The game 7 Wonders Duel may have three different ways for one of its two players to win, but there’s a million different ways to upgrade the game’s components. Actually, I was only able to come up with about a half-dozen component upgrades. But we’ll be taking a look at each of them as we discuss ways to protect, organize, and trick out 7 Wonders Duel today, on The Component Proponent.

Today, we’ll be taking a look at the game 7 Wonders Duel, which is specifically designed for two players, who will draft cards from a shared display of cards, some of which will be face-down and some face-up, arranged in a different pattern each round. As the game progresses, players will acquire resources which are used to improve their civilization. Bigger and better civic improvements are also availlable to each player in the form of four Wonders they each have available, which they can construct to obtain a special abilities. But only seven wonders in total can be built, so one player will end up short. The game can be won in three different ways: instantly by advancing the military marker all the way toward your opponent's capital; instantly by acquiring a set of six different scientific symbols; or having the most points when the game naturally ends.

One of the fundamental components of 7 Wonders Duel is its cards. There’s sixty-six cards representing the three different ages of the game, and there’s twelve Wonder cards representing the astounding technological advances your culture can achieve, like the Pyramids, the Great Lighthouse, or the Hanging Gardens. And another man-made marvel of technology that we can add to the game is card sleeves. Card sleeves: the protective ozone layer of board games. (NOTE: Chaz Marler does not understand how the ozone layer works.)
7 Wonders Duel will require two different sizes of card sleeves. 65 x 100 millimeter card sleeves will fit the Wonder cards, and 45 x 68 millimeter card sleeves will accommodate the Age cards. But that’s not all! Because ancient civilizations apparently hadn’t yet invented the concept of industry standards, you’ll need another, third size of card sleeves if you have the game’s Pantheon expansion. The god cards from the expansion are a card size known as French Tarot. For those, 63 x 115 millimeter card sleeves should protect your cards for years to come. Unless you throw them into a lake. They won’t protect them from that. But just don’t do that.

Now that we’ve protected the game’s cards, let’s take a look at how to store them safely and securely. Well, I guess the first tip would be not to throw them into a lake. But, even better advice than that would be to use an insert. Let’s take a look at two different inserts, designed not only to store 7 Wonders Duel, but assist in its setup and gameplay.

The first insert we’ll be taking a look at is The Broken Token’s wooden “Dueling Gods” insert. This organizer provides space to store all of the game’s components from both the base game and the Pantheon expansion securely, including trays for coins, tokens, and the conflict and Minerva tokens. It fits sleeved cards, features removable dividers, and notched walls to hold the game boards. It also features removable trays that not only give the game’s tokens and coins a cozy place to resice, but can also be used while playing.

Secondly, there’s this foamcore one by Insert Here, which accommodates both the base game and the Pantheon expansion. It is composed of four trays and is designed to hold sleeved cards. One of its removable trays can be used as a portable storage for the coins while another removable tray holds the Age cards, each in a separate pile. Yet another removable tray holds the components from the Pantheon expansion. Neither insert includes a USB charging port.

During my research, I noticed that both inserts include more than enough room to store the cards from the base game and its expansion. And that’s good, because it turns out that several more print and play cards and bonus goodies are available at 7 Wonders Duel dot com. On that website, you’ll find a library of PDFs, including a downloadable copy of the rules for both the base game and the Pantheon expansion, a help sheet, help cards for both the base game and the Pantheon expansion, additional scorepads, wallpapers, and bonus Wonders featuring the Statue Of Liberty and The Messe. And all these items are free, they won’t cost you any coin to download.

And speaking of coins, let’s turn our attention next to upgrading the game’s paper coins. The paper coins included in 7 Wonders Duel are designed pretty well. They’re die-cut and illustrated to really look like ancient currency. What would be really cool is if there were metal versions based on these specific designs. Well, now you can! This metal coin bundle was made specifically for 7 Wonders and 7 Wonders Duel. These minted coins, crafted from zinc and nickel, feature high-relief 3D designs that match the illustrations from the game’s original coins. This set that I got is available in sets of 31 or 80 coins in denominations that match the game, including 30 millimeter copper coins, 20 millimeter silver coins, and 25 millimeter gold coins.

But if you’re looking for even more variety, there’s also various ancient looking minted coins available from the company Campaign Coins. Their gaming coins are fantastic and worth a look, but you’re looking to get the biggest bang for your buck, you may want to purchasing coins for your collection in bulk. To obtain a large number of metal coins fast, several viewers have suggested buying sets of foreign coins on ebay. Some auctions include for a specific number of pre-selected coins, while other auctions sell foreign coins by the pound. Of course, in most of these packs, the coin selection is random. And some of them even go out of their way not to include any duplicate coins, which can make integrating them into a tabletop game more difficult.

Of course, there’s also my current favorite option for upgrading game coins, which is to invest in a collection of Sacagawea gold dollar coins. Not only do they have a great weight and a satisfying metallic clank, but they’re also money. So, if you ever need to, you can liquidate them and get 100% of your money back. So, in a way, you’re making money by doing this. (NOTE: Chaz Marler does not understand how math works.)

Now, what would a game called 7 Wonders Duel be without Wonders for the players to be dueling over? Nothing, because there’d be no Wonders, and no dueling. And at that point, you might as well just throw the game into a lake. Fortunately, the game DOES feature Wonders to be constructed, represented by cards that the players will build as the game goes on. But, if you want a little more eye candy on the table? In that case, may I turn your attention to these sets of plastic landmarks produced by Safari LTD., which I recently discovered at a Michael’s craft store. Combining four of the Safari LTD. “super toobs” provides 41 different landmarks which can be used as proxies for the various Wonders the players construct. From the Pyramids, to the Circus Maximus, to the Mausoleum. The pieces included in the Safari LTD. packs aren’t a perfect one-to-one match for the Wonders, but they do add a bit of extra flair to the game, adding some more paintable plastic pieces to the playthrough presentation.

And speaking of painted plastic pieces, I want to give a shout out to the members of the board game community that have posted some of their custom upgrades on Board Game Geek dot com. The most popular community upgrade for 7 Wonders Duel is painting the shield marker for the military track. This simple pigment upgrade is a noticeable enhancement to the game, and inspires me to do the same. In fact, the only thing that’s preventing me from painting my military marker is a complete lack of paints. And brushes. And painting ability. And willingness to expend the slightest effort in order to learn how.

But the award for the cleverest custom component upgrade this time has to go to Gustavo, who improved the look of his various 7 Wonders Duel tokens by filling in the sides of his tokens with matching colored Sharpies. It’s a simple upgrade that adds nice touch to the tokens in this, or any game.

So, there’s several storage and component upgrades for 7 Wonders Duel. Whether you invest in the 7 Wonders Duel upgrades featured in this video, or make your own, I hope they’ve given you with some ideas for customizing your copy of the game. And for more board game component upgrade videos, be sure to check out the complete Component Proponent playlist, linked to in this card and in the video description below. And if there’s a game that YOU think is worth talking about, tell me about it either in the comments, or at components@pairofdiceparadise.com. I welcome your suggestions, and may even feature them in an upcoming episode.

Until then, for more board game news, reviews and commentary, be sure to subscribe, and remember that videos like this are made possible by viewers like you who have been financially supporting Pair Of Dice Paradise’s PodPledge fundraising campaign. Thank you for your support. Take care, and, until next time, I’ve been Chaz Marler, your Component Proponent.