Review: Diluvium

Introduction & Overview

A long, long time ago, when our ancient civilization was in its golden age and myths and legends still walked among men, a cataclysm struck the world. The sea swallowed the land, leaving barely a few isolated archipelagos above its surface. Of the old and powerful empires, only those skilled in building ships capable of exploring the seas in search of the last emerged lands survived. You are the leaders of those civilizations in exile. You must establish new settlements, find food, and gather weapons to face the terrible creatures that still inhabit the islands.

This is how Diluvium is presented to us, a design by Antoni Guillen (Monki, Mojo). First published in 2024 by Nuts! Publishing in an English and French version. Maud Chalmel (Take Time, Shamans) is in charge of the illustrations.

It is published in Spain by Eclipse Editorial (the game is completely language-independent except for the rulebook). It allows **games for 1 to 4 players**, with a **suggested minimum age of 10 years** and an **approximate duration of 15 minutes per player**. The **retail price is €44.95**. For this review, a copy of the Spanish version from Eclipse Editorial has been used, which the publisher kindly provided us with a review copy of[cite: 1].

Important: if you already know the game and/or are only interested in my opinion about it, you can go directly to the Opinion section. The Content and Mechanics sections are especially intended for those who do not know the game and prefer to get a general idea of how it works.

Go to Personal Opinion

Components

Inside a two-piece box (cover and bottom), dimensions 25×25×7.2 cm. (square box similar to Azul), we find the following elements:

• 29 Ocean Tiles (cardboard)
• 4 City Tiles (cardboard)
• 4 Storage Trays (cardboard)
• 17 Standard Cards (63×88 mm.):
  • 16 Ruin Cards
  • Solo Mode Aid Card
• 60 Gold Coins in values 1, 3, and 10 (cardboard)
• First Player Token (cardboard)
• 28 Food Tokens (cardboard)
• 28 Weapon Tokens (cardboard)
• 28 Craft Tokens (cardboard)
• 8 Defeated Monster Tokens (cardboard)
• 4 Action Boards (cardboard)
• 24 Exploration Markers (6 of each color) (wooden)
• 4 Warships (1 of each color) (wooden)
• 4 Exploration Ships (1 of each color) (wooden)
• 36 Settlers (9 of each color) (wooden)
• 4 Military Strength Markers (1 of each color) (wooden)
• 4 Resource Racks (1 of each color) (cardboard)
• Solo Mode Board (cardboard)
• 4 Solo Mode Settlement Tokens (cardboard)
• 8 Solo Mode Combat Tokens (cardboard)
• Solo Mode Astrolabe Token (cardboard)
• 4 Solo Mode Objective Tokens (cardboard)
• Rulebook
• Campaign Mode Rulebook

How to Play

Diluvium is a game set in a world flooded by the ocean after an ancient cataclysm, where each player takes command of a civilization in exile to rebuild their empire by exploring and settling islands. The game unfolds over an indeterminate number of turns alternated by players selecting actions via a helm wheel. On each turn, the active player must turn the helm to an action different from the one chosen on the previous turn among explore, settle, produce, or fight. The actions allow moving ships to reveal and inspect ocean tiles and place exploration markers, moving settlers to islands under our control to collect resources or obtain ruin cards with special effects, activating a territory to harvest goods and exchange them for money or military strength, and moving warships to engage rival vessels or sea creatures. At the start of the first player’s turn, if any of the resource supplies have been exhausted, a final round is completed after which accumulated gains are added up. The player with the most accumulated gold is declared the winner.

Key Concepts

Let’s begin with the Ocean and City Tiles, which make up the map over which players’ ships move. The city tile acts as the main base of operations for each civilization, while ocean tiles show different islands and sea spaces, as well as four spaces to place exploration cubes in exchange for various benefits. These tiles serve to host locations to place workers, produce resources, explore new lands, or face creatures. The ocean tiles have their exploration cost printed on their back.

The Exploration Ship is the main naval unit available to each civilization and is activated when performing the explore action. It serves to navigate the map with the goal of discovering unknown areas, flipping hidden ocean tiles, and placing exploration markers in available spaces on the map.

When a player reaches a new island with their exploration ship, they may leave an Exploration Marker on it. These are cubes placed in map exploration spaces upon reaching them for the first time with the exploration ship, granting an immediate reward and enabling that area so the player can send their settlers there to settle.

Settlers are pawns that initially occupy spaces on the player board and serve to be deployed onto open spaces on map islands or the player’s city, allowing them to collect specific resources, draw ruin cards, or unlock bonuses on the action board when removed from their slots.

On the other hand, we have the Warship, the other naval unit that each player possesses on the map. It serves to move across the ocean to initiate combat against rival warships, drive away enemy exploration ships and settlers from tiles, or battle sea monsters for rewards. It also allows exploration, though not placing exploration cubes on islands.

One of the main elements of the game is the Action Board. This is divided into four sections corresponding to the four main actions and includes a rotating wheel to select the turn’s action, in addition to the military strength track. The military strength marker indicates the player’s current combat level on that track, which conditions power in engagements and the gold reward granted or conceded to rivals. In these sections, players will initially place exploration markers and settlers. As they remove them from the action board and deploy them to tiles on the central board, they will unlock various bonuses, both immediate and recurring when resolving the corresponding action.

One of the actions will allow obtaining elements from islands where we have settlers. On one hand, we have Food, Weapon, and Craft Tokens, which are the three basic resource types available in the game. They serve to pay for different actions: food allows extending ship movement or revealing new tiles, weapons are spent to increase military strength in combat, and craft items are used to trade for gold.

Each player will have a Resource Rack, which serves to keep each player’s supply organized in front of them, ensuring that the total quantity of resources is visible to rivals while hiding their specific nature, respecting the maximum storage limit allowed at the end of the turn (no more than six fit).

On the other hand, we have Ruin Cards, which represent ancient forgotten artifacts from the Empire of Mu. These are one-time immediate effect cards that players obtain by sending settlers to ruin locations. They serve to provide various situational advantages, such as obtaining resources directly, increasing military strength, moving units, or acquiring money.

The key element of the game is Gold Coins, which are the main scoring resource and come in values of 1, 3, and 10. They represent the accumulated wealth of each civilization over the course of the game. They act as victory points, as at game end, the player holding the highest amount of gold in their supply will be declared the winner.

Finally, we have Defeated Monster Tokens. These are markers placed over monster illustrations printed on map tiles to indicate that a sea creature has been defeated in combat following a fight action, clearly showing that the monster can no longer be fought by any player for the remainder of the game.

That is enough to get started.

Preparación de la Partida

1. Arrange the ocean tiles in the center of the table forming the body of water according to player count, placed faceup or facedown depending on the map and randomly chosen from tiles of corresponding cost.
2. Place gold coin tokens within reach of all players to form the general supply.
3. Separate resources into three resource trays corresponding to player count: 16 resources of each type for 2 players, 23 for 3 players, and 28 for 4 players, returning leftover items to the box. The fourth tray is left empty as a discard pile.
4. Shuffle ruin cards to form a facedown draw deck.
5. Randomly select the starting player and give them the first player marker.
6. Each player chooses a color and receives:
   • 1 Action board with its helm wheel (players choose whether to play with symmetric or asymmetric side).
   • 1 City tile (placed in corresponding space based on player count).
   • 1 Exploration ship (placed on their city tile).
   • 1 Warship (placed on their city tile).
   • 6 Exploration markers (placed in action board spaces).
   • 9 Settlers (placed in action board spaces).
   • 1 Military strength marker (placed on starting space of military strength track).
   • 1 Resource rack
7. Each player places their city tile in front of them and positions their two ships on it.

We are ready to begin!

Game Flow

A game of Diluvium plays out over an indeterminate number of turns alternated by players, starting with the first player and continuing clockwise.

On their turn, the active player must choose one of four available actions on their personal board by turning the helm wheel to the corresponding section. Selecting the same action two turns in a row is not allowed. Turning the helm is mandatory at the beginning of the turn (on the first turn of the game, a player may select any of the four actions). Afterward, the player executes the selected action by performing its mandatory main effect and, optionally, available secondary effects or bonuses. Any cost paid in resources must be returned to the discard tray (not returned to general supply).

At any point during their turn (before or after performing the main action), the active player may play as many ruin cards as desired to apply immediate effects (obtain resources, gold, extra movement, or track advances) and subsequently discard them. There is no hand limit for these cards.

After resolving their action, the player must check if they hold more than 6 resources in their personal supply, discarding any excess if exceeding that limit. Afterward, the turn passes to the next player.

Available actions are:

• Explore. The player must move their exploration ship up to 2 tiles away. They may discard food resources to move additional spaces (1 food per extra space). If moving onto a hidden tile, they must pay the food cost indicated on the back, flip it, and immediately end movement. Following movement, if the tile has not been previously explored by the player, they remove the leftmost exploration marker from their personal board (gaining gold indicated beneath) and place it on an open exploration space on the reached ocean tile. Then, apply the occupied space effect: gain the indicated gold amount or move a settler (from board or map) to an open space on that tile. A player cannot explore the same tile twice.
• Settle. The player must move two of their settlers. Each settler may move from action board or map to an open space on their city tile or an ocean tile containing an exploration marker belonging to that player (cannot move to tiles with enemy warships). If a settler moves to a resource island (food, craft, or weapons), immediately collect one corresponding resource token. If moving to a ruin space, draw a ruin card. If all three settlers in the settle section of their personal board had already been previously deployed, the player receives 1 resource of their choice as a bonus.
• Produce. The player selects a single map tile where they have presence. Each settler present on the chosen tile produces one resource corresponding to their location (ruin spaces do not produce resources or allow drawing cards with this action).
  Optionally, the player may discard 2 craft resources to gain 3 gold coins (repeatable as many times as can be paid) or 2 weapon resources to advance their military strength marker one space on the track (repeatable as many times as can be paid).
  If all three settlers in the produce section of their personal board had already been previously deployed, the player receives 1 additional gold coin.
• Fight. The player must move their warship up to 2 tiles away (paying food to extend movement or reveal hidden tiles as in explore action). Upon ending movement, resolve potential engagements present on the tile in order:
  • Combat vs Enemy Warship. If a rival warship is present, resolve simultaneous combat. Both players may secretly commit military strength by discarding cards or weapon resources from hand. Reveal contributions; player with highest total military strength wins (attacker wins ties). Used weapon resources are discarded. The loser retreats their warship to their city tile, and the winner gains gold equal to the loser’s military strength marker value. If winner’s combat section on personal board was empty of settlers, they also gain gold equal to their own military strength marker value.
  • Drive away exploration ships and settlers. If no enemy warships remain (or after defeating one), active warship drives away remaining rival pieces on the tile. Enemy exploration ships return to respective city tiles and settlers return to available spaces on owner’s personal board or city tile (collecting resources if returning to city). Active player gains 1 gold coin per ship or settler driven away.
  • Combat vs Monster. If an undefeated monster is present, player may engage it by comparing military strength (spending additional weapon resources) to monster strength. If player strength is equal or higher, defeat monster, discard used weapons, gain gold indicated on tile, and place a defeated monster token. If player personal board has no settlers in combat section, receive additional gold indicated by own military strength marker.

Game End

The game ends following a final round triggered at the start of the first player’s turn if at least one of the three resource supplies (food, craft, or weapons) is completely depleted.

The player with the most gold in their personal supply is declared the winner. In case of a tie, the player with the fewest Settlers remaining on their Action Board wins. If still tied, players share victory.

Variants

Solo Mode. The player faces an enemy civilization that does not act on its own initiative, but rather reacts directly to their actions. Each round, following player’s turn, opponent executes as a general rule same action player performed on previous turn (Explore, Settle, Produce, or Fight). However, at start of each round, draw a combat token. If it shows a special symbol, bot instead resolves a random action determined by position of its settlement tokens. While player attempts to fulfill specific scenario objectives selected within campaign, bot deploys ships and settlers following fixed automated rules (using an astrolabe to resolve navigation ties) and moves warship directly toward player’s city. If enemy ship reaches human player city, player immediately loses game. To claim victory, player must not only fulfill scenario endgame condition, but also accumulate more gold than rival automaton at game conclusion. Player selects one scenario or progresses through a campaign linking these scenarios.

Personal Opinion

The 4X genre (you know: explore, expand, exploit, and exterminate) always exerts an irresistible pull on the board gaming community. The promise of building an empire from scratch, deploying large-scale strategic vision, and making momentous decisions on expanding maps immediately hooks any board gamer.

However, its epic nature usually entails demanding learning curves, marathon play times, and a considerable rules load that often makes it difficult to bring to the table. Precisely because of this, it is fascinating when a design attempts to synthesize such ambition into a more accessible and dynamic experience without sacrificing its strategic essence.

An example of what was mentioned at the beginning of the previous paragraph is the Twilight Imperium experience. A masterful colossus capable of delivering peerless geopolitical sensations, but at the cost of marathon sessions lasting up to eight hours and overwhelming logistics. It is the paradigm of traditional 4X, admired by all but confined to the back of the closet by the intrinsic difficulty of aligning schedules for a single game. It represents that boundless ambition where every political and combat phase demands brutal mental effort, becoming the mirror against which any attempt at compressing the genre must be measured.

And an example of succeeding at synthesizing is Eclipse (here its tocho-review)[cite: 1]. Touko Tahkokallio’s design manages to compress the fascinating 4X experience into a polished and elegant eurogame structure. Its brilliant income management system via influence disc removal, combined with ship customization, manages to strip away less essential aspects so as not to dilute sensations. It is empirical proof that you can explore, expand, exploit, and exterminate at a breakneck pace and with crystal-clear mechanical clarity at roughly half an hour per player (assuming no AP gets in the way).

However, we live in an era where time is a scarce luxury and a two-hour game remains an insurmountable barrier for many tables. Tight schedules, daily responsibilities, and current life pace drastically reduce openings for leisure. In this fast-paced scenario, even an efficiency marvel like Eclipse risks gathering dust. Thus, the quest for the ultimate 4X Holy Grail has shifted toward ultra-compact experiences promising all that epic scale in under an hour.

In that race to distill the genre, Jamey Stegmaier hit the nail on the head (at least regarding commercial success) with Scythe (here its tocho-review)[cite: 1], paring down conquest scale to a cross-action personal board, turning territorial expansion and resource management into a race dynamic to reach specific milestones. However, in that eagerness to smooth rough edges, the design on one hand dilutes the “X” of extermination, since battles are rare and purely deterrent, and on the other hand minimizes the “X” of exploration to the extreme, reducing it to tiny, scattered crossroads where players decide which benefit to claim, but without the board changing in any meaningful way, removing the uncertainty of trekking through the unknown.

Following Scythe’s footsteps comes Diluvium. A game that promises to stay truer to genre fundamentals while maintaining a tight duration serving as its primary selling point when adding it to your game shelf and, more importantly, getting brought to the table frequently. Let’s see if it delivers on that promise, but first let’s thank Eclipse Editorial for providing the review copy that makes this rambling essay possible[cite: 1].

Set against the collapse of an ancient civilization following a cataclysm, Diluvium places us in charge of a rising people ready to reclaim old world ruins. Its proposal aims to compress hex-map exploration, faction clashes, and tech development into lightning-fast sessions lasting barely forty-five minutes.

To do so, it uses the exact same mechanical system as Scythe, namely an action selection system that forces players not to execute the same action two turns in a row. These actions are represented on a personal board, and each action links to concepts and components meant to replace traditional 4X tech aspects (though not forming part of any of the X’s).

These actions are precisely the four core genre actions: explore, expand, exploit (extract resources), and exterminate rivals. So let’s overview them all so you get an idea of how turns flow in this game. First is the explore action, allowing revelation of hidden map tiles set up at game start. This mechanic keeps terrain uncertainty alive without slowing down game flow through nimble deployment.

Granted, it lacks total freedom and hidden tiles sit at fixed hidden locations. Yet this alone suffices to stop players from mapping out strategies before resolving their first turn, forcing adaptation to revealed tiles. Furthermore, requiring a specific pawn move to reveal tiles gives real weight to the action, stopping players from uncovering any random map tile at will.

The second action is expansion, allowing movement of two settlers, either from our personal board or relocated from the map, toward our starting city or tiles containing our exploration markers (visited earlier by our exploration ship). Stepping onto a resource island (food, artifacts, or weapons) instantly yields one matching unit, while occupying ruins draws ancient technology cards.

It’s an idea combining Scythe’s development concept of freeing action board items to boost effects while simultaneously establishing main board presence to resolve production actions—which generates tension, as unprotected settlers are an enticing source of coins, as seen next.

To produce resources, a player selects a single map tile where they hold presence, activating all settlers there to collect matching resources. Additionally, this action allows spending two of the three resource types for bonuses: permanently boosting military strength, or trading craft goods for coins. It serves as the engine converting craft into gold or weapons into permanent military strength gains. Food is needed to explore and/or expand ship movement range.

It’s worth pausing on this action because, unlike most games of this type, a resource storage cap exists here. At the end of each turn, players cannot hold more than six resource tokens, discarding any excess.

Even more interesting is that these resources act as the trigger ending the game. For each resource type, a fixed supply exists based on player count. Every time a player takes a resource token from its supply, that resource can only be spent into a discard tray, never returning to the original supply. Thus, if any resource supply is empty at the start of a round, the final round triggers.

As the fourth and final action: combat. With it, we move our warship to resolve conflicts. It allows hunting monsters for rewards or boarding rival ships to resolve blind combat using accumulated military strength and weapon consumption in a manner nearly identical to Scythe. The interesting aspect of combat is that the winner, if attacking, not only takes gold based on rival military level, but also expels enemy ships and settlers back to their boards or cities, dismantling the opponent’s production network in one swoop and reaping a heavy coin payout for doing so.

In this way, players alternate turns focused on hoarding maximum gold. Gold can be acquired through three of the four actions: exploring grants gold upon removing an exploration marker and can grant gold upon placing it on an island; producing allows trading craft for gold; fighting grants gold by expelling settlers and explorers or defeating monsters or enemy warships.

Well, with this I think you have enough context to discuss dynamics and sensations. I’ll start with the design’s chief virtue: it delivers on its promise of a genuine 4X experience under an hour without feeling gutted or superficial. Unlike other simplification attempts that sacrifice interaction or direct conflict, inter-faction tension is palpable from early turns. Secret combat resolution and aggressive interaction recall Scythe’s agility, but condensed into a ruthless format where map presence and resource competition feel meaningful at all times.

It is extremely frustrating when a rival reaches an island where you hold two or more settlers and expels them to your capital—or worse, back to the action board if starting island spaces are full. Of course, in four-player games, three warships roam without needing massive effort to reach virtually any map tile.

Next to highlight is the intriguing balance between lightness and tension. The action wheel enforces a brisk pace that almost entirely eliminates analysis paralysis, making it ideal both as a genre gateway and for gathering varied gamer profiles. Its brief duration does not dilute decision-making: every turn demands picking a clear trajectory and executing it with conviction, offering a rewarding and highly accessible experience.

That said, simplification carries a steep cost. We are dealing with a design that may feel overly flat to seasoned gamers. Simplified mechanics turn exploration and development into near-automatic chores where a lack of dynamic event interaction or tactical surprises can create a sense of monotony after a few plays, making the package feel more basic than desired. This shows especially if a player resolves the explore action too often, as once all cubes are placed, it ceases to be a “useful” action, narrowing maneuvering room (though by then the game shouldn’t have much time left anyway).

This is most noticeable in the absence of dramatic tension inherent to a great 4X, beyond settler expulsion. Monster encounters feel anecdotal (merely coin farms urging players to raise military power to claim them), while the ruin card deck offers rewards so generic they barely incite active hunting. And, as in Scythe, player combat—though swift—reduces to a straightforward calculation of majorities and spent resources that rarely leaves room for epic moments or unexpected turns, making conflict a cold, predictable optimization exercise.

So Diluvium gives us what it promises, but what it promises might not feel as satisfying as one would hope. Ultimately, civilization games require time. Twilight Imperium or Through the Ages (here its tocho-review)[cite: 1]. Whether or not they are a 4X game isn’t what matters; it’s the sense of development and weight. Reaching a certain milestone, looking back, and assessing whether a choice turns ago was right or wrong—reaping benefits or penalties many turns later. In a sub-one-hour game, that is impossible to achieve. That isn’t the design’s fault; it’s our expectations.

Naturally, the game shines brightest at four players, where tension peaks and doors open to table talk persuading the active player to attack a specific rival. At two players, it devolves into a race for military power and rushing monster kills. At three, there is some tension, but the whole thing still feels overly light.

This brings us to Diluvium‘s primary flaw: its replayability. It carries enough interaction that, if a group clicks with it, it could see table time frequently thanks to its short length. However, the proposal will likely run dry relatively quickly due to a lack of variability. I haven’t tried the solo mode, but it might offer an outlet for those who enjoy that setup, given its campaign mode.

Moving on to production. Components meet standard quality, featuring punchboards of good thickness and dense pressing that punch out cleanly, custom wooden pieces with original shapes, solid density, and proper paint jobs, alongside cards of acceptable weight, smooth finish, and decent snap (sleeving isn’t strictly necessary). The rulebook is well-structured and leaves no ambiguities.

On the art front, we find a modern comic book aesthetic with nods to Art Nouveau and mythological graphic art. The artwork uses bold, well-defined black line work to outline contours. This approach is evident on the cover with dynamic compositions, swirling clouds, and stylized faction depictions, as well as on tiles and cards where relief engravings and integrated iconography maintain a clean, evocative, and readable tabletop presence. Spiral patterns mixed with visual texture evoke a classic legend feel without losing modern game freshness and utility.

And let’s wrap this up. Diluvium is a compact design aiming to synthesize 4X essence into a swift action selection system via a personal board. Constant tension over island control, strict resource limits, and aggressive interaction where combat punishes enemy presence deliver fast-paced, highly accessible games for all player types. However, its heavy simplification results in a arc that isn’t as intense as one might hope, where missing tactical surprises and combat lacking traditional genre swing erode medium-term strategic weight. It fulfills its promise of condensing a universe into a short timeframe, but falls somewhat short for gamers seeking deep, epic development. Yet as an entry point to the genre, it stands as the most honest and effective option. For all these reasons, I give it a…