Cloudspire Hero's Bounty Expansion: What's Inside and How to Play

Quick answer

The Cloudspire Hero's Bounty expansion adds new heroes and bounty-driven objectives to your games. To play, unpack and sort the new components, integrate the heroes into your faction draft, set up the bounty track as instructed, and resolve bounty rewards during the income phase. If you already own Cloudspire: The Shada Faction Expansion or Cloudspire: The Graft Faction Expansion, you can mix these new heroes into those factions for varied matchups.

The Cloudspire Hero's Bounty expansion gives you fresh heroes and a bounty system that changes how you value board position and combat timing. This guide walks you through setup, hero integration, and scoring so you can get it to the table without second-guessing the rulebook.

Because Cloudspire already has a lot of moving parts, the trick is to add Hero's Bounty in layers: first the components, then the heroes, then the bounty rules. That order prevents the common mistake of introducing bounty scoring before everyone understands how the new heroes generate and spend bounty.

What's inside the Hero's Bounty expansion

The expansion includes new hero chips, bounty tokens or track, and reference cards. Exact component counts are not listed in the supplied catalog facts, so check the box or product page for the final inventory. What matters for play is that each hero has a distinct ability set that interacts with the bounty system, so you will want to read all hero cards before choosing one.

If you own other Cloudspire expansions, keep their components separate during your first Hero's Bounty game. Mixing in too many optional modules at once makes it harder to tell which rules are causing confusion.

• Sort hero chips and bounty tokens before your first game; missing a single token can stall scoring later.

Step 1: Set up the base game first

Set up Cloudspire exactly as you normally would: map, spires, minions, and starting resources. Do not add Hero's Bounty components yet. This gives you a clean baseline and makes it obvious where the new bounty track belongs.

Common mistake: placing the bounty track in the market area. It belongs near the income and scoring side of the table so you can reach it every round without disrupting the board.

• Checkpoint: your base game should be fully playable before any Hero's Bounty component hits the table.

Step 2: Integrate the new heroes

Shuffle the new hero chips into the hero pool, or draft them separately if your group prefers. Each player then selects a hero and places its chip next to their faction reference. If you are using Cloudspire: The Shada Faction Expansion or Cloudspire: The Graft Faction Expansion, you can pair the new heroes with those factions for more thematic matchups.

Common mistake: assuming the new heroes replace your faction's existing abilities. They add to them. Read both the faction card and the hero card before your first turn so you do not miss a triggered ability.

• If a hero's ability references terrain, note that the Shada faction already benefits from terrain differences, so those combinations can be especially strong.

Step 3: Place and explain the bounty track

Put the bounty track where all players can see it. Walk through how bounty is gained and spent before the first income phase. The goal is that every player can state, in one sentence, how to earn bounty and what it buys.

Common mistake: skipping this explanation because the track looks self-explanatory. Bounty interacts with combat and income timing, so a two-minute overview prevents mid-game arguments.

• Checkpoint: each player should be able to name one way to earn bounty and one way to spend it before you start.

Step 4: Play the first round with bounty active

Run round one normally, but resolve bounty gains and spends during the income phase. Keep the first game simple: no optional variants, no mixed expansions beyond what you already set up. This lets you see how bounty changes player incentives without adding noise.

If you own Cloudspire: Thick Health and Source Chips, use them here. The extra-thick chips make tracking Health and Source easier when bounty rewards shift your totals mid-round, and four sets cover a standard game.

• Common mistake: resolving bounty at the end of combat instead of the income phase. Follow the expansion's stated timing to avoid double-counting.

Step 5: Score bounty and reset for the next round

At the end of the round, score any bounty objectives, return spent tokens to the supply, and reset the track for the next round. Then check whether any hero abilities trigger on bounty scored. This reset step is easy to forget and leads to inflated totals in later rounds.

For storage between games, the Cloudspire: Market Bag keeps small components upright and in good shape, which helps when you are sorting bounty tokens back into the box.

• Checkpoint: after scoring, the bounty track should read zero for all players unless a hero ability says otherwise.

Hero's Bounty setup steps at a glance

1. Set up base Cloudspire: Build the map, place spires, minions, and starting resources using the standard rules. Checkpoint: the base game is fully playable before adding any expansion parts.
2. Add hero chips and bounty track: Shuffle the new heroes into the draft and place the bounty track near the income area. Common mistake: putting the bounty track in the market zone, where it gets knocked around.
3. Explain bounty timing: Tell every player when bounty is earned and spent, and confirm they can repeat it back. Checkpoint: each player names one earn method and one spend method.
4. Play round one with bounty: Resolve bounty only during the income phase and avoid optional variants for the first game. Common mistake: scoring bounty after combat instead of during income.
5. Score and reset: Score bounty objectives, return spent tokens, and reset the track to zero. Checkpoint: the track reads zero unless a hero ability says otherwise.

Products that support Hero's Bounty play

• Cloudspire: The Shada Faction Expansion: The shada faction takes advantage of terrain differences like no faction before them, and its minions gain special abilities on that terrain. Pairing Hero's Bounty heroes with the Shada faction rewards players who fight over specific map regions, making bounty objectives more dynamic.
• Cloudspire: The Graft Faction Expansion: The Graft features a movable feastress thanks to Nucleus, who enjoys the advantages and suffers the pitfalls of being both a unit and a structure. If you want a Hero's Bounty game with unusual positioning decisions, the Graft's movable feastress creates bounty opportunities that other factions cannot replicate.
• Cloudspire: Thick Health and Source Chips: These extra-thick chips make for excellent dials when tracking Health and Source in a game of Cloudspire, and four sets cover a standard game. Bounty rewards often change Health and Source mid-round, so thicker, easier-to-read chips reduce tracking errors during Hero's Bounty games.
• Cloudspire: Market Bag: This draw bag has a durable design that keeps everything upright and in good shape, and it lets you refill the market as needed. Hero's Bounty adds small tokens that are easy to lose; a dedicated bag keeps them organized between sessions and speeds up setup.

Hero's Bounty rewards players who plan around timing and terrain, not just raw combat. Set up the base game first, add the heroes and bounty track second, and keep the first session simple. Once your group knows when bounty moves, you can layer in factions like Shada or Graft for matchups that feel genuinely different.