Review: Cindr (Smirk and Dagger)

“Looking for a dragon to light up your life? Accept the quest on Cindr, the only dating app dedicated to matching you with the dragon of your dreams. Start your quest for love tonight!”

They say there’s an app for everything, but we never expected one for the fantasy world. In the Cindr dice game from Smirk and Dagger (under their Smirk and Laughter imprint), you’re a classic fantasy character looking for draconic love in the newest place around: the Cindr dating app.

Let’s check out the top five things you need to know about searching for love in the dragon dating scene.

Characters, Dragons, Likes, and Loves

#

Each player starts with one of 15 user profiles showing male, female, or gender neutral images. Using one of the included wipe-off markers, give your character a name, then flesh them out a bit with their pronoun, likes, and dislikes.

Your choices in the Compatibility Matcher set how your character feels about treasure, climate, lifestyle, and making social connections. This drives the game by controlling how they’ll “match” with dragons during dates.

Dice Game with a Twist

#

At its heart, Cindr is a push-your-luck dice game that sets itself apart with a mix of custom dice and situational rules. The basic play is simple: roll your dice to earn hearts but stop before you roll too many flames and get burned.

The situational rules add randomness and a bit of card combo strategy to the game, but they also raise the complexity level. You find situational rules on the dragon cards and the date location cards.

Let’s Start Dating!

#

The dragon draw deck represents the Cindr “app.” The current player reads the name and profile blurb of the dragon on top of the deck out loud, looking for clues about likes and dislikes.

If the dragon doesn’t feel right for your character, “swipe left” to throw them into the dating pool. Otherwise, “swipe right” to choose them for a date. You can also date a dragon in someone’s circle, but it costs love points (victory points) to tread in another players trove, if you get my meaning.

Flip over the dragon card and choose your dice by comparing the dragon’s compatibility with your character. Identical choices give you a green die (four hearts, two flames), while less compatible options yield either a blue die (three hearts and flames) or a red die (four flames and two hearts).

Choosing the Location

#

With your dragon selected, draw the top card of the location deck and find out what the “Whelp” app says about where you’re going.

The front of a location card shows the name, star rating, and a brief humorous blurb about the place. The back lists the special rules for that location. These rules usually change something with your dice or give you a bonus for making a certain roll. They also give a fun description of what you’ll do during the three stages of your date.

Rolling for Love and Second Chances

#

It’s finally time to grab the dice and find out how the date goes. You can roll up to three times during your turn. Every heart is a love point that gets you closer to the 21 points you need to win. Every fire puts that die out for the rest of your turn.

After each roll, you can either stop and score your love points or press your luck and roll the heart dice again. Second Chance cards let you try to salvage a date by re-rolling dice or removing flames, but after three flames, the date is a bust, the dragon goes back into the dating pool, and your turn ends.

If you succeed in two or three rolls, you had a successful date and the dragon goes into your dating circle where they’re available for future dates. Dragons in your circle can also grant you special abilities.

Playing Together or Alone

#

In addition to the competitive mode of play, Cindr also includes rules for cooperative and solitaire games.

In the “Abundant Love” cooperative version, players try to collectively spark as much love as possible. For solitaire play, the game mimics the old “love meter” arcade game, challenging you to score the most points. Both versions of the game play over exactly five rounds.

Verdict

#

Cindr surprised us. We expected a fluffy, luck-driven dice game, but we got something a lot deeper.

When you start, Cindr feels like a light filler game. Somewhere around mid-game, though, it turns into a gamer’s dice game with multiple special abilities coming into play each round.

The locations cards include some hilarious nods to dating as well as roleplaying history. Our favorites included the Pompous Poet Playhouse (“more fun than the name suggests”) and The Borderlands Keep (“raided and looted for years”).

Cindr puts a distinctive twist on a classic dice game concept. Recommended for dice lovers everywhere!