Type of mechanics

Dragon Keeper could be considered as a cooperative game, but with all the players being traitors. Each participant plays for himself, but they can be defeated together!

In the game you will collect tiles (which depict different adventures trying to rob the dragon) to score points at the end. However, you will be dealt a guild card at the start, and will score negative points for any adventures from that guild you collect during the game.

At each of your turns, you first move the dragon to pick up a tile from the row it's on, then move it again in the column and give a tile to the preceding player. If you give them a tile worth more than 2 you gain a gold. Some tiles include a special action.

The tile that the following player will get depends on the position of the tile you have given, thus creating a strong interaction. The original guilds are secret, so you must deduce which ones are your opponents, to penalize them as much as possible.

The level ends when the dragon can land on any adventure tiles, and the player that causes this loses a gold.

At the end of each level you must pay the dragon between 0 to 3 gold depending on how many tiles are left on the board, as depicted by the flames on your player board.. If you can't, you are eliminated.

At the end of the third level each player must discard their highest stack of tiles (choose if two are equal) before paying the final tribute to the dragon. Then any tiles with the 'Release' special action is resolved before the final scores are calculated.