Dungeon Lords Festival Season Expansion Setup Guide
By Czech Games Edition | Published: 2026-10-26
Category: How-to Guides
Learn how to set up the Dungeon Lords Festival Season expansion step by step. Includes new rounds, monsters, rooms, traps, and spells.
Quick answer
Set up the Dungeon Lords Festival Season expansion by adding the new festival season round, shuffling the new monster, room, trap, and spell cards into their respective decks, and placing the bard tokens and festival season board.
What the expansion changes
Dungeon Lords: Festival Season turns the usual two-year game into a five-round-per-year structure. Each year now includes winter, spring, summer, autumn, and the new festival season. This gives you more time to build your dungeon, but adventurers also get more time to gather a larger party.
The expansion adds new monsters, rooms, traps, and spells. It also introduces sneaky bards who encourage adventurers. You will need to adjust your strategy to handle the longer game and the new threats.
Before you start
Make sure you have the base Dungeon Lords game. The Festival Season expansion is not a standalone game. You will also need the base game's components for setup.
Festival Season setup steps
- Set up the base game normally: Follow the base Dungeon Lords setup instructions. Place the game board, player boards, and all base game components as usual. Do not skip any base game setup steps. The expansion builds on the existing framework.
- Add the festival season round: Place the festival season board next to the main game board. This board tracks the new fifth round of each year. Place the festival season round marker on the first space. The festival season round occurs after autumn each year. Make sure all players understand the new round order.
- Shuffle new cards into base decks: Take the new monster, room, trap, and spell cards from the expansion. Shuffle each type into its corresponding base game deck. Do not remove any base game cards. Common mistake: accidentally leaving out some new cards. Double-check that all expansion cards are mixed in.
- Place bard tokens and bard deck: Put the bard tokens near the adventurer track. Shuffle the bard cards and place them face down as a draw pile next to the adventurer deck. Bards appear during the adventurer phase. They can encourage adventurers, making them harder to defeat.
- Review the new rules summary: Read the Festival Season rulebook to understand how bards work, how the festival season round differs, and any new action options. Keep the summary handy during your first game. Do not assume the rules are identical to the base game. The extra round and bards change timing and strategy.
What you need
- Dungeon Lords: Festival Season: The game is still played over two years, but now each year has five rounds instead of four: winter, spring, summer, autumn and festival season. You will need to plan for an extra round each year, giving you more time to build your dungeon but also allowing adventurers to form larger parties.
Dungeon Lords: Festival Season - Dungeon Lords: Festival Season: There are new monsters, rooms, and traps to prepare your dungeon for the battle, but also new nasty spells for the adventurers and sneaky bards who encourage them to perform. Shuffle the new cards into the corresponding decks from the base game. The bard tokens add a new layer of strategy as they can boost adventurer effectiveness.
