Expansions Include:
- Pearlbrook (2019)
- Bellfaire (2019)
- Spirecrest (2020)
- Newleaf (2022)
- Mistwood (2022)
- Mini Expansions:
- Legends
- Extra Extra!
- Rugwort Pack
- Glimmergold Pack
This game provides examples of:
- Anti-Hoarding:
- The game has a hand limit of 8 (though certain player powers increase it) to keep you from hoarding cards. Particularly relevant because some effects let you discard cards for a bonus.
- The Innkeeper and Crane can be discarded to play respectively a Critter or Construction at a discount. These cards are subject to a Uniqueness Rule to discourage you from playing one and sitting on it for too long — that means you won't be able to snag a second copy if one shows up in the Meadow. Another option is keeping the card in your hand, but then it'll count against your hand limit.
- Awesome, but Impractical:
- Building more than a single instance of specific building is great... for short-term profit. Long-term, it can hurt your final score pretty badly, as there is a limit of only 15 cards to be build.
- Directly "building" characters tend to cost enormous amount of berries - it's always easier to simply invoke them once the building related to them exists.
- Boring, but Practical: The two resin slot. It's the easiest and most straightforward way of getting large amount of the all-important resource.
- Cash Gate: As a rule of thumb, the better the structure, the more expensive it is to build it. Especially when it's something unique.
- Cats Are Mean: The Bellfaire Expansion Pack introduces player powers represented by different species of workers. While most of the ability names have positive or neutral connotations, the Cat worker's ability is called "Bossy" and lets you place a worker on a spot already occupied by an opponent's worker. (The only other exception to the "positive or neutral connotations" thing is Rats being "Obnoxious".)
- Civilized Animal: The game is set in a medieval-ish village of those, including predominately mammals and avians, but there is also a turtle, a frog and even a beetle in the basic game and many more species in the expansions.
- Clever Crows: The Teacher card is a crow.
- Deckbuilding Game: Downplayed. The game operates more like playing solitaire, but each player must first assemble a deck, while drawing and exchanging cards are both vital parts of the gameplay loop.
- Deck Clogger: Any unique card that you got in your starting hand will be impossible to build, while there is a strict limit of just 8 cards forcing to discard everything else. To make it worse, the card in question might be actually good and useful, but players are unlikely to play them earlier than Autumn.
- Digital Tabletop Game Adaptation: There is a dedicated PC application for the game.
- Disc-One Nuke: It is possible to have an opening hand that consists of Boat, Farm, Rower, Husband and Wife, allowing to build them all and get a large amount of resources in the process.
- Drafting Mechanic: There are many ways of getting additional cards and/or exchanging the ones from your hand for others.
- Event-Driven Clock: Players start in late winter, and advance to the next season through one of the actions. Season positions are per-player, thus one player may be operating in Autumn while others may still be putting finishing touches in Summer.
- Expansion Pack: Five of them, adding new cards to the game and minor changes to the base mechanics.
- Extrinsic Go-First Rule: "The most meek player goes first". Anyone who self-declares as such is naturally not the case.
- First-Player Advantage Mitigation: The first player starts with 5 cards. For each subsequent step in the turn order, the player in question gets one additional card. This compensates for how the first player gets the first opportunity to visit exclusive locations, play cards from the Meadow and achieve events.
- The Gimmick: The Tree serves no other point than looking impressive. The game can be played without it with zero changes to anything.
- Junior Variant: My Lil' Everdell removes the seasons from its older counterpart, toning down the complexity of the rules and number of components. The theme is also shifted from actual construction to role-play with the kids of Everdell building a make-play town.
- Literal Wild Card:
- Constructions are associated with a Critter — if you have the Construction, you can play the Critter for free once. The Ever Tree uniquely lets you play any Critter for free.
- The Judge's ability lets you substitute one of any resource for any other resource whenever you play a Critter or Construction. For instance, you may pay a 2-berry cost with a twig and a berry instead. This amounts to letting you treat any one resource of your choice as a wild whenever you pay a card's cost.
- The Peddler lets you exchange up to two resources for the same number of other resources.
- Reduced Resource Cost: Cost reduction is an important part of Resources Management Gameplay:
- Each Construction card is associated with a Critter card, like the Inn and Innkeeper. When a Construction is played, it negates the cost to play one copy of the associated Critter (though the player still has to draw or obtain the Critter card normally).
- After a Crane has been built, it can be discarded to reduce the cost of a new Construction by three resources of any type(s). The Innkeeper does the same for playing new Critters.
- Some cards (such as the courthouse) provide a post-purchase benefit of one resource after building a construction. The initial investment is still necessary, but can be used to reduce the net cost.
- Resources Management Gameplay: The game has a very tight amount of actions to be made, and building things requires resources, which have to be first gathered by either your (very limited) workers, or cards you've played.
- Scoring Points: The game is resolved by a point count in the end. Only part of it comes from cards build, while there are side-objectives and even option to simply trade cards in your hand for additional points.
- Uniqueness Rule: Your village can only contain one copy of critters and constructions with the "unique" property. This sometimes has a thematic justification (it makes sense that you can only have one King or Queen), but more often than not it just serves to keep you from spamming cards that would be too good in multiples. For the Innkeeper and Crane (which can be discarded to play respectively a Critter or Construction at a discount) in particular, it's a form of Anti-Hoarding — you can play them and hold onto them, but this means that if another one shows up in the Meadow, you won't be able to snag it...
- We Work Well Together: The Husband and Wife cards - a pair of mice related with Farm, that offer additional bonuses when both are present.
- Worker Placement: Each player starts with 2 workers, and each new season adds additional to the pool.
- You Dirty Rat!:
- While most of the game's various critters are good-natured, solo mode opponent Rugwort the Rat is a nasty Hate Sink who comes to Everdell with his "rowdy, rambunctious, rat ruffians" in an apparent attempt to take over the city. The last Rugwort scenario even has him kidnapping one of your workers. He later got his own mini-expansion where all of his cards have nasty effects on opponents: one steals one of their green cards and gives them a detrimental card in return, one has you exchange hands with someone (which means a chance to steal their stuff while "giving" a small or empty hand in return), and one whose point value scales with the number of events an opponent has.
- The Bellfaire Expansion Pack introduces player powers represented by different species of workers. The Rat worker's ability is called "Obnoxious", while most of the other ability names have positive or neutral connotations. (The only other exception is Cats being "Bossy".) The "Obnoxious" ability lives up to its name, as it makes you benefit when someone plays a certain card from the Meadow.
