Wizard’s Wellspring, and Throk. Along the way, players may augment their bands through the use of fate cards with new artwork from the demented minds of John McGavock McConnell and Eliza Childress. The ultimate goal is Numenor, victory, and a record contract penned in brimstone, VD, and pot smoke.