Wingspan – the phenomenon from Stonemaier Games

Wingspan, designed by Elizabeth Hargrave and published by Stonemaier Games in 2019, represents a landmark shift in the tabletop gaming landscape. While many “heavy” strategy games rely on themes of industrial conquest or medieval warfare, Wingspan centers on the tranquil, scientifically grounded world of ornithology. Its meteoric rise—winning the prestigious Kennerspiel des Jahres—proved that a game about birdwatching could be just as cutthroat and complex as any civilization builder.

A Brief History

The game’s origin is as unique as its theme. Elizabeth Hargrave, an avid birder, spent years meticulously cataloging data for over 170 North American bird species to ensure the game’s mechanics reflected real-world avian traits. This dedication to “hard science” transformed Wingspan from a mere game into a piece of interactive art. Its success paved the way for several expansions, bringing birds from Europe, Oceania, and Asia into the fold, each adding new mechanical layers to the core experience.

Core Mechanics: Building the Engine

Wingspan is a competitive, medium-weight, card-driven, engine-building board game. Players act as bird enthusiasts—researchers, bird watchers, and collectors—seeking to discover and attract the best birds to their network of wildlife preserves. The game is played over four rounds, during which players manage three distinct habitats on their player mats:

• The Forest (Gain Food): Essential for paying the “cost” to play new bird cards.
• The Grassland (Lay Eggs): Eggs are worth points and are required to play birds in more advanced columns of the mat.
• The Wetland (Draw Cards): Provides access to new bird species and potential engine pieces.

The brilliance of the mechanics lies in the brown powers. As you play birds into a row, every time you take that habitat’s action, you activate the “brown powers” of every bird already in that row from right to left. This creates a chain reaction where a single action can yield food, eggs, and cards simultaneously.

Common Strategies for Victory

While the game offers thousands of potential combinations, expert play generally revolves around three core strategies:

1. The Grassland “Egg” Engine: Because every egg is worth 1 point at the end of the game, a common late-game strategy is to fill the Grasslands with birds that have high egg capacities or “lay extra egg” powers. In the final round, players often spend almost every turn simply laying eggs to maximize their raw score.
2. The “Big Four” Power Play: Certain birds, like the Franklin’s Gull, Killdeer, and the Common Raven, are legendary for their efficiency. They allow players to trade eggs for cards or food, effectively allowing a player to ignore the Forest or Wetland habitats entirely and focus solely on the Grasslands.
3. Tucking and Caching: Predator birds and flocking birds allow players to “tuck” cards from the deck behind them or “cache” food on the card. Each tucked card or cached food is worth 1 point. A dedicated “tucking engine” in the Wetlands can generate 3–5 points per turn without ever needing to play a new bird.

Conclusion

Wingspan’s enduring popularity stems from its perfect balance of aesthetic beauty and mechanical depth. Whether you are a casual player enjoying the stunning watercolor illustrations or a strategist calculating the optimal food-to-point conversion ratio, Wingspan offers a rewarding, “bird’s-eye view” of the natural world.