The sequel to Spiel des Jahres hopeful Raiders of the North Sea is getting an expansion

Explorers of the North Sea, the third part of Shem Phillips’ ‘North Sea’ trilogy that includes this year’s Spiel des Jahres nominee Raiders of the North Sea, is setting sail for discovery with a new expansion.

Explorers focuses on the last years of the Viking Age and involves players seeking out new lands to settle while managing their resources and attacking rival clans. It’s less combat-focused than Raiders, which placed the central years of Vikings and their raiding of settlements at its core.

Explorers of the North Sea: Rocks of Ruin brings the maximum player count up to five, as well as expanding the size of the finished map by 50% with 24 new tiles.

The title refers to shipwrecks, which can be salvaged for extra goods, from VP-earning gold to timber, which can be used to build the three new structures in the box: the mill, workshop and barracks.

Also new to the game are fortresses, an advanced version of settlements which only reveal their reward once raided. They can be worth up to 6 VP, but result in the deaths of warriors used to take control.

Rocks of Ruin also includes a mini-expansion for The North Sea: Runesaga that adds support for a fifth player, plus three new runestones and inscription tokens, to the optional game mode allowing a connected competition across all three North Sea instalments.

Explorers of the North Sea: Rocks of Ruin will be out next March and costs NZ$50 (£28) on Kickstarter. It’s already raised double its NZ$23,000 (£13,000) target.