Potion Explosion – Board Game Review

Reviewed by: Fwooshe

It’s the final exam of the year at Horribilorum Sorcery Academy. My favourite class: Potions. Two empty flasks sit in front of me, the ingredient dispenser in the middle of the room. I need lots of ogre mucus and fairy dandruff for my Potion of Magnetic Attraction but I am struggling with collecting the ingredients. I ask the professor for a Little Help at the expense of two points taken off my final score. I hope it’s worth it. He pulls out a single unicorn tear from the dispenser and the rest of the ingredients fall into place. I have a plan! I dive in and collect what I need, as my classmates dodge the resulting explosions. This will be the best potion I have ever brewed… the Student of the Year award is well within reach!

Let’s Play Potion Explosion!

Potion Explosion is a dynamic and tactile board game in which everyone plays as a sorcery school student taking their potions exam. Players compete for the highest score (and “Student of the Year” award) by gathering potion ingredients (marbles) of the correct colours to fill potions and accumulate points for completed potions. At the centre of this game is a unique component: a large five-track marble dispenser which players interact with every turn. The tracks are slanted, so that when you pick up one marble, the marbles above it roll down and collide with the marbles below, creating potion explosions.

Potion Explosion Gameplay

In a game of Potion Explosion you play with six of the eight types of potions, differentiated by their stopper design. You can choose them randomly or deliberately. Each player takes two starting potion tiles to place in their desk board, recipe side up. (This side has bands of colours that indicate which colour of marbles to fill it with). The rest are shuffled and randomly dealt into five piles. Set aside a small stack of four to six skill tokens, amount depending on player count. This stack acts as a countdown to the end of the game. The first player takes the Starting Player token.

On Your Turn

On your turn, gather potion ingredients by picking up a marble from the dispenser. If the two colliding marbles are the same colour, this triggers an explosion. You get to take those exploded ingredients as well as any adjacent marbles of the same colour. If a second explosion is triggered then continue picking up marbles until the collided marbles do not match.

Once you have gathered your marbles, place them into the matching colour holes of the potions on your desk board. When you have completed a potion by filling all the holes, return those marbles to the top of the dispenser, flip the potion over to its completed side, and set it aside.

You can drink completed potions at any time during your turn to use their effects as indicated by the design of the stopper. (Effects include taking extra marbles from the dispenser, stealing opponents marbles from their storage flasks, etc.) You get points for completed potions whether or not you use them, so drink up!

During your turn you may choose to use a Little Help token to select an extra marble. This will not trigger an explosion. While doing this will deduct two points from your total score, it can be very helpful in setting up a chain of explosions, or just to get the last marble you need to complete a potion.

After you finish placing your marbles, store up to three marbles in your side flask to use during your next turn and return the rest to the dispenser. Then replace any empty slots on your desk board with new potion tiles from the potions stacks.

End of Game

The game ends when the small stack of skill tokens, worth four points each, runs out. Take a skill token when you:

• Complete your third potion of one type
• Complete five different types of potions

When the last skill token in the countdown stack has been claimed, the round continues until everyone has played their final turn.

Scoring

• Add the total value of points from completed potions
• Add four points for each skill token
• Deduct two points for each Little Help token

The player with the highest score wins the game and is crowned Student of the Year!

Our Thoughts on Potion Explosion

I fell in love with Potion Explosion the first time I played it about five years ago, and it continues to be captivating many plays later. The marble dispenser is such a unique, engaging, and fun mechanic! I’ve had plenty of turns where I’m so focused on getting the biggest possible chain of explosions that I don’t pay attention to the colours that I actually need for my potions and I end up having to return most of my marbles to the dispenser. But I do so satisfied. It’s exciting to get a really good explosion chain!

In my experience, Potion Explosion has been a huge crowd pleaser. It is a simple, visual, tactile game that does not allow for strategizing across turns because the “board” constantly changes. For these reasons, I strongly disagree with the age rating of 14+ and would say it is closer to 10+.

Potion Explosion is a great option for:

• Groups of varying experience levels
• Board game newbies
• A lively break from more intense games
• When you just want to play a fun, exciting, not-too-serious game

The ever-changing board (i.e. marble dispenser) does come with drawbacks. You cannot plan your turn ahead of time and so you must decide what to do on the spot. It can take several minutes to study the marble tracks, visualize possibilities for collisions, and factor in whether/how/when to use potion effects and the Little Help option. This can make for a lot of downtime in between turns, especially at four players. In spite of this drawback, I find Potion Explosion enthralling and incredibly enjoyable.

Potential Caveats:

• Lots of downtime at four players
• Easy to drop and lose marbles

I would love to hear your thoughts on the game! What do you like or dislike about it? What your opinions about the age recommendation and optimal player count?