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Days of Wonder

Five Tribes

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$79.00
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Five Tribes is a medium-weight strategy game for 2–4 players, recommended for ages 13+, with a typical play time of 40–80 minutes. Manoeuvre the five tribes of the fabled Sultanate of Naqala across a modular board in this clever twist on the worker placement genre from Days of Wonder.

Players
2–4 players
Play time
Up to 2 hr
Age
Teens
Complexity
Medium

About the Game

Crossing into the Land of 1001 Nights, your caravan arrives at the fabled Sultanate of Naqala, where the old sultan has just died and control of the city-state is up for grabs. In Five Tribes, 2–4 players compete over roughly 40–80 minutes in a medium-weight strategy game recommended for ages 13+.

In a unique twist on worker placement, the meeples begin already in place. You pick up a group and "dis-place" them one by one across the villages, markets, oases and sacred places of Naqala, with the final meeple triggering the action of its tribe — Assassins, Elders, Builders, Merchants or Viziers. Bidding for turn order, summoning powerful Djinns and weighing many paths to victory reward careful calculation.

Designed by Bruno Cathala and published by Days of Wonder in 2014, Five Tribes builds on a long tradition of German-style games featuring wooden meeples, pairing straightforward, easy-to-learn rules with deeper tactical play.

History

Designed by Bruno Cathala and published by Days of Wonder in 2014, Five Tribes builds on a long tradition of German-style games featuring wooden meeples. Its unique twist on the now-standard worker placement genre begins with the meeples already in place, challenging players to cleverly "dis-place" the Assassins, Elders, Builders, Merchants and Viziers across the villages, markets, oases and sacred places of Naqala.

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Shipping details

Five Tribes

$79.00

Watch: How to play

Rules of Five Tribes

  • Setup: Shuffle the tiles into a 6×5 grid, place three random meeples on each tile, and deal merchandise cards and Djinn cards to the market. Each player takes coins and camels in their colour.
  • Bid for turn order: Each round, players bid coins for position in the turn order — going earlier usually costs more but gives first pick of moves.
  • Move meeples: On your turn, pick up all meeples from one tile and drop them one at a time across adjacent tiles (no doubling back or diagonals). Your last meeple must land on a tile containing a meeple of the same colour.
  • Tribe action: Remove all meeples matching your final meeple's colour and trigger that tribe's power — Assassins, Elders, Builders, Merchants or Viziers each score or act differently.
  • Tile action: If you empty a tile of meeples, you may claim it by placing a camel, then take the tile's action (gain coins, buy merchandise, summon a Djinn, and so on).
  • Market: At the end of your turn you may buy goods from the merchandise row, which is then refilled.
  • Objective: Score victory points from coins, Viziers, Elders, Djinns, claimed tiles and merchandise sets.
  • Game end: The game ends when no legal meeple moves remain or the merchandise deck runs out; most points wins.

Strategy

  • Plan your drop path backwards: work out where your last meeple needs to land before picking anything up, since it must match a colour on the destination tile.
  • Don't overbid for turn order early — coins are worth points at the end, so only pay up when an early move is clearly worth it.
  • Builders score based on your gold and the tile's value, so they can swing big points if timed well.
  • Merchants shine once you can grab several goods at once; diverse merchandise sets score far more than singles.
  • Emptying a tile lets you claim it with a camel, so look for moves that clear a tile while also landing a useful tribe action.
  • Collect Elders when you can — they let you summon Djinns, whose ongoing powers can shape your whole game.
  • Watch what your opponents set up: a big pile of meeples you leave behind may hand them a powerful move next turn.
  • Keep an eye on Vizier counts, as they score for majority — a cheap way to pick up points if others ignore them.

Reviews

4.8 / 5
848 ratings on Amazon

One of our favourites

Amazon Customer

Five Tribes have become one of our favourite games since we bought it! The rules are simple yet game really deep and strategic. Can definitely cause analysis paralysis for certain people, but lucky for us it wasn't an issue at all. Highly recommend this one.

Reviewed in Australia on 14 June 2021

Brilliant game

Jonathan

We love it. You often don't know who's won until you count upthe points at the end.

Reviewed in Australia on 18 December 2020

Great game

Lira Souza Gonzaga

One of my favorites from my collection! Different game play from all the games that I have! Great as a 2 player game as well as a 4 player!

Reviewed in Australia on 24 June 2019

More reviews (7)

good

Snipal

good

Reviewed in Australia on 23 August 2019

Very good

Greg Cox

Excellent fun brain burning game.

Reviewed in Australia on 28 November 2019

Excelente juego

Luis Tijerina

Excelente juego, el paquete llegó en óptimas condiciones, sin ningún daño aparente.

Reviewed in Mexico on 27 April 2026

Very dynamic game

Murilo Barbosa

Five tribes has a very dynamic play style as the board constantly changes after other player's move. This grants each player a lot of power to change the game and rely less on luck type of play (don't use dices). The board and pieces are really well made - ...
Read full review

Five tribes has a very dynamic play style as the board constantly changes after other player's move. This grants each player a lot of power to change the game and rely less on luck type of play (don't use dices). The board and pieces are really well made - maybe the box could have better slots to store the pieces after. Definitely recommend!

Reviewed in Canada on 12 December 2020

Super jeu a 2

QDC

Super jeu à jouer à deux

Reviewed in France on 16 January 2019

Strategia coloratissima

Rosa Maria

Gioco semplice ma strategico e divertente, lo abbiamo giocato in due ed è godibilissimo!

Reviewed in Italy on 23 April 2023Reviewed in Italy on 23 April 2023

Un buen juego de estrategia

Miguel Blacksad

Five Tribes es un magnífico juego de mesa que funciona perfectamente de 2 a 4 jugadores. Montar la partida lleva unos minutos, pero al ser el tablero modular, ofrece a cambio una gran rejugabilidad. El juego consiste en ir moviendo y retirando muñequitos (m...
Read full review

Five Tribes es un magnífico juego de mesa que funciona perfectamente de 2 a 4 jugadores. Montar la partida lleva unos minutos, pero al ser el tablero modular, ofrece a cambio una gran rejugabilidad. El juego consiste en ir moviendo y retirando muñequitos (meeples) de diferentes colores del tablero, que te permiten ir haciendo determinadas acciones y sumando puntos de victoria. Al principio hay muchas acciones disponibles, pero al poco tiempo éstas se van volviendo más escasas y hay que analizar el mejor movimiento con el que conseguir hacerse con casillas del tablero, mercancías, genios, visires, ancianos, dinero, etc. Un aspecto muy positivo es que hay tantas formas de puntuar que cada jugador puede llevar a cabo la suya y, si los otros jugadores no se dan cuenta, hacerse con la victoria de forma casi sorprendente cuando parecía que se estaba quedando atrás. El juego está en inglés, pero es totalmente independiente del idioma. Sólo las instrucciones hay que leerlas en inglés y se pueden encontrar en castellano en el siguiente enlace de la BGG. [....] Five Tribes termina siendo una especie de rompecabezas o pseudoajedrez con una interacción entre los jugadores intermedia, ni inexistente ni continua. El mayor riesgo que tiene es que alguien pueda estar mucho tiempo pensando su jugada, aburriendo al resto, riesgo que se puede acrecentar si se juega a 4 jugadores. En esos casos, conviene poner límites al tiempo (un relojito de arena hubiera sido un añadido curioso y apropiado para un juego con una temática tan árabe). Por eso, funciona extremadamente bien a dos jugadores. En definitiva, un buen juego de estrategia, con magníficos materiales y componentes.

Reviewed in Spain on 26 November 2015