The Illuminary, the center of the magical realm of Lorcana, has summoned you because of your great imagination. Using an Inkcaster, you are able to summon glimmers, new versions of Disney characters that exist only in this world. With the aid of the glimmers, you search for missing lore, protecting Lorcana from threats.
What Is Disney Lorcana?
Disney Lorcana is a trading card game for 2-6 players, ages 8 and up, and takes about 20-30 minutes to play. While there are rules for multiplayer games, Disney Lorcana will likely most often be played with just 2 players, similar to other trading card games. As with most TCGs (trading card games), each player will need a deck of at least 60 cards to play. A pre-made starter deck for a single player retails for $16.99, while booster packs containing 12 random cards are $5.99. Disney Lorcana is sold directly from Ravensburger, from the Ravensburger store on Amazon, and at many local game stores and big box retailers. However, at the time of this writing, it may be challenging to find Disney Lorcana products at a reasonable price, at least until the holidays—see “The Dumbo in the Room” a bit farther down for details.
Disney Lorcana was designed by Ryan Miller and Steve Warner, and published by Ravensburger, with original illustrations by 70 different artists.
Disney Lorcana Components
Ravensburger sent over a variety of Disney Lorcana products, so let’s take a look at some of the offerings, and you can see what’s available.
One of the items included was a print by Nicholas Kole, one of the many Disney Lorcana artists. I haven’t seen these for sale, so it may just be a promotional item.
Next up is one of the neoprene playmats on offer for Lorcana. This one features the Juan Diego Leon artwork from the card, “Mickey Mouse: Steamboat Pilot.” It’s the same size as most TCG playmats, with a smooth, printed top and rubber backing.
Ravensburger sent along one booster pack. Each booster pack contains 12 random cards. There are multiple rarities of cards in Lorcana: Common, Uncommon, Rare, Super Rare, and Legendary. The bulk of most booster packs will be Common and Uncommon cards, with a Rare or two or even a Super Rare inside. Opening 4 booster packs in total (one is also included with each Starter Deck), I didn’t get any Legendary cards.
For anyone new to Disney Lorcana, a Starter Deck will make a likely first purchase. For this initial release of Lorcana, also known as “The First Chapter,” there are 3 different 60-card Starter Decks, which together cover all six different colors of the card. According to deck construction rules, a deck must be composed of no more than 2 colors. The 3 Starter Decks are: Amber and Amethyst, Sapphire and Steel, and Emerald and Ruby.
However, the 60-card deck isn’t all you’ll find in a Starter Deck box. There is also a booster pack, damage and Lore tracker tokens, a paper playmat, and instructions on how to play. It was nice to see that the instructions for each of the 3 decks included a section on strategies for playing that specific deck.
Lore is essentially your victory points, as you will need 20 Lore to win a match. I would have loved to have seen a cardboard dial included to track Lore, in case you’re playing with a neoprene playmat instead of the included paper playmat. However, other methods can be used to track your Lore, from glass beads to a 20-sided die.
How to Play Disney Lorcana
You can download a copy of the rulebook here.
The Goal
The goal of the game is to be the first to reach 20 Lore by questing with your characters.
Note: I had sleeved all my Disney Lorcana cards before play, hence the blue backs. The unsleeved back of the cards normally appears like this:
Setup
The setup for each player is identical.
Shuffle your deck, and set your Lore tracker to “0.”
Draw 7 cards for your starting hand, then randomly determine the starting player.
Note: If you have a poor starting hand, you have a one-time opportunity to discard any number of cards and then draw back up to 7, reshuffling your deck afterward.
Gameplay
Each player takes an entire turn before the next player goes. A turn consists of 2 phases: a Beginning phase and a Main phase.
Beginning Phase
- Ready – Turn any exerted cards upright. Exerted cards have been turned sideways, to show that they have been used on that turn.
- Set – Check for any start of turn effects on cards. Follow the instructions on those cards.
- Draw – Draw a card from the top of your deck. During the first turn for the first player only, this step is skipped.
Main Phase
Once per turn, you can put a card facedown into your Inkwell. The card must be one with an Inkwell icon around its cost.
Once a card is placed into the Inkwell, and for the rest of the game, it will count as 1 Ink, no matter what the original card was. Ink is essentially the currency a player uses to play cards from their hand into the play area.
You may also take as many of the following actions as you are able, in any order:
- Play a card. Pay the cost in Ink, and put a card into play faceup. If it is a Character card, that card enters play in the ready (upright) position, but cannot be used until that player’s next turn. Item cards can be used right away and remain in play, whereas Action cards are used, and then immediately discarded. Songs count as action cards, but players can either pay their Ink cost or exert a Character in play that is named by that card.
- Use a Character ability that doesn’t require them to exert.
- Use an Item ability.
Additionally, you can take actions with Characters that you’ve had in play since the start of your turn. These actions include:
- Quest
- Challenge an opponent’s exerted Character
- Use an ability that requires them to exert.
Quest
Whereas the goal of most TCGs is to destroy your opponent, in the case of Disney Lorcana, you are trying to reach 20 Lore by questing.
To Quest with a character, exert them, and then gain the amount of Lore equal to their Lore value, as indicated by the Lore symbol on the bottom right of their cards. Adjust your Lore tracker accordingly.
Challenge an Opponent’s Exerted Character
While eliminating an opponent’s Characters isn’t the goal of the game, it can be an effective method to slow their questing down.
Exert one of your Characters, then choose an opponent’s exerted Character to challenge. Both Characters will do damage to each other, based on their Strength. For example, Aurora: Dreaming Guardian has 3 strength, while Aurora: Briar Rose has only 2 strength.
So were one of these Auroras to challenge the other, Dreaming Guardian would do 3 damage to Briar Rose, who in return would also do 2 damage to Dreaming Guardian. Both of these two Characters have 5 Willpower, which are essentially wounds.
Damage tokens would get placed on both cards, which can only be removed by specific abilities that state that you can do so.
Once a Character has accumulated damage equal to its Willpower, it is Banished and placed in the owning player’s discard pile.
Using an Ability That Requires Them to Exert
Some abilities will specifically require you to exert the Character to use them. Therefore, if you use that ability, you will not be able to Quest or Challenge with the Character that turn. However, by exerting, your opponent may then choose to challenge that Character on their turn! Some of these abilities may additionally have an Ink cost to activate them.
Game End
The game ends as soon as one of the players has achieved 20 Lore or greater, thereby winning the game. Also, if your deck ever runs out of cards, you lose the match the next time you go to draw a card.
Disney Lorcana is GeekDad Approved!
The Dumbo in the Room
If you follow board and card game news on the internet at all, then you’re already aware that Disney: Lorcana has garnered quite a bit of attention, and not for the reasons that Ravensburger would like. In short, the initial stock of Lorcana got wiped out almost immediately upon release, and finding decks and boosters was often challenging if not downright impossible. This was due to a combination of factors. For one, it appears that Ravensburger underestimated demand, so hadn’t printed a large enough supply of the original print run of cards. Some stores received a much smaller allocation of stock than they had ordered, and some of these and other stores, especially the big box retailers, did not put any restrictions on how much Disney Lorcana any one individual could purchase.
This led to predatory resellers showing up at stores, buying up all of the Lorcana products on the shelves, and then listing them online at greatly inflated rates. These people would literally camp out at stores, waiting for them to receive their shipments, and then wipe them out. You’d also get gamers that would have to have every card available in Disney Lorcana’s First Chapter, so they would buy as many booster packs as they could get their hands on, clearing out supply.
All of this has made it very difficult for many gamers to get their hands on Disney Lorcana without either spending a lot of money, being extremely patient, or both. But thankfully, Ravensburger has already taken steps to correct this. Originally planned for the beginning of next year, they are doing a full reprint of The First Chapter cards. This reprint was originally targeted for Q1 2024, but will now be available for the holiday season of this year.
The Future of Disney Lorcana
The reprint will be released alongside the second set of Lorcana cards, Rise of the Floodborn. Expanding on the rules from The First Chapter, the new set will introduce not only new cards but also new mechanics.
As with any good TCG, Ravensburger plans to regularly release new sets, to keep the game fresh and challenging. It’s also important for another aspect of Disney Lorcana, which is deck building.
While you can certainly enjoy yourself just playing with any of the 3 premade decks that were released with The First Chapter, most trading card players enjoy building their own decks. To do so, they generally acquire cards through new releases, booster packs, or purchasing individual cards on the secondary market. When building a deck, players will often seek to capitalize on interactions between certain cards and therefore aim to get multiple copies of each to try to ensure that those particular cards will come up in play.
When building your own Disney Lorcana deck, there are just a few guidelines that must be adhered to:
- The deck must have at least 60 cards in it.
- The deck may not have more than 4 copies of any single card.
- The deck can only contain cards from 1 or 2 Inks (aka, colors).
Why You Should Play Disney Lorcana
One of the things that really drew me to Disney Lorcana is the focus on questing to acquire Lore. In most trading card games, there’s a heavy emphasis on fighting to reduce your opponent’s health to zero. But with Lorcana, the fighting is secondary. You’ll need to be strategic as to when you want to challenge another Character because choosing to fight with a character means that you won’t be able to Quest, as that character will be exerted. So you’ll really need to think if it’s in your best interests to challenge another Character, as well as which particular Character to challenge. Not only is this focus more original, it’s also more family-friendly.
Ravensburger made some great decisions regarding the 3 starter decks from The First Chapter. Each of these decks has a unique pair of Inks, so if you have all three of the decks, you’ll get an inkling (pun intended) on how cards for each Ink play. Not only do each of the decks have a different playstyle, but they are designed for different levels of TCG experience. The Amber and Amethyst deck is most suitable for players who are new to trading card games and has a number of cards that synergize well together. The Emerald and Ruby deck is for intermediate players and plays aggressively with an eye toward delaying your opponent’s progress by taking out their questing Characters. Finally, the Sapphire and Steel starter deck is the most nuanced and best for experienced players.
Much like other trading card games, Disney Lorcana is super fast to both setup and play. Most matches of Lorcana will last about 15-20 minutes once you’ve learned the game and don’t require much room to play, either.
On the flip side, trading card games can be real money sinks, especially if you’re a competitive player or a completionist. While all three of the affordable starter decks are enjoyable to play, many people will want to build their own decks. They may find themselves chasing that thrill of buying and opening those random booster packs and hoping to find something exciting inside. I’ll admit, I was keenly anticipating finding one of the legendary cards, and wish Ravensburger had sent me a few more booster packs in the hopes that I would have found one. Any trading card game can be addictive, so it’s always something to consider before you get involved in Disney Lorcana or any other TCG.
Something I haven’t spoken about much yet, but is sure to be a huge drawing point for many (again, pun intended), is the artwork on the cards. Knowing how many Disney fans are out there, Ravensburger definitely spared no expense on making a game that was not only mechanically strong but beautiful to look at. The 70 different artists have put loving touches on the glimmers, which are different interpretations of well-known Disney characters. With bold use of color and lighting, each card is a piece of art in and of itself, and it won’t be surprising if some Disney fans end up picking up the game just to enjoy the artwork.
Despite a bit of a bumpy launch, Ravensburger has a hit on their hands with Disney Lorcana. The game is easy to learn and accessible for new players but also has plenty of meat on its bones for more experienced players. It’s affordable to get into (as long as you stay away from those resellers) and is a lot of fun. Ravensburger has plans for regular expansion of Disney Lorcana too, starting with Rise of the Floodborn, so players will always be discovering new combinations of cards and new game mechanics. The artwork is gorgeous, and much like with the MCU’s multiverse, you get to see many alternate versions of Disney characters that you won’t find anywhere else. Disney Lorcana was one of the most anticipated games of this year, and the good news is it was worth the wait. And with just a little bit more to wait, both the reprint of The First Chapter and the next wave, Rise of the Floodborn, will be hitting store shelves soon.
To purchase Disney Lorcana, head to your local games store, big box stores, or the Ravensburger store on Amazon. For a look at the game from a different angle, check out fellow GeekDad Robin Brooks’ article on Disney Lorcana.
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Disclosure: GeekDad received a copy of this game for review purposes. As an Amazon affiliate, I may earn a small commission on qualified purchases.
