Tips & Strategy

How to teach Heart of Darkness, equipping with 20 Credits, choosing a Patron, managing Time, Health, Sanity and Food, playing solo, and the videos worth watching.

Advice, not rules: where anything here disagrees with the rulebook, the rulebook wins.

Teaching and a first game

• Set up one expedition and play through the rulebook’s full example of play (rule 7A, Buye) before the first game: it shows a whole Matrix search, a Rumor, a Wasteland moving and a Special Discovery.
• The Matrix is the part new players question most: it is a close-up of the one region you just entered, too detailed to fit on the map.
• Keep the Encounter and Incident charts open on the table; most chits change with the previous Encounter and the second Event.
• A clear frame or sheet of plastic over the Expedition Sheet keeps the many markers from sliding.
• Allow four hours or more; many players keep a journal of their explorer’s adventures.

Equipping with 20 credits

• Resources almost never come back: you can only regain Guides and Canoes (and a random Resource now and then), and new men only from Missionaries. Buy what you will need for the whole game.
• Food first: your men eat 14–18 a Game Turn. Ending a move in an explored region gives 20 Food, but costs your whole Matrix Phase.
• Keep your Ammo Stock above your number of Askaris: hunts and ambushes get easier.
• Fishing caps hunger Discontent at 1; Machete and Canteen save Time in Jungle and Desert; Quinine and Cannabis are your only way to heal at the end of a Game Turn.
• Buy the Resources that add DP for your Patron’s finds: Painting or Surveying for “Exploring”, Books for “Science”, Pickax for “Finance”, Bible for “Politician”, Diary for “The News”.
• A Guide is two extra moves every Game Turn; players often regret not taking one.

Patron

• “Exploring” has the most chits that draw its attention (scenery, mountains, lakes, lost cities and six water markers), so it gains bonuses most often; designer Kim Kanger sees the Patrons as part of your story rather than a balance tool.
• Head where your Patron’s finds are likely: rivers and lakes for “Exploring”, villages for “Science”.

Time, Health and Sanity

• Your Time each Game Turn is Health + 5: losing Health costs you moves for the rest of the game.
• Reaching “End here” avoids a Health-roll; plan the last moves of a search.
• Low Sanity makes Villages fear you but Porters desert; low Health makes them pity you but Askaris desert.
• Watch Discontent: every man lost and every hungry turn adds to it, and 10 is death.
• Use Success to remove an Encounter when the next combination would hurt (Healer after Healer, Plant after Plant).

Solo

• Remember −2 on the Disease and Horror rolls: the markers often land on the top slots, so expect a Health or Sanity-roll most Game Turns.
• Running two or three expeditions yourself is a popular way to play: different parts of Africa get explored and the map fills up.

Host game

Teach a Game Turn as the Map Phase followed by the entire Matrix search, then show the smaller Player Turns inside that search. On the first three Player Turns, ask which Time costs apply and point to the Event sequence; keep the Encounter chart open rather than asking players to memorise combinations.

Rehearse the food bill

Use an expedition with 6 Askaris and 8 Porters and 20 Food before beginning a Game Turn. Feed all 14 men: deduct 14 Food and leave 6. This bill is paid at the start of the Game Turn, not paid again for each Player Turn in the Matrix. Then point to Time as the separate limit on that region’s exploration. Reset the example’s Food before playing the actual opening. Food and turns and rounds.

Sources

• Heart of Darkness Review - Part 1 — SOLO Boardgaming.
• Heart of Darkness - Part 2 - How to Play - SETUP — SOLO Boardgaming.
• Heart of Darkness - Part 3 - How to Play - MAP PHASE — SOLO Boardgaming.
• Heart of Darkness - Part 4 - How to Play - MATRIX PHASE — SOLO Boardgaming.
• Lets Play HEART OF DARKNESS — Solo Gamers Club.
• Heart of Darkness First Look — Centurion’s Review.
• Designer answers on the BoardGameGeek Rules forum.

The videos sometimes slip: one compares the Porter desertion roll with Health instead of Sanity, another forgets to move the activated Rumor before dealing with a Finding. Follow the rules pages.