A board game set during Norway's brutal 12th-century civil war has funded on Kickstarter in under six hours. Fjordar, by Bergen-based studio Go To Pieces Games, hit its €40,000 goal on 7 April and has already climbed past €51,000 with 446 backers.
The game drops players into 1130 CE, the year King Sigurd the Crusader (Sigurd Jorsalfar) died and left Norway without a clear successor. Each player takes on the role of one of Sigurd's heirs or another power broker vying for the throne. The board is modular, three-dimensional, and built to evoke the Norwegian coastline with mountains, fjords, and islands, though it deliberately avoids being an actual map of Norway.
Fjordar is an area control wargame for up to six players, with card-driven movement and simultaneous combat card resolution. Each turn, you play a card for movement points and special abilities, manoeuvring units across the board to seize territory. When armies clash, both sides secretly choose a combat card and reveal simultaneously, adding strength to their units. Norway's civil war era, which stretched from 1130 to 1240, is rich with shifting alliances and contested claims, and it rarely gets the tabletop treatment. That fast funding suggests players are hungry for historical settings beyond the usual Roman and medieval English fare.
The campaign runs until 28 April. If Viking-era politics and area control are your thing, the Kickstarter page has the full breakdown.
Sources: Kickstarter | Kicktraq | BGG
