Card DrawDraw one card from your deck.
Defenders of Hogwarts is an asymmetric deckbuilding board game for 2 to 5 players, designed by David Waterman with Studio MinaLima. One player controls the Dark Forces. Everyone else represents a Hogwarts house and races to prepare the castle before Voldemort arrives. A game takes about 90 minutes and the box says ages 13 and up.
This page follows the order you actually need at the table. If you have the box open right now, start with the setup checklist and come back here.
The game in one minute
Two sides, two different races
One Dark Arts Player against 1 to 4 House Players
House Players
Each of you plays one house: Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw or Slytherin. You move three pawns around the castle and grounds, learn new spells and collect items.
You win the moment you hold 2 Defence Shields. Other House Players can help you, but only the first one to two shields wins.
Dark Arts Player
You send Dark Arts Pawns into the grounds, bump students back to the Great Hall and push the Dark Arts Marker along the Dark Arts Path.
You win by collecting all 3 Progress Tokens and then getting the required number of pawns onto one location at the same time.
If the Dark Arts Path runs out and nobody has won with their final hand, the game ends in a draw.
Two things surprise most first-time groups. First, the game is not fully cooperative: House Players share an enemy, yet each of them wins alone. Second, the Dark Arts Player is mostly powered by the House Players themselves, because every time a House Player refills their hand, the Dark side moves one step closer to victory.
What is in the box
| Group | Components | What they do |
|---|---|---|
| Boards | Main Board (map of the castle and grounds), Side Board, 4 House Player Boards, 1 Dark Arts Player Board | The map is where pawns move. The Side Board holds the Dark Arts Path, the Hogwarts Loyalty Track and the shared card rows. |
| Pawns | 16 House Player Pawns (4 per house), 7 Dark Arts Pawns | Three pawns per house go on the map, the fourth climbs the Loyalty Track. |
| House Player cards | 4 Starter Decks of 7 cards, Acquire Deck (42), Library Book Deck (11), Location Deck (21) | Your deck, the cards you can learn, the books you need for shields and the places you must visit for scrolls. |
| Dark Arts cards | Starter Deck (7), Acquire Deck (20), Location Deck (4), 3 Event decks of 5 (white, orange, red) | The Dark side's deck, its upgrades, its final target and the events on the Path. |
| Tokens | 6 Defence Shields (2 types), 7 Hogwarts Tokens, 8 Parchment Scrolls, 4 D.A. Coins, 1 Dark Detector, 4 House Markers, 1 Dark Arts Marker, 3 Progress Tokens, Room of Requirement piece, 5 Player Aid Cards | Items, rewards and trackers, all explained below. |
How House Players win: the shield recipe
A Defence Shield is never handed to you. You trade three items for it while one of your pawns stands on a Defence Shield Space. Collect two shields and the game ends immediately in your favour.
The Defence Shield recipe
Stand on a Defence Shield Space with all three items, then trade them in
Library Book CardLand in the Library and take one of the two face-up books.
Parchment ScrollHave pawns in 2 of the 3 places shown on your Location Cards.
Dark DetectorLeader on the Loyalty Track at space 5 or higher.
OR
D.A. CoinEnter the Room of Requirement while it is open.
Defence ShieldThe shield on the space shows which key item it wants.
Library Book Cards
Two Library Book Cards lie face-up on the Side Board. When your pawn lands in the Library and you do not already hold a book, take one of them. Its effect happens right away, then you keep the card on your player board as a shield ingredient. The empty slot is refilled from the Library deck. You can only hold one book at a time, so you need a fresh trip to the Library for each shield.
Example
Slytherin's pawn lands in the Library and Slytherin holds no book yet. They choose one of the two face-up books, carry out its effect straight away and lay it on their player board. A new book from the deck fills the empty slot.
Parchment Scrolls
At the start you draw three House Player Location Cards. Each one points to a place on the map using grid coordinates. As soon as you have at least one pawn in two of those three places, reveal those two cards, put them under the Location deck and take a Parchment Scroll. This is a free action, so you can do it in the middle of your turn. After your first scroll you draw back up to three Location Cards. After your second scroll you discard the last one and never draw Location Cards again, so you can earn at most two scrolls, one per shield.
Example
Hufflepuff's Location Cards show the Charms classroom, the Astronomy Tower and the Trophy Room. One pawn already waits in the Charms classroom. When a second pawn reaches the Astronomy Tower, Hufflepuff reveals those two cards, slides them under the Location deck, takes a Parchment Scroll and draws two new Location Cards.
The Dark Detector
There is only one Dark Detector. It belongs to the House Player whose Loyalty pawn is furthest along the Hogwarts Loyalty Track, and only once that pawn has reached space 5 or higher. If two players tie on a space, whoever got to space 5 or higher first keeps it. Spending the Detector on a shield costs you: your Loyalty pawn drops back three spaces and the Detector returns to the Side Board, or passes straight to another player who is already on space 5 or higher.
Example
Ravenclaw is the first to reach space V of the Loyalty Track, so Ravenclaw takes the Dark Detector and the Room of Requirement appears on the map. Later Slytherin climbs to space VII, where Ravenclaw already stands. Ravenclaw hands the Detector to Slytherin, steps back to space VI and draws a card.
D.A. Coins and the Room of Requirement
The first time any Loyalty pawn reaches space 5, the Room of Requirement piece is added to the map. While it is there, any House Player who moves a pawn into it takes a D.A. Coin (one coin per player at a time, four in the game). The Room closes again when every Loyalty pawn has dropped below space 5. A pawn left inside is stuck there until the Room reopens.
Example
Hufflepuff's pawn is inside the Room of Requirement when the last Loyalty pawn above space IV drops back to space IV. The Room is removed from the board and Hufflepuff's pawn stays locked inside until someone reaches space V again.
Defence Shield Spaces
Six shields are shuffled and placed face-up on the six Defence Shield Spaces during setup. Three of them ask for the Dark Detector and three ask for a D.A. Coin, so look at the shield before you walk over. Each shield also needs a book and a scroll.
Example
Hufflepuff already owns one shield and now holds a Library Book Card, a Parchment Scroll and a D.A. Coin. Their pawn lands on a Defence Shield Space whose shield shows the coin. Hufflepuff hands in the three items, takes the shield and wins the game on the spot.
How the Dark Arts Player wins
The Dark Arts Player watches one thing above all: the Dark Arts Marker on the Dark Arts Path. The Path runs around the Side Board through three coloured zones. Moving through them unlocks stronger card effects, triggers events and opens the way to the final assault.
The Dark Arts Path
Schematic: the real track has more plain spaces between the event spaces
White zone
White effects on Dark Arts cards work from the start. Take the Giant token at a white event space.
Orange zone
Orange effects unlock as soon as the marker enters. Take the Acromantula token at an orange event space.
Red zone
Red effects unlock. Taking the Dementor token reveals your target location:
- at the 1st red event: get 3 pawns there
- at the 2nd red event: 2 pawns
- on the last space: just 1 pawn
The marker moves when
- a House Player takes the Replenish action
- an Event Card says so
- the Dark Arts Player holds every House Marker (they go back afterwards)
On an event space
- Draw the top Event Card of that zone's colour
- All House Players resolve their half first
- Then the Dark Arts Player takes the zone's Progress Token or uses the event's Dark effect
Two timing rules shape the whole Dark game. The marker cannot leave a zone until the Dark Arts Player has taken that zone's Progress Token, so passing on it at every event eventually forces the choice. And in the red zone you choose when to take the Dementor: take it early and you need three pawns on the target location at once, wait and you need fewer pawns but give the students more time.
Example
The marker lands on the first red event space. The Dark Arts Player takes the Dementor instead of the event's Dark effect and draws a Dark Arts Location Card: The White Tomb. From now on they need three Dark Arts Pawns on The White Tomb at the same time. Had they waited for the second red event, two pawns would have been enough.
When the marker lands on the very last space of the Path, every player draws up to five cards and nobody can Replenish again (card effects and Card Draw spaces can still give you cards). Play continues with those final cards. If a House Player completes two shields, they win. If the required Dark Arts Pawns stand on the target location together, the Dark side wins. If everyone runs out of cards first, the game is a draw.
Turn order
The House Player sitting to the left of the Dark Arts Player starts, then play goes clockwise around the table. The Dark Arts Player therefore takes one turn per round, just like everyone else, and usually reacts to what the students did.
A House Player's turn
House Player turn
One Main Action, plus any number of free actions
1. Choose one Main Action
Explore
Play one card from your hand. Use its movement and its effect, in either order. Effects are optional unless the card says otherwise.
Learn
- Discard 1: take a face-up card from the Acquire Row, or the top card of the Acquire Deck
- Discard 2: take a card from the Advanced Acquire Row and move up 1 on the Loyalty Track
The new card goes on top of your draw deck. You need at least one pawn outside a Protected Area to Learn.
Replenish
Discard any cards you like, draw back up to 5, and stand up your stunned pawns.
Cost: Dark Arts Marker +12. Free actions, at any point in your turn
Use a Hogwarts Token
Return a token you picked up on an earlier turn to take an extra Explore with a card of the same type.
Gain a Parchment Scroll
Reveal two Location Cards whose places hold your pawns and take a scroll.
3. End of turn
Cards you played go to your discard pile. Play passes to the left.
Explore: playing cards
Every card has a movement value in its top corner and usually an effect. A single value such as 4 lets you move one pawn up to four spaces. A double value such as 3 + 3 lets you move two different pawns up to three spaces each, or one pawn up to six. You cannot split it any other way, so 3 + 3 never becomes 2 + 4. Some cards move you to a Fly Off Point or to a specific named location instead of counting spaces.
Example
Gryffindor plays a 3 + 3 card. One pawn walks three spaces towards the Library and another walks three spaces towards a Location Card area. Gryffindor could instead move a single pawn six spaces, but not one pawn two spaces and the other four.
Cards with a lightning bolt have a Reactive Effect. You can play such a card normally for its movement and ignore the effect, or keep it in hand and reveal it outside your turn when its condition is met, resolving only the effect.
Learn: building your deck
Learning is how your deck improves. Because a learned card goes on top of your draw deck, you will draw it the next time you draw. Learning from the Advanced Acquire Row costs two cards but also moves your Loyalty pawn up, which brings you closer to the Dark Detector and the Room of Requirement.
Replenish: the expensive refill
You only draw new cards when you Replenish (or through effects and Card Draw spaces). Replenishing is the only normal way to refill your hand and to wake up stunned pawns, but every House Replenish pushes the Dark Arts Marker one space. In a four-student game that adds up fast.
Bonus spaces on the map
Card AcquireTake a card from the Acquire Row or Deck for free, or discard 1 to take an Advanced card and move up the Loyalty Track.
Play AgainTake another turn.
A bonus space only works if your pawn ends its move there. Walking through does nothing.
Hogwarts Tokens
Seven Hogwarts Tokens sit on their own spaces, one for each card type: Magical Creatures & Beings, Hogwarts Items & Artefacts, Transfiguration & Spell Casting, Defence Against the Dark Arts, Charms, Potions and Herbology. End a move on a token's space to take it. From your next turn on, you can return it to its space to make an extra Explore with a card of that type. You can hold only one token, so you must put one back before taking another.
Example
Ravenclaw's pawn ends its move in the Charms classroom and takes the Charms token. On a later turn Ravenclaw first takes a normal Explore, then returns the token to its space and plays Alohomora, a Charms card, as an extra Explore to slip out of the castle through a Locked Door.
The Dark Arts Player's turn
Dark Arts Player turn
One Main Action: Explore or Replenish
Explore
- Play one card, resolving its movement and effect in either order
- An effect only works if its colour zone is already unlocked on the Path
- Spend 1 movement point to bring a pawn from your pool onto an empty Deployment Space
- Your pawns ignore obstacles but can never enter a Protected Area
Replenish
- Stand up your stunned pawns
- Draw until you hold 5 cards
- You cannot discard first
- This does not move the Dark Arts Marker
Bumping a student
1. Bump
End a Dark Arts Pawn's move on a space with a House pawn. If several are there, you choose one. It goes back to the Great Hall.
2. Reset
Your pawn leaves the map and returns to your pool. Take that player's House Marker if you do not have it yet.
3. Reward
Draw 2 Dark Arts Acquire cards, put 1 on top of your draw deck and the other at the bottom of the Acquire Deck. Once per turn.
Hold every House Marker at once and the Dark Arts Marker moves forward one space; the markers then go back to their owners.
The bump reward is the Dark Arts Player's main way to improve their deck, and House Markers are the Dark side's own engine for moving the Path. With one House Player, a single bump completes the set. With four students, you need to catch every house before the bonus step happens.
Moving around the castle
The Main Board is divided into spaces. Moving one space means crossing into a neighbouring space that shares a full border with yours, marked by a dotted line. Red dotted lines are the doors in and out of the castle. Solid castle walls cannot be crossed. A pawn may pass through and stop on spaces with other House pawns, but it cannot backtrack: within one turn it may not re-enter a space it already crossed or finish where it started.
Locked DoorsObstacle. House pawns need a card that lets them pass.
Protective SpellsObstacle. Same rule: only with a matching card effect.
Physical ObjectsObstacle that blocks House pawns between some spaces.
WaterObstacle around the lake and grounds.
Protected AreasFour safe spaces with a blue shield, among them the Great Hall, the Astronomy Tower and Hagrid's Hut. Dark Arts Pawns cannot enter or cross them.
Fly Off PointsWith the right card, fly from one Fly Off Point to any other at no movement cost.
Secret PassagewaysThree colour-coded pairs. Students only, and only with a card that allows it. Counts as 1 space.
Castle wallsNobody moves through a wall.
Students cross an obstacle with a card that shows the matching icon. Every starter deck already holds one card per obstacle: Alohomora for Locked Doors, Partis Temporus for Protective Spells, Strengthening Solution for Physical Objects and Gillyweed for Water. Dark Arts Pawns ignore all four obstacle types. That is their biggest movement advantage, so expect them to cut through places where students need the right card.
Stunning and bumping
Student lands on a Dark pawn
Both pawns are stunned and laid on their side. The House Player then moves the Dark pawn to a neighbouring space of their choice. A stunned pawn cannot move at all until its owner Replenishes.
Dark pawn lands on a student
The student is bumped back to the Great Hall, the Dark pawn returns to its pool, and the Dark Arts Player collects that house's marker and a card reward.
Example
A Dark Arts Pawn ends its move on a space with a Gryffindor pawn and a Slytherin pawn. The Dark Arts Player picks Gryffindor: that pawn goes back to the Great Hall, the Dark Arts Pawn returns to the pool and the Gryffindor House Marker moves to the Dark Arts Player. Then they draw two Dark Arts Acquire cards, put one on top of their deck and the other under the Acquire Deck.
The Hogwarts Loyalty Track
Each house's fourth pawn lives on the Loyalty Track, a row of seven spaces on the Side Board. Climbing it is the only way to earn the Dark Detector and the only way to open the Room of Requirement.
Hogwarts Loyalty Track
1Start
2
3
4
5Room opens. Leader holds the Detector
6
7Last space
Climb by ending a move on a map space with the Dark Detector icon, by card effects, or by taking a card from the Advanced Acquire Row.
If you reach the last space, you stop there and take the Dark Detector. If another player was already sitting there with the Detector, they hand it to you, step back one space and draw a card.
Cards and deckbuilding
Every player starts with a seven-card Starter Deck. All four houses get the same starter cards, so your choice of house is about colours and table spirit rather than different powers. New cards come from the shared Acquire rows (for students) or from bump rewards (for the Dark Arts Player). When your draw deck runs out, shuffle your discard pile to form a new one, so good cards come back again and again.
Dark Arts cards show a coloured zone marker. White effects work from the first turn, orange effects once the marker reaches the orange zone, and red effects once it reaches the red zone. Until then, the card can still be played for its movement. For every icon on cards and boards, see the cards and icons guide.
How the game ends
| Result | When it happens |
|---|---|
| House Player wins | A House Player trades items for a second Defence Shield. The game ends immediately. |
| Dark Arts wins | The Dark Arts Player holds all three Progress Tokens and has the required number of pawns (3, 2 or 1) on the location from their Dark Arts Location Card at the same time. |
| Draw | The marker reached the last space, everyone drew their final five cards, and all cards were played without either goal being met. |
Rules groups often get wrong
- Replenish has a price. A student's Replenish always moves the Dark Arts Marker. The Dark Arts Player's own Replenish never does, and neither do cards drawn from events, Library Books or Card Draw spaces.
- Learned cards go on top of your deck, not into your hand and not into your discard pile.
- One of each: a student can hold only one Library Book Card, one Hogwarts Token and one D.A. Coin at a time.
- Bonus spaces need you to stop on them. Passing through does nothing.
- Tokens wait a turn. A Hogwarts Token can be used from your next turn, not on the turn you pick it up.
- Multi-move values do not split freely. 3 + 3 means two pawns up to 3 each, or one pawn up to 6.
- No backtracking within the same move.
- Stunned means frozen. No card can move a stunned pawn until its owner Replenishes.
- A bumped Dark pawn leaves the map. It goes back to the pool and must be deployed again for 1 movement point.
- Learn needs a pawn outside the Protected Areas. The Great Hall is one of them, so on your first turn, with all three pawns still at the start, you cannot Learn. Hiding all your pawns later blocks Learn too.
- The Dark Arts Player cannot discard when replenishing, so a bad hand has to be played out.
- The Room can close on you. If every Loyalty pawn drops below space 5, a pawn inside the Room of Requirement is stuck until it reopens.