The best games from Indie Boards & Cards 🇺🇸🏢 2026

The Resistance: Avalon is a standalone game set in the legendary world of King Arthur, combining the mechanics of secret identities and deduction found in The Resistance with a thematic backdrop of Arthurian legend and the struggle between good and evil.

The Resistance is a dynamic party game focused on social deduction, set against the backdrop of a dystopian empire. It's designed for five to ten players and offers a thrilling experience of intrigue and deception.

Coup is a strategic bluffing game set in an Italian city-state. Players, as heads of rival families, seek to outmaneuver and eliminate others to be the last one standing. Influence is key, represented by face-down character cards, each offering unique powers.

Players take on the roles of either investigators or cultists in a social deduction game. Investigators aim to prevent Cthulhu from awakening, while cultists seek to bring about a disastrous end to the world. The game is played over four rounds, with players using investigation cards to uncover clues, and the outcome depends on whether Cthulhu is revealed or if all clues are discovered first.

Aeon's End: War Eternal plunges you into the desperate battle for Gravehold, the last stronghold in a world under siege by The Nameless. This standalone expansion of Aeon's End delivers a thrilling cooperative deck-building experience.

The New Age introduces an expedition system to the Aeon's End universe, allowing players to experience their own content in a shorter campaign format. After each game, players receive new treasures and player cards to grow in power, but the enemies they face become stronger with each battle. This standalone expansion is compatible with all other standalone games, enabling exciting new combinations of content.

Players grow trees in a three-dimensional space. They move their Kodama stones around a 4x4 grid of branch tiles to choose the branches they want to add to their trees. Once all players have placed 12 branches on their trees, they score their goal cards, and the player with the most points wins.

Flash Point: Fire Rescue immerses players in the high-stakes role of firefighters, tasked with rescuing victims from a blazing building. This cooperative board game challenges players to strategize, take risks, and work as a unified team to avert disaster.

Aeon's End: Legacy immerses players into the world of breach mages, defenders of Gravehold, the last bastion of humanity. As apprentices, players are inspired by legendary mages like Brama, Dezmodia, Mist, Malastar, and Xaxos, each embodying unique traits and powers.

The magical forest of Kodama is blooming, but the ancient paths to the inner sanctuaries have become overgrown and lost. As a devoted Kodama, you must restore these paths, collect offerings for the forest guardians, and earn their favor. Kokoro is an exciting family game for up to eight players, featuring simultaneous rounds for quick play, where players connect their sanctuaries with offerings to gain points while avoiding greed that can lead to penalties.

Are you a modern, clever detective? The Sherlock Files: Elementary Entries offers three perplexing cases to solve. Investigate the cause of a deadly heart attack on flight TJ1309, delve into an old case from 1923 involving the violent death of a renowned explorer, and unravel the mystery behind a corpse that disrupted a family's Fourth of July celebration. Gather clues, determine their relevance, and collaborate with your detective partners to piece together the truth.

Kodama: The Tree Spirits is a charming and strategic board game where players assume the role of caretakers for Kodama, the enchanting tree spirits. The game is set in a rapidly growing forest, and your goal is to create a healthy and thriving home for these whimsical creatures. Designed by the creator of Kigi, this game offers a unique and engaging way to play.

Players are part of a notorious group of criminal goat masterminds who have pulled off their biggest heist yet. After stealing the coveted golden hoof from the safest bank vault in Barn City, everyone must try to pin the crime on one unsuspecting player. Trade cards, make deductions, and discover if you are the scapegoat before the cops catch up!

Haggis is a strategic card game that belongs to the climbing game family, sharing similarities with games like Zheng Fen and Big Two. It combines various elements from these parent games, such as card combinations, bombs, and scoring based on both cards in hand and cards collected in tricks. A distinctive feature of Haggis is the inclusion of equally distributed wild cards and a betting mechanism where players wager on being the first to deplete their hand of cards.

Coup: Rebellion G54 is a standalone game that evolves the successful elements of the original "Coup" into a new and exciting format. The game emphasizes strategy, deception, and survival, making it a thrilling challenge for players who enjoy bluffing and deduction.

Aeon's End: Outcasts continues the expedition system introduced in Aeon's End: New Age, allowing players to replay all their content in a short campaign format. After each game, players acquire new treasures and player cards to enhance their power. However, the nemeses they face grow stronger with each battle.

Three new puzzling cases await resolution. First, track down a man missing from his shift at a cemetery. Next, investigate the fate of a wealthy butler, and finally, uncover the driver behind a suspicious hit-and-run.

Players take on the role of powerful crime bosses in a dystopian universe, building their criminal organizations by recruiting agents with unique abilities. The goal is to steal as much money as possible from corrupt governments and rival companies using a hand-building mechanism that keeps all specialists available for strategic use. Each specialist has special skills, and players can choose to play them individually or in teams to complete missions and gain immediate benefits.

Players are the bravest dragon slayers in the world, fighting to be crowned the master slayer. The warrior must seek out wild beasts, defend against their attacks, and be ready to take them down. Dragon Slayer introduces a push-your-luck mechanic with simple rules and adds a layer of complexity through challenges among players, giving every action during their turn a new dimension.

Gauntlet of Fools is a skill and luck adventure game for 2-6 players, lasting less than 30 minutes. Choose your hero from hundreds of combinations and engage in ridiculous boasting to secure the best one—though each boast comes with a price. Tackle fifty deadly encounters, roll dice, slay monsters, and claim their treasures. Die with the most gold to win.

Players assume secret roles as either government informants or rebel fighters in a fast-paced game for 3 to 10 participants. Informants reveal themselves at night, while players take turns performing special actions that include gathering information and swapping roles. The rebels win if they successfully identify an informant; otherwise, the informants triumph by remaining hidden.

Brave adventurers from across the realm venture into the Skull Cave to seek their fortune. Gold, treasures, and dangerous encounters await behind every door, so players must gather their gear, sharpen their swords, and beware of goblins.

Players cooperate in a strategic card game where they supply fuel to keep a fire burning. Each card provides warmth and requires the fire to maintain a certain temperature. As the fire constantly goes out, players must work together to manage their cards and ensure everything in the deck can be burned.

The realms are divided, their former glory lost and forgotten. The Tyrant Queen has seized the throne, driving the rightful heirs into deep exile. Players are the sons and daughters of once-great houses, gathering followers and recruits under the guidance of advisors to reclaim what is rightfully theirs.

Players investigate three perplexing cases. First, they explore the lives of a recently deceased crime lord's family, friends, and business associates. Next, they uncover how a group of cunning jewel thieves vanished with their loot, and finally, they seek the truth behind a devastating laboratory fire. Decode clues and determine which are relevant to each case while collaborating with fellow detectives.