Wyrmspan – More Than Just Wingspan With Dragons

As an amateur dracologist, you have one mission: to study and protect dragons of all shapes and sizes. To do that, you’ll need to excavate a hidden labyrinth, turning it into a safe haven that will attract these magnificent creatures to your land.

If that premise sounds familiar, you’re not wrong. Wyrmspan takes clear inspiration from Wingspan, but this isn’t just Wingspan with dragons. While the core mechanics will feel familiar, Wyrmspan adds plenty of fresh ideas to make it stand on its own.

👥 1-5 players, ages 14+
⌛ Playing time: 90 minutes
📝 Designer: Connie Vogelmann
🎨 Artwork: Clémentine Campardou

🏢 Publisher: Stonemaier Games (review copy provided)

Gameplay Overview

The game plays out over four rounds, with players taking turns until everyone decides to pass. At the start of each round, you get six coins, which you’ll use to take one of three possible actions.

First, you can excavate caves. You pay a coin, place a cave card from your hand into one of your three caves, and immediately activate its ability. Caves can give you resources, eggs, coins, or bonus actions, all of which help set up your future turns.

Once you’ve made space, you can entice a dragon. Again, you pay a coin, choose a dragon card from your hand, and spend the required resources, coins, and eggs to bring it into your sanctuary. Like in Wingspan, dragons come in different sizes and types, have unique living preferences, and can carry eggs on their cards. On top of that, each dragon has a special ability that triggers at different times, like when it’s played, while exploring, at the end of a round, or even at the end of the game.

The third action is exploring. This lets your explorer venture deeper into your caves. You pay a coin, plus one or two eggs if you’re revisiting the same cave during the round. Your explorer moves along the cave path, collecting bonuses as they go and activating dragon abilities when they land on the right spots. Depending on the cave, you can gain resources, eggs, new dragon or cave cards, or even progress in the Dragon Guild. The Dragon Guild is another way to earn rewards, but it also has two key spaces where you can place a player marker. These markers give you extra actions during the game or bonus points at the end.

At the end of each round, everyone checks how well they did on the common goal and places their markers on the board in order. Then, you get fresh coins and an egg to get ready for the next round.

After four rounds, it’s time to see who wins. You’ll score points for your markers in the Dragon Guild, your success in the common goals, and the point values of your dragons. Some dragons have endgame abilities that can boost your score even more. Eggs, tucked cards, and leftover resources also count for points. When all is said and done, the player with the highest total is the winner.

Game Info

Wyrmspan is a standalone game designed by Connie Vogelmann, with development by Elizabeth Hargrave, the creator of Wingspan. It was published by Stonemaier Games in 2024 and plays with 1 to 5 players, recommended for ages 14 and up. A typical game lasts around 90 minutes, though if you’re playing with new players, expect a little extra time for learning.

If you’re familiar with Wingspan, you’ll immediately recognize some shared DNA, but Wyrmspan doesn’t just swap birds for dragons. It introduces fresh mechanics and a different approach to strategy, making it feel like its own thing rather than just a re-theme.

Components, Production, and Artwork

Right out of the box, Wyrmspan feels both familiar and new at the same time. Instead of a large central board, the game uses three smaller shared boards, making it easier to fit on the table. Each player gets their own individual board where they’ll excavate caves and lure in dragons.

The game comes with a huge deck of dragon cards, over 180 of them, along with 75 cave cards that help shape your underground lair. There are also speckled egg tokens, shiny cardboard coins, and various resource tokens. Each player has their own adventurer meeple, markers, and guild tokens in a distinct color.

The artwork is what gives the game so much of its charm. Clementine Campardou’s illustrations have a soft, watercolor look that gives the game a light and airy feel. The dragons are full of personality, and I often find myself pausing just to admire the details on the cards. If you love visually stunning games, this one delivers.

The game also comes with a couple of small but thoughtful extras, like two lidded containers for storing eggs and resources and a score pad for easy tracking at the end of the game. My personal favorite? The Dragon Fact Book, which is packed with fun little tidbits about dragons. I won’t pretend I don’t flip through it between turns. In fact, I may have spent a little too much time reading about mythical creatures instead of planning my next move. No regrets.

For those who want to go all-in, there are optional upgrades like natural rubber playmats, metal coins, and wooden resource tokens. But even with the standard components, the production quality is solid.

Gameplay and Strategy

It’s no secret that Wyrmspan takes inspiration from Wingspan, but calling it a dragon version of Wingspan doesn’t quite do it justice. The game introduces some extra mechanics that give it a bit more weight. I’d still call it accessible, but if Wingspan is a pure family game, Wyrmspan leans slightly more into the midweight category. If you’ve played Wingspan before, you’ll pick up the rules fairly quickly, though it’s not a requirement. New players might need a round or two to fully grasp everything, but it’s not an overwhelming game once you get into the rhythm.

One of the core mechanics is engine building, where your actions become more powerful over time. Excavating caves and enticing dragons affects how efficiently you can generate resources, and every choice has a ripple effect. Planning ahead is key because if you forget to excavate before trying to lure in a dragon, you can be stuck scrambling. (Not that I’d know from experience. Okay, maybe once. Or twice.)

Resource management plays a big role, as the caves you dig and the dragons you attract determine what you’ll generate. Actions are limited by coins, which act as your action currency. You only get six per round, so efficiency is everything. Sometimes you’ll be able to stretch your turns by gaining extra coins, but other times, you’ll have to make tough decisions about whether to spend one on a powerful dragon or save it for later.

Players also compete for end-of-round goals, which can shift the focus of your strategy. It’s not just about building up your board; you also need to keep an eye on what your opponents are doing.

Different Ways to Play

What I really like about Wyrmspan is that it doesn’t lock you into one path. You can go all-in on attracting high-scoring dragons with strong abilities, or you can focus on exploring your caves, triggering abilities, collecting resources, and advancing in the Dragon Guild. Racing up the Dragon Guild track can earn you valuable bonuses and end-game points, but staying adaptable is just as important.

Common goals also change from game to game, so some dragon types or traits will be more valuable in one session than in another. Cycling through the deck to find what you need can be a challenge, especially when others are after the same dragons. There are enough ways to draw new cards or pick from the display, but there’s still an element of luck involved.

Player Interaction

Even though you’re building your own board, Wyrmspan isn’t a completely solo experience. The common goals are resolved at the end of each round, meaning you can’t just claim them first, but you need to be ahead of your opponents when the time comes.

The Dragon Guild track is where things get just a little cutthroat. Some spots give you extra actions or points, but once someone claims them, they’re gone. Ever had a perfect plan, only to watch your opponent snatch the bonus you were aiming for? Yeah, that happens here.

Replayability

There’s plenty of variety here. Each game uses one of four double-sided Dragon Guild tiles, four of ten double-sided objective tiles, and of course, the massive decks of dragon and cave cards. No two games will play exactly the same. The changing goals and card availability mean you’ll need to tweak your strategy each time, making it feel fresh even after multiple plays. I’d say the replayability is more than solid.

How Does It Compare to Wingspan?

If you’ve played Wingspan, you’ll immediately recognize some shared mechanics, like placing creatures into different habitats, collecting eggs, storing resources, and scoring based on specific traits. But Wyrmspan builds on those ideas in a way that gives it a unique identity.

One of the biggest differences is the exploring mechanic, which introduces movement, something Wingspan doesn’t have. The coin system also changes things up, making action efficiency more critical. The Dragon Guild track brings a little player interaction by making you compete for key spots, whereas Wingspan keeps things more separate. And with caves, you’re not just placing dragons into fixed habitats, but you get to decide how your sanctuary grows.

It’s similar enough that Wingspan fans will feel right at home, but different enough that it doesn’t feel redundant.

Final Thoughts

Personally, I like Wyrmspan even more than Wingspan. It offers some extra planning and depth, which I really enjoy. There’s nothing worse than having the perfect dragon lined up, only to realize you forgot to excavate a cave first. That extra bit of forward-thinking makes it all the more satisfying when your engine starts running smoothly.

That said, it’s just my two cents. The engine-building mechanics are engaging, and there’s plenty of room for strategy. Interaction is mostly limited to the Dragon Guild, so at times, it can feel like you’re playing your own puzzle rather than actively competing with others. The coin system can feel restrictive, especially when resources are tight, but that’s part of the challenge.

Is It for You?

If your idea of fun includes collecting dragons, crafting clever combos, and building an engine that runs so smoothly it makes your opponents jealous (but not too jealous), Wyrmspan is right up your alley. It’s approachable, engaging, and just when you think you’ve figured it all out, it throws in another surprise to keep things interesting.

If you’re a fan of Wingspan, Everdell, or Cascadia, you’ll probably feel right at home here. It draws you in with its stunning artwork, keeps the rules simple enough to get going quickly, and then surprises you with how much room there is to experiment with different strategies.

And if you’ve ever played Wingspan and thought, This is great… but wouldn’t it be even better with dragons and an underground labyrinth? Well, congratulations. Your game has arrived.

📝 We received a copy of the game from Stonemaier Games for review.