My first experience with Vale of Eternity was back in May 2025 where in preparation for my volunteer coaching at All Aboard Expo, I went to the nearest Gaming Library store to get the hang of things. One of the games to be featured was indeed Vale and upon first game it was an immediate hit for me. A game totally outside of my radar instantly became a must-get for me.
So did a lot of people. There were tons of preorders that there weren't enough copies for sale on the event itself and couldn't count for any sales records because of it even though it sold out. I finally acquired my copy by August, which ironically came later than its first expansion.
Vale of Eternity is a bit hard to pin down genre-wise. The way I described it during the convention was that it's a game where you summon creatures and get the most points doing so. That statement is a very rough summary, but the newbie doesn't know what "engine-building" is.
The game goes either up to ten rounds or after someone crosses 60 points, whichever goes first. Each round consists of a hunting phase, an action phase and a resolution phase.
In the hunting phase creatures are dealt up and players take turns drafting two of them to use in the action phase. The action phase is where drafted cards are sold or tamed, it's also where summoning happens. Summoning costs stones which you can acquire through selling creatures or card effects, without these stones you really can't do much on your turn.
To summon a card you pay the price listed on the card and play the card on your area. Cards feature various creatures with unique effects. Some happen instantly at once, while others either permanently affect your area or resolve after the action phase. These creature effects are where game points will come from, though some effects can also next extra stones or cards/summons.
That is a rough summary of Vale of Eternity's gameplay. It may be a bit rough for some who have some experience playing as the language in the rules and card effects are as precise as a trading card game. There's no room for ambiguity in a game like this where a lot of effects have conditions to fulfil.
There are five families of cards in Vale, which define more than its sell value; families revolve around some theme that make them work when played together. Each family has its strategy and cards of different families can still synergize well so while you don't need to stick to a family to have a working strategy, a setup based on the same family will have a better dynamic.
Cards are effective based on what part of the game it is, giving room for tough decisions on whether to dispose of a card or hold on to it for later use; whether to play the card now or later and sequencing actions to great effect. Passive gains are just as important as the instant gains from instantaneous effects, in fact every part of the card is nontrivial. Cost and even what type of effect a card has can come into play in some cards. This means that there are more connections between cards and synergies pop up in unexpected ways.
What makes the game fun is the chaining of moves in both the action and resolution phases. You can chain moves for points in either phase or even use the resolution phase to fuel the next round's moves. Of course chaining is expected in games with an engine-building aspect but the free rein in the order of actions and activations is another feature of Vale's gameplay.
Resource management comes up when doing such combinations, as you can only hold so many stones and have so many summoned cards. This also means that order matters in your play, some moves will open up or close your options and will depend on your style.
The way it plays is like a combat TCG but without direct combat and a common randomized selection of draft picks, so depriving your opponents possible combos in the hunting phase is as important as playing yours during the action phase, though not a lot of interaction between players happens during gameplay otherwise.
A game that's easy to pick up that even with the same bunch of cards never feels the same with every play, it's more skillful than it seems at first glance. Thank goodness I crossed paths with Eternity cause I cannot recommend enough, only when the store runs out of stock.
