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Gladiatorial board game Spartacus: A Game of Blood and Treachery re-enters the arena in upcoming second edition

The 2012 release is finally getting a reprint.

Spartacus: A Game of Blood and Treachery - the board game adaptation of the television series - is receiving a second edition later this year.

Set in the debauched and dangerous city of Capua during the height of the Roman empire, Spartacus has players becoming dominus over their own noble house - with the aim to win gold and glory by pitting their gladiators against those of rival houses. Featuring various characters and factions from the television show, Spartacus has players using their wits and nerve to win competitions and become the most influential house in Capua.

Starting with novice fighters, players can acquire more powerful gladiti by winning gold through betting on the winners of competitions and seeing their own fighters become victorious. Players can also train their existing gladiti to improve their stat dice and make them more formidable opponents in the arena.

Outside of the arena, players can also hatch schemes to undermine their rivals and acquire more wealth. Whilst some schemes require very little to pull off, others may even force players to convince an opponent to help them - either through bribes or promises.

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By balancing their strategies both in and out of the arena players can gradually improve their social standing, until one house acquires enough influence to be named the winner.

This upcoming board game edition of Spartacus features a brand new art style that focuses on original illustrations rather than images from the television series. One of the houses previously featured in the original edition - House Solonius - has also been replaced by a new house hailing from North Africa, called House Chuma.

Spartacus: A Game of Blood and Treachery was designed by Aaron Dill, John Kovaleski and Sean Sweigart - the same creative team behind Firefly: The Game, movie board game Star Trek: Ascendancy and the party board game Family Guy: Stewie’s Sexy Party Game.

The publisher behind Spartacus is Gale Force Nine, a company responsible for releasing the recent reprint of Dune - reviving one of the best board games of the nineteen seventies - and the upcoming board game, Aliens: Another Glorious Day in the Corps!

This newest edition of Spartacus: A Game of Blood and Treachery is set to be released sometime in Q4 of 2020, according to website ICv2.

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Alex Meehan avatar
Alex Meehan: After writing for Kotaku UK, Waypoint and Official Xbox Magazine, Alex became a member of the Dicebreaker editorial family. Having been producing news, features, previews and opinion pieces for Dicebreaker for the past three years, Alex has had plenty of opportunity to indulge in her love of meaty strategy board games and gothic RPGS. Besides writing, Alex appears in Dicebreaker’s D&D actual play series Storybreakers and haunts the occasional stream on the Dicebreaker YouTube channel.
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