The Peak Team

• Designer: Scott Almes
• Publisher: Matagot
• Players: 1-5
• Age: 10+
• Time: 60 minutes
• Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/3KhNg7K
• Played with review copy provided by publisher

As a team of wildlife rangers, your mission is to ensure the well-being of different species in your wildlife reserve while protecting them from potential threats. In The Peak Team, a cooperative game by Scott Almes, 1-5 rangers work together to complete a variety of challenging tasks.

The main board represents the wildlife reserve, dominated by a towering mountain divided into distinct regions. Using a “reverse-drafting” mechanic, where each player assigns their cards to others, rangers will acquire the tools they need to explore the mountain via different paths and transportation systems.

By reaching various locations and observing wildlife, players will complete their personal missions and earn bonuses. Each ranger has two mission slots that fill up as soon as tasks are accomplished. Only by completing all missions before running out of actions will the rangers successfully fulfill their duty!

The Peak Team is built around a tiered level system, with the game increasing in difficulty and complexity as sessions progress. It strikes a careful balance between accessibility for newcomers and a rewarding challenge for seasoned players.  

The Peak Team is a cooperative game (though it can also be played solo!) that has five different levels of play.   I’ll explain the full game here, but be aware that the rules intend you to learn the game in stages, adding in new rules at each new Level.

When you setup the game, you’ll be setting up for somewhere between 3 and 5 players.  If you are playing solo, you’ll take on the roles of all 3 players, and if you’re playing with 2, you’ll have a virtual player.  The board is placed on the table and the animal tokens are put on the appropriate spots.  Mission cards are dealt out to each space on the Round Track.  Each player gets a player mat (looks like a Messenger bag) and all the bits in their color.  1 Regular Mission card is dealt out to each player – this goes in one of the two slots at the top of the player board.

[Lv 2] Draw out four of the 10 animal blocker tokens and then place them on the matching routes on the board.

[Lv 3] Each player draws a random Power tile giving each player a unique ability.  The Special Missions deck is shuffled, one is drawn and placed face up on the table, and the letters on this card are marked with Special Mission Flags on the board.  Additionally, one more Special Mission card is revealed as the Final Mission – at the bottom of the round counter. 

[Lv 4] Place as many Success tokens on the Special Mission as the number of players.

[Lv 5] Place 1 Weather card face down on each Round space – these cards will add new rules that apply only to the current round.  These cards are revealed at the start of each round and apply during the entirety of that round.

As you play the game, there are two phases 

1) Supply Drop – each player draws 4 new supply cards which can be used to record animals, to move your ranger around the park or to renew your Support token.  The twist is that you don’t keep the cards you draw, but instead, you must distribute them as evenly as possible to your neighbors, and you’re not allowed to verbally communicate while you do this!

2) Taking actions – going around the table, players take turns doing 1 or more actions

• Record an Animal – play a card that shows an Animal that is in the same region as your Ranger. Take the Animal token

• Move your Ranger – play a card and use the icons in the top corner to move on the designated path type.  Some routes may be blocked by Animal blocker tokens; you cannot use these paths until the Blocker is removed. After the move is complete, you can complete a mission is you are in the correct location, you can share cards with any other Rangers in your location, you can get more Missions for the team if you are at a Ranger Station, complete the Special Mission if all the flags have been collected, trigger the final mission, or consider starting a new Special Mission to gain Success markers.

• Be supported – if another player is willing to exhaust their Support token, you can move one step along any path.  (you also have the same post-move options here as above)
• Remove a Blocker Token – another player can move an Animal Token from their player mat (so it has to have already been recorded) to the board in order to remove the blocker token
• Use another players Animal Token – another player can move an Animal Token from their player mat (so it has to have already been recorded) to the board in order for you to gain the reward printed on it
• Reactivate your own Support token – discard cards with a total of 4 or more icons on them
• Rest – discard a supply card to temporarily pass – you do not have to take an action on your turn, but you also are not out of the round
• Pass – you will take no further actions this round; if you have cards left in your hand, you will distribute these along with the 4 new cards in the next round

At the end of the round, you move the Round Token to the next space.  You must place 1 Blocker token on the board for each Regular Mission left at the current Round Space.  Unfinished Mission cards are moved down into the next Round

Check to see if the game is won 

•  if there are no missions left on the Gameboard or Player Mats and all the Animal Tokens are collected – then the team wins.
• In advanced levels, you also have to have complete the Special Mission and the Final Mission

The team loses if:

• There are no more rounds left to play in the game
• If you have left 4 or more fewer mission cards when everyone has passed at the end of a round
• If you don’t have enough Blocker Tokens to place for remaining Mission cards at the end of a round

My thoughts on the game

The Peak Team is a challenging and quite complex game once you add in all the parts. The rules are set up in a nice stepwise manner for you to learn the game well over your first five games.  That being said, in today’s gaming world – or at least my group – it’s not necessarily easy to find time to play a game five different times just to learn it.  I did OK lumping together the rules into three learning games, but of course YMMV.

The rules are all in the rulesheets, but the format is not one I’d choose.  There are two pamphlets, the first for Levels 1-2, and the other for Levels 3-5 and the solo game.  They are map-fold things, think of four sheets of paper in a row – it’s really a huge 34″x11″ sheet of double sided paper.  The dang sheets are just too long and you often have to open up the whole thing to find what you are looking for.   It’s really hard to find things quickly as the rules are meted out in different levels, so you have to remember at what Level the rule was introduced to find the right part of the rules to answer your question.   I would have much preferred a regular sixteen page rulebook (stapled in the center of a two page display at a time) as well as an Index.  Everything is likely included in the two different rulebooks, but man, it’s not easy to use at all.  

But, once you do manage to get all the rules down, there is a really tough cooperative game here.  The players must work together to achieve the goals, and they must distribute the cards without discussion – so each player must be paying attention to what is going on in the game and what each of their neighbors likely wants in the game.  You can sometimes tell where a player wants to go based on the Mission cards they have on their player board; so trying to either help them get to the right place or to give them animals that they can record while on the way is crucial here.

The first level did not pose much of a challenge, but then again, that’s probably why it was set up as the first level.  Just learn the basics of the actions and the flow of the game.  As you add in the Blocker Tokens in Level 2 and the Special Missions in level 3, the complexity and difficulty of the game really ratchets up.   My win percentage at Level 3 is quite low and zero at Level 5 at the moment!

There are also solo rules in the box, but be forewarned that the game requires you to play with at least the Level 4 rules.  This is how I learned the game, and I’ll admit it was quite difficult to start with all those rules in play – but I had the advantage that I didn’t risk miscommunicating with myself when choosing all the actions!

The art is really beautiful, both on the box cover and the board as well as on the player cards.  The information on the cards is quite easy to read, and I appreciate the uncluttered look there.  

The Peak Team is a cooperative game that works on a number of levels, mostly in part because it offers you different levels of complexity to play at.  Each group can hopefully find the level that works for them and offers the right amount of difficulty.  Additionally, for those (like me), who prefer to cooperate only with themselves, the solo game allows for that mode of play too.

Until your next appointment,

The Gaming Doctor

Amazon affiliate link: https://amzn.to/3KhNg7K