Saboteur

Saboteur is a card-based board game designed by Frédéric Moyersoen and first published by AMIGO in 2004. It casts players as dwarves digging through a mine, but some of those dwarves are secretly saboteurs. The original game accommodates three to ten players.

At the beginning of each round, players receive hidden role cards identifying them as gold miners or saboteurs. Because not every role card is necessarily dealt, even the number of traitors can be uncertain. Players keep their identities concealed until the round ends.

The table starts with an entrance card and three face-down destination cards. Only one destination hides the gold; the other two show stones. Miners want to extend a continuous tunnel from the entrance to the gold, while saboteurs try to prevent that connection.

On a turn, a player may place a path card, play an action card, or discard a card and pass. Paths must fit the established tunnel network: passages cannot meet solid walls. This placement rule makes every apparent shortcut a spatial puzzle.

Action cards supply the game's most pointed interference. A broken pickaxe, lantern, or mine cart stops its owner from placing path cards until repaired. Other cards repair tools, remove a path card with a rockfall, or let one player secretly inspect a destination.

The inspection card is a map: it reveals information to its user without automatically sharing it with everyone else. Consequently, a player who claims to have found the gold might be reporting a genuine discovery, withholding useful information, or deliberately directing the group toward stones.

A round ends when the gold is reached or when play can no longer continue. If the miners connect to the gold, they share gold-nugget cards; if they fail, the saboteurs receive gold instead. Players then reveal roles and set up a new round.

Saboteur lasts three rounds, with roles redistributed between rounds. The winner is the individual who has collected the most gold nuggets, not necessarily someone who has consistently belonged to the same side. This scoring gives players reason to watch both cooperation and personal reward.

AMIGO later released Saboteur 2, an expansion that adds new roles and action cards and requires the original game. The series also includes Saboteur: The Duel, a separate two-player version. Those later titles build on the original's distinctive combination of hidden loyalties, shared tunnel construction, obstructed equipment, and a race for concealed buried gold.