Res Arcana: Lux et Tenebrae Review – Because Four Players Weren’t Enough?

Continuing on from my earlier review of Res Arcana, this time we’re diving into the expansion, Lux et Tenebrae. Which I had to go digging into the Latin dictionary to find out it stands for “Light and Darkness”. A fitting name for an expansion that introduces a new ‘Demon’ keyword on cards.

As a quick refresher, my final verdict on Res Arcana was that it’s an excellent two-player game that becomes flat out miserable at four players. Which immediately made me suspicious of this expansion, because alongside all the new content, it also adds support for a fifth player.

So the question is whether Lux et Tenebrae actually fixes the higher player count issues, or if it’s simply more Res Arcana for the people already sold on it.

What’s New in Lux et Tenebrae?

Out of the box you’ll get new mages, artefacts, and magic items, along with enough components to support a fifth player. Lux et Tenebrae also introduces new rules for Monuments and Places of Power, plus an entirely new keyword for cards: Demons.

For a complete rundown, you’ll get:

• 2 new Places of Power
• 12 Artefact cards
• 4 Mage cards
• 2 Magic Items
• 4 Monument cards
• 8 Scrolls
• 25 additional essence tokens

The updated rules for Monuments and Places of Power are probably the biggest gameplay change here. The number available now scales with player count, which keeps the two-player game largely unchanged while opening things up significantly in higher player counts. I’ve included it below since this is something to try out if you have the base game.

Player Count	Monuments	Places of Power
2	7	4
3	10	5
4	12	6
5	14	7

The new magical items are also worth a mention. One of them, the Inscription item, lets you grab an all new component called Scrolls. These basically let you store a one-off action (even between turns). For instance, the Shield scroll let’s you ignore an attack from an opponent, or the Vitality scroll let’s you untap a component.

Like the magical items themselves, they’re incredibly strong when used well and can absolutely save you from disaster.

The second magical item is a bit more niche, but no less useful. It lets you play a card as though you already had a Beast, Demon, or Dragon in play, even if you don’t. It’s perfect for that moment when you proudly build the Dragon Academy before realising your deck contains exactly zero dragons.

More Res Arcana, For Better and Worse

Lux et Tenebrae feels less like a traditional expansion and more like an extension of the original game. Even though it adds a decent stack of new cards and components, once everything is shuffled together it quickly becomes hard to tell where the base game ends and the expansion begins.

A lot of that comes down to how naturally the new content fits in. Most of the cards and components reuse icons and mechanics from the original game, so there’s very little extra rules overhead to learn. What it does add, though, is a heap of new combo potential, especially through the new magical items and the Demon cards.

One artefact that stood out to me was the Infernal Engine, which lets you bank as many resources as you want and then cash them back in during a later round, assuming you can find a way to untap it. I had some wonderfully calculated moments using it to hide resources from dragon attacks, stalling out my next few turns while my opponents roasted everyone else at the table.

That said, most of the new artefacts don’t fundamentally change how Res Arcana is played. You’re still trying to build clever little engines, chain together synergies, and squeeze every possible resource out of your cards. The expansion simply gives you more tools to do it with.

The updated Monument and Place of Power rules are also a great addition, and the new mages slot neatly alongside the original cast. Although, they definitely lean towards the advanced side. Their strengths aren’t always as immediately obvious as something straightforward like “gain extra resources each turn”.

Now, to answer the question from the introduction: does Lux et Tenebrae fix the higher player count issues?

No. If anything, it arguably makes them worse by adding even more players and more attack cards into the mix. So once again, I really wouldn’t recommend playing Res Arcana at four or five players unless everyone at the table already knows the game inside and out, and is prepared for a bit of a slog.

Overall though, Lux et Tenebrae almost feels like an invisible expansion. It adds a surprising amount of new content, but throughout the entire experience it still felt like I was simply playing more Res Arcana. Which is fantastic, because the original game is excellent.

And honestly, that’s both the expansion’s biggest strength and its strangest weakness. It integrates so seamlessly into the base game that it barely feels separate from it at all. Part of me wanted the expansion to leave a slightly bigger impression, but at the same time, it’s hard to complain when the end result is simply more of a game I already loved.