Credo the Board Game

We have been playing the earlier edition since 1993, and eagerly awaiting the new edition since prophecies of its coming more than 30 years ago, now our faith has been rewarded at last. Credo, the card game of duelling sects of early Christianity competing to get their beliefs accepted as the Orthodox creed. New edition is designed for faster, smoother, play, but with a few more tactical options, and also has very pretty art. Most importantly it retains all the references to historical (and dubiously historical) nonsense.

Credo is a fun game with an interesting theme, but its rules and mechanics make it frustratingly difficult to enjoy. First, the rulebook is surprisingly incomplete. For example, it never properly explains what the Missionary cards are or how they are supposed to work. They are mentioned only once, in the description of the special event "Gothic Invasion." It makes little sense to include an entire additional deck of cards if they can only be used during a single, relatively rare event. In our games, these cards never came into play. Having a whole deck that is barely mentioned in the rulebook and apparently serves no purpose during most games is simply bizarre. The more serious problem is that several rules actively undermine what should be the game's central mechanic: negotiation. For example, you can only vote for your own Articles of Faith and Firm Beliefs. What is the point of negotiating if the rulebook has already determined where your votes must go? It is fun to exchange made-up theological ideas, but at the end of the council, it often does not make any difference. The number of votes you receive depends on the number of bishops you control, which often feels almost arbitrary. There seems to be very little you can do to influence this number strategically. Combined with the restrictions on voting, this makes the Council phase feel much less engaging than it should be. Another frustrating limitation is that you can play only one event card during each Council phase. Many of the event cards also feel rather situational. As a result, we ended up accumulating large hands of cards that we rarely had an opportunity or reason to play. Since you draw a card at the beginning of each turn and another at the end of each Council, this problem gets worse as the game progresses. I could explain other aspects of the rules that felt poorly tested, but these should be enough. Admittedly, we only played short games with three players, and perhaps Credo works significantly better for a longer game with a larger group. However, if that is the case, the rulebook should provide modified rules for different number of players. There are no adjustements of this kind and one has to fix it with house rules. Overall, the game has a cool premise but has poorly explained rules and unnecessarily restrictive mechanics. Cool art and theme can not replace the most important aspect of any board game—its mechanics. I really wanted to like it, but was sadly disappointed.

Credo was always a lot of fun, and in its new 2026 form is now exceptionally beautiful too with art by Kalin Kadiev