All Errata and FAQ Entries

Since this is a searchable site rather than a printed document, it errs heavily on the side of inclusiveness: infrequently asked questions, questions answered by a careful / strict reading of the rules, extreme corner-cases, and questions about the game as a product all appear here.
As such, this list of every single question is extremely long. Assuming you have a smartphone, we recommend simply loading the FAQ on it (the site is mobile-friendly, and the QR code on the back of the rulebook links to it) and using the search-box labeled "Search the FAQ" (at the top-left of most pages, inline on the main page) if you run into any questions. All FAQ entries are tagged both with general systems and the titles of specific cards / Spirits, to aid in searching.
If you can't find an answer here, try posting on any of the sites listed on home page; those are highly likely to get you an answer, and can result in new FAQ entries being added.

Current Errata / Updates

IMPORTANT: This lists only Errata / Updates from Fall 2018 onward (6th printing core / Branch & Claw) - the majority of copies now in circulation are at least that recent, usually much more so.
If you have the 5th or earlier printing of the core game or Branch & Claw, please see Older Errata and Updates. (Note that the 6th printing failed to increment the printing number on the back of the box, so erroneously says "5th edition". For how to distinguish the two, see "How can I tell what printing I have (from looking at the outside of the box)?")

Adversaries

  • Promo 2 - 1st printing
    Errata for Kingdom of Scotland Lvl 1 -- Scotland's Level 1 "Trading Port" ability is missing a "1" in front of the Explorer. It should read "...in Coastal lands, Explore cards add 1 Town instead of 1 Explorer".
    So if an Explore would normally add 2 Explorers - due to an Event, or combining Scotland with France - it would instead add 1 Town and 1 Explorer.
    Tags: Explorer, Kingdom of Scotland

Effect Rules

  • Branch & Claw, Core game - all printings
    Errata / clarification on older materials with imprecise wording -- Some earlier game materials use terms that are now ambiguous with the more precise terminology introduced in Jagged Earth. For the most part, they work just as they always have, but in case additional clarity is needed:
    • Bringer of Dreams and Nightmares - their Special Rule is a modifier - when your Power would Destroy Invaders, instead generate Fear (and perhaps Push them).
    • France lvl 6 - "After the normal Explore Phase," should read "After resolving an Explore Card,"
    • Event: Fortification - first sentence should read: After advancing Invader Cards: perform a Build Step for one terrain not shown under any Invader Action.
    • Event: Cash Crops Take Hold - first sentence should read: Perform a Ravage Step for one terrain not shown under any Invader Action.
    The only mechanical change is that France 6 will behave slightly differently if there are 0 or 2+ Explore cards in a turn, adding one Explorer per card instead of a flat 1.
    See also Errata / Clarification on which items are triggered actions and New Nomenclature Roundup.
    Tags: Kingdom of France, Fortification, New Cash Crops Take Hold
  • Jagged Earth - 1st and 2nd printings
    Update for Badlands tokens -- Instead of "the first time an action damages Invaders", each Badlands token boosts damage "one time an action damages Invaders". (So it could be the 2nd time, 3rd time, etc.)
    This is relevant only rarely – e.g., on "Pyroclastic Bombardment" (which deals damage to Invaders multiple times with different restrictions on which Invaders can take Damage), or "Voice of Command" (which causes a Ravage to deal damage to Invaders multiple times with different restrictions).
    (Badlands works the same way for Dahan - boosting damage one time, rather than the first time – but there are no actions where that makes much of a practical difference.)
    Tags: Badlands, Voice of Command, Pyroclastic Bombardment (Volcano Looming High)
  • Core game, Branch & Claw, Promo, Jagged Earth - all printings
    Errata / Clarification on which items are triggered actions -- Jagged Earth formalized how triggered actions work. The following earlier items are triggered actions ("after X, do Y") even though their wording doesn't use "after":
    • Vengeance of the Dead (Major Power, core game);
    • Ocean In Play (Ocean's Hungry Grasp special rule, core game);
    • Sworn to Victory1 (Thunderspeaker special rule, core game);
    • Blazing Presence2 (Heart of the Wildfire special rule, promo 1);
    • Constant Raiding (Dahan Insurrection Scenario rule, core game);
    • Military Response (Dahan Insurrection Scenario rule, core game).
    The following items are also triggered actions ("after X, do Y") even though their wording doesn't use "after" (but practically speaking it doesn't matter much):
    • Portents of Disaster (Minor Power - Branch & Claw);
    • Forbidden Ground3 (Keeper of the Forbidden Wilds special rule - Branch & Claw);
    • Deep Layers Exposed to the Surface (Stone's Unyielding Defiance special rule - Jagged Earth)
    1 = The trigger is "After a Ravage destroys 1 or more Dahan..." and does not involve Blight; see this FAQ entry for elaboration.
    2 = This rule used to say "When you add or move Presence...". More recent printings of the Spirit correctly say "After you add or move [Presence] after Setup...".
    3 = Read as, "After one or more lands become a Sacred Site for you, Push all Dahan from those lands."
    See Summary of Action rules for more details on how triggered actions work in general.
    Adversary instructions saying "After Setup:" are not triggered actions, but just a specification of when that rule applies ("not during Setup"). We apologize for the wording overlap, and will be using "During Play:" or "Post-Setup:" moving forward.
    Tags: Triggered Actions, Vengeance of the Dead, Portents of Disaster, Sworn to Victory (Thunderspeaker), 5 more...

Setup

  • Jagged Earth - 1st printing
    Errata for Badlands setup on Thematic Boards (JE p. 6) -- Land #9 on the West board should have 2 Badlands tokens, not just 1.
    Tags: Badlands, Thematic map
  • Nature Incarnate - all printings
    Habsburg Mining Expedition Level 2: Miners Comes From Far and Wide -- Add 1 Disease and 1 City in the highest-numbered land with a Town Setup symbol on each board; don't just add them to the single highest-numbered land with a Town Setup symbol on the entire island.
    Tags: Island setup, Habsburg Mining Expedition
  • Core game - all printings
    Erratum for setting up the Healthy Island Card -- During Setup, you get exactly 1 additional Blight in your Blight pool.
    (i.e.: If you are using a Healthy Island card, treat it as if it said “2 per player, +1". If you are not using a Healthy Island card, treat the Blight space as if it said “5 per player, +1".)
    This does NOT apply after Setup (i.e., when Blight Cards flip) - just at the start of the game.
    This also applies to any Scenarios (e.g., Blitz) or other effects (e.g., Sweden level 6) that change the amount of initial Blight. In all cases, add one additional Blight.
    Blight Cards in future expansions will not fix this, as doing so would make them distinguishable from previously-printed Blight Cards.
    Note that this does not affect the board from Horizons of Spirit Island, only the core game Invader Board and all Healthy Island cards. The rulebook in core game 14th printing and onwards mentions this errata, as does Nature Incarnate.
    Explanation, for the curious: The Blight system has a fencepost error which makes smaller games harder. While the # of Blight sitting on the card scales proportionally to the number of players, the number of usable Blight ("how much Blight can we let happen without the Blight Card flipping?") does not:
    • Players: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
    • Blight on card: 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12
    • Usable Blight without flip : 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11
    • Blight per player: 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2
    • Usable Blight per player: 1, 1.5, 1.666, 1.75, 1.8, 1.833
    This erratum adds 1 extra blight on setup, which has the usable Blight per player scale proportionally with the number of players, and makes the experience / Difficulty of smaller (1-2p) games more in-line with that of larger games. (In some ways the change very slightly disadvantages larger games relative to smaller games, but practically speaking that impact is much lower than the upside from multiple Spirits cooperating.)
    No changes are needed for flipped Blight cards (whether Still-Healthy or Blighted); if you want a deeper look into why see these comments.
    Likewise when setting up for the Second Wave scenario, do not add an additional Blight, since it was already added in the first wave.
    Tags: Blighted Island

Spirits and Innate Powers

Frequently Asked Questions

Adversaries

Aspects

Blighted Island cards

Definitions

Effect Rules

Elements and Elemental Thresholds

Event Cards

Fear and Fear Cards

General Play

Invader Actions

Play Options

Power Cards

Presence and Sacred Sites

Range and Targeting

Scenarios

Setup

Spirit Phase

Spirits and Innate Powers

~ Expansions, Promos, and Publishing

  • How can I get the promotional Spirits from the Kickstarters? <i>(Serpent Slumbering Beneath the Island and Heart of the Wildfire)</i>
    The promotional spirits from the core-game Kickstarter (Serpent Slumbering Beneath the Island and Heart of the Wildfire) and from the Jagged Earth Kickstarter (Downpour Drenches the World and Finder of Paths Unseen), along with the rest of the promotional items from Jagged Earth, are now packaged as part of the Feather and Flame boxed set.
    In addition, images of the promo spirit panels and their Power Cards from the first KS have been uploaded to BoardGameGeek here, so even if you can't get hold of physical copies you can still print-and-play them. (The cards are never shuffled into any decks, so don't need to match backs or cardstock.)
    Tags: Expansions, Serpent Slumbering Beneath the Island, Heart of the Wildfire, Downpour Drenches the World, 1 more...
  • What happens if you just add some of the Branch & Claw expansion cards / elements to the game? Do you think you could play with everything from the expansion but the Event Cards?
    Many expansion elements rely on each other to a greater or lesser extent. Mixing in some without others won't break the game, but may skew it.
    Going item-by-item:
    • Scenarios: Are fine to use. Most of these are in the expansion purely because they use the expansion's Scenario Tokens.
    • Adversary: France can be used at Level 1 and below without any trouble. Level 2+ will be harder without Strife tokens and the Event Deck. (Though you can fix the latter by just resolving Slave Rebellion every 4 turns.)
    • Events: Most of them should be usable by skipping the token Event... but this will make the game harder. However, if you look up the Jagged Earth rulebook online, it has rules for playing without Event Cards (without kneecapping Beasts-using Spirits like Sharp Fangs Behind the Leaves).
    • New Fear Cards: There are about half a dozen fear cards that don't reference tokens. (They're in the expansion because of new rules, or just to keep effect distribution even.) Including just those 6 will slightly skew the effects of the fear deck, but not in any way that you're apt to notice unless you're a very experienced player.
    • New Blight Cards: The expansion Blight cards don't have a negative ongoing effect, because the Event deck handles that: About 1/3 of the Event cards involve adding Blight / destroying Presence if the island is Blighted. So using the new Blight cards without the Event deck lowers the incentive to keep the Blight Card from flipping early, which in turn slightly lowers difficulty / early-game tension. Doing so also makes the small-pool Blight cards better (especially "Back Against the Wall" / "Aid from Lesser Spirits") because they're less risky.
    • Spirits: Keeper of the Forbidden Wilds needs Wilds tokens. It may have a slightly harder time of it without the possibility of players gaining Minor/Major Powers that add Wilds, but is probably fine. Sharp Fangs Behind the Leaves needs Beasts tokens to function well, and Beasts need Event Cards to be good; without Events, Sharp Fangs is almost certainly underpowered unless you use the "Play Without Event" rules from Jagged Earth.
    • New Power Cards: Adding only a subset of new Power Cards is likely to change the distribution of different types of effects, and near-certain to change the elemental distribution (both how often each element appears, and how often each pair of elements appears). The game will absolutely still work, but some Spirits will be invisibly penalized / rewarded (because Power Card draws will on average be lousier/better for their elements), and it may skew strategy depending on what types of effects get added to the deck. This isn't apt to be a big deal if you're just adding a few cards, but if you're adding half the new cards it could be more pronounced. Also, some Major Powers are in the expansion because they shouldn't be part of a small Major Power deck.
    And finally, "Everything except the Event Cards": If you omit the starting Disease from each board, and don't use the "Aid from Lesser Spirits" / "Back Against the Wall" Blight cards, my educated guess is that using everything but the Event Cards wouldn't mess with game difficulty too much - Beast tokens will be much worse (mild difficulty boost), and the Blight Card changes will make things slightly easier. (You could also use Event Cards for token Events only, in which case you're probably making your game easier by 1 or 2 Difficulty?) It's totally untested that way, but if you want to give it a shot, please go for it - and if you have a chance, post to BGG or the >G forums to let me know how it went!
    (Discussion elsewhere)  Tags: Events, Learning, Difficulty, Expansions, 0 more...
  • Can I create my own Spirits / Adversaries / Scenarios / etc? What about sharing them online?
    For your own use: of course!
    For posting online, see Creating your own game elements.
    Tags: Fan Spirits
  • Is Branch & Claw required for the Promo spirits <i>(Serpent Slumbering Beneath the Island and Heart of the Wildfire)</i>?
    No, those Spirits do not require the Branch & Claw expansion.
    The Special Rule for Heart of the Wildfire refers to Beasts tokens. Ignore that clause if you are playing without Beasts tokens.
    (Discussion elsewhere)  Tags: Heart of the Wildfire, Serpent Slumbering Beneath the Island
  • What changed between different printings of the game?
    Mostly small typo/clarity changes, plus some rewording / additional sidebars in the rulebook based on questions answered online. For a full list, see:
    (Note: there are currently 10 printings and counting, but starting with the 7th printing there were few - if any - changes.)
    Tags: Printing changes, Printings and Editions
  • I got one of the fancy canonical-island playmats. How do I use it? And what are those new setup icons?
    See the Playmat instructions page for full notes. Most of it is pretty straightforward.
    (Discussion elsewhere)  Tags: Island setup, Playmat
  • What languages besides English is Spirit Island available in?
    The following localizations have appeared or been announced:
    LanguagePublisherTiming
    GermanPegasus SpieleEssen 2018 (base game); October 2019 (Branch & Claw)
    FrenchIntrafinNovember 2018
    RussianHobby WorldSpring 2019 (base game)
    SpanishArrakis Games2019 (base game)
    PortugueseACE StudiosFebruary 2019 (base game)
    PolishLacerta
    HungarianGém Klub Kft.
    ItalianGhenos Games
    KoreanBoardM Factory
    ChineseOne Moment Games

    The above table is best-knowledge (not a guarantee), and does not include deals not yet finalized / announced. Dates listed are initial printings only; if something's out of stock and you want to ask about a reprint, contact the publisher. Publishers with licensing to print the base game also have permission to print expansions, so if you want those to happen, write to them, not Greater Than Games! :)
    If there's a language not shown above for which you'd like to see a localization of Spirit Island, the steps to make this happen are: (a) find a local publisher who'd be interested in printing such a thing; then (b) get them to talk to Greater Than Games about licensing.
    Tags: Foreign Languages, Printings and Editions
  • How many Presence tokens should I have?
    You should have 13 Presence tokens of each color.
    Some printings of the core game and Jagged Earth came with an extra token of each color. Use these as a spare. For the scenario Guard the Isle's Heart, the extra Presence at the start of the game comes from your Presence tracks, not this extra token.
    If you have too few tokens, contact the publisher for a replacement.
    (Discussion elsewhere)  Tags: Presence, Guard the Isle's Heart
  • How can I tell what printing I have (from looking at the outside of the box)?
    • Core game first printing has both the >G and Fabled Nexus logos.
    • Core game second printing has only the >G logo.
    • Core game third and fourth printing show the printing number underneath the bar code.
    • Core game fifth and sixth printing both show "5th edition" under the bar code. (Whoops.) They can be distinguished on the exterior by the Greater Than Games logo directly over the UPC symbol - the 5th printing has a shades-of-blue die above the text "greater/than/games" while the 6th printing has a blue-and-white die nestled below a larger, all-caps "GREATER THAN GAMES" - see Telling 5th and 6th printings apart for photos of the two logos.
    • Core game seventh and eighth printings show the printing number underneath the bar code.
    • Branch & Claw second and third printing show the printing number underneath the bar code.
    • Branch & Claw fourth printing shows "5th edition" under the bar code. (Whoops.)
    • Branch & Claw then skipped to 7th printing (in order to sync up with core-game printings), which is shown underneath the bar code.
    • Promo Spirits (Wildfire and Serpent) second-and-onwards printings have "Add a Presence" instead of "Add Presence" as reminder text under Growth options.
    See also: What changed between different printings of the game?
    (Discussion elsewhere)  Tags: Printing changes, Printings and Editions
  • Can you post an electronic PDF of the rulebook?
    Here are links that Greater than Games provided to the core rulebook, the Branch & Claw rulebook, the Jagged Earth rulebook, and the Nature Incarnate rulebook.
    (Discussion elsewhere) (Discussion elsewhere)  Tags: Rulebook
  • What are Apocrypha Spirits?
    Apocrypha Spirits are Spirits designed by Eric Reuss, but not part of the formal Spirit Island canon. You can think of them kind of like "fan-made Spirits made by the game's creator" - perhaps they resonate with the established lore a touch more simply due to being created by the same person.
    The following things are generally true about Apocrypha Spirits:
    • They've had vastly less design / development / playtesting than published Spirits, so are apt to be substantially rougher, be over- / under-powered, have parts that just don't work, etc. This is especially true for Apocrypha Spirits designed in real-time with fans at an event, and for those with novel mechanics.
    • They are permitted to have more thematic and mechanical overlap with canon Spirits than canon Spirits generally have with each other.
    • They are not "in playtesting". Reactions to / stories about playing them are just as welcome as for any Spirit, but playtesting data is not desired, and there's no specific plan to develop them any further.
    • They do not restrict future design: small or large portions of them could make their way into canon Spirit designs someday.
    • Nothing mentioned in their lore - including the fact of the Spirit's existence - is necessarily true in canon.
    • In some cases, it's plausible that there might be stories of these Spirits in canon - maybe fanciful knowingly-false tales, maybe serious stories that are uncertain or poorly-informed. But even if such stories exist, that doesn't necessarily mean the Spirit does.
    • Unless someone chooses to commission/donate artwork for a Spirit, they are likely to either have no art, or whatever public-domain / creative-commons art I can scrounge up. (Which may mean imagery that's only tangentially relevant, or doesn't have much stylistic consistency.)
    The back of the Spirit panel should list the circumstances of its creation, and whether/when it's okay to spread them around. The norm for Spirits created in collaboration with fans at an event is to be first given to those fans, then a bit later to the Spirit Island community at large - many thanks to the publisher (Greater Than Games) for allowing this!
    The first public Apocrypha Spirit, Spreading Rot Renews the Earth, was released in March 2021. Covets Gleaming Shards of Earth came out in June 2024.
    PS: Yes, "Apocrypha" is a plural noun; technically it should be "apocryphal" or "Apocryphon". Call it poetic license, with a side order of "easier to say".
    (Discussion elsewhere)  Tags: Apocrypha Spirits
  • What game items have been retired or replaced in expansions?
    Replaced with new cards:
    • Sea Monsters (Major Power in B&C) – new version in JE (capping Fear)
    • Draw Towards a Consuming Void (Major Power in JE) – new version in NI (wording – no functional changes)
    • Growth Through Sacrifice (Minor Power in B&C) – replacement Minor in NI (Roiling Bog and Snagging Thorn)
    Retired:
    • Outpaced (Event in B&C) – retired as of NI
    • War Touches the Island's Shores (Event in B&C) – retired as of NI (which has a new Event with similar theme)
    • A Strange Madness Among the Beasts (Event in B&C) – retired as of JE/NI
    • Tipping Point (Blighted Island Card in B&C) – retired as of NI
    Farmers Seek the Dahan for Aid has not yet been replaced, because that replacement would best be done as part of a Dahan-centric expansion.
    It's fine – but not required – to retire game items "early" (i.e., without buying the expansion which officially says they're retired). That's awkward for replacing game items - since you need the replacement - though some players opt to omit Growth Through Sacrifice, finding the elemental distortion from its absence to be less impactful than it seeing use in play.
    Outpaced, War Touches, Strange Madness, and Tipping Point were all retired for an overly swingy play experience. Original Sea Monsters was so good with Many Minds that it trivialized the game. Growth Through Sacrifice was nearly always game-warpingly good. Draw Towards a Consuming Void was one of the very few things that moves other Spirits' Presence without explicitly stating so, and Nature Incarnate had space on the card sheet, so we printed a replacement.
    Tags: Retired or Replaced Game Items, Expansions, Sea Monsters, Draw Towards a Consuming Void, 6 more...
  • What Spirit Island games / expansions exist? Is there any required order to the expansions?
    The Spirit Island Wiki has this information in both list and graphical form, along with recommendations for frequently asked purchasing questions at the bottom. You can also click through to see the contents of different expansions.
    Retail and crowdfunding versions of Spirit Island products are equivalent; there is no exclusive content.
    Tags: Printings and Editions, Expansions
  • When is a good time to add expansion materials from Branch & Claw or Jagged Earth to the core game?
    The only firm recommendation is "not right away!" - they add extra complexity while you're learning the core rules, make some core Invader dynamics more variable (and thus harder to learn), and the awesome variety they offer isn't nearly so awesome without understanding the core game. That said, some players disagree, and you should play however you like!
    As a rough gauge, the more of the below questions you'd say "yes" to, the more natural it'd be to start using the expansion:
    • Are you comfortable with the core game's mechanics? (No longer need to use the player aid cards / look up basic rules in the rulebook while playing, though you might consult the FAQ for edge cases. This question is the most important of the lot.)
    • Have you seen much of the core game's diversity? (Played many of the Spirits / played alongside all of them; taken or considered-taking all of the Minor Powers and many of the Major Powers.)
    • Are you winning games with Difficulty higher than 0? (Playing against Adversaries, or the more difficult Scenarios.)
    • Have you played some of the Medium/High-complexity Spirits?
    • Do you REALLY REALLY like new stuff and want to add the expansion materials as soon as possible?
    • Are there more-experienced players in the game with you? (Particularly if they're already familiar with the expansion materials.)
    • Are you able to predict victory more than a turn in advance? (With the only Invader randomness being the new Explore card, seasoned players can reach a point where they foresee victory multiple turns ahead of time, even when playing on a good difficulty level for them. If you've hit this point, I actively recommend breaking out the expansion, as its Event deck returns an edge of uncertainty - and thus, tension - to such situations.)
    If you can say "yes" to at least 2-3 of these - definitely including the first one - then it's a fine time to add expansion materials. If you can say "yes" to 4 or more of them, no need to keep waiting! You don't need to play through literally everything in the core game's box first. (Though of course if you want to, great, do that!)
    Another reasonable POV someone expressed: "Events - added in the expansion - are best when you have enough of the game system internalized that it's easy to predict what the Invaders will do. The Event Deck combats this by adding some randomness. But if you're not yet at the stage where you feel like you can picture the board 1 or 2 turns in advance, adding Events will just make it harder to do that. So waiting on the expansion until then isn't a bad idea." Though some folks like the Events more for their theme and occasional hard choices than their effects on the Invaders per se, so this may not be universal.
    (Discussion elsewhere) (Discussion elsewhere) (Discussion elsewhere) (Discussion elsewhere)  Tags: Learning, Expansions
  • Will there ever be a Second Edition of Spirit Island? Or some sort of balance-tweak expansion for the current edition?
    Nothing is certain, but see Thoughts around the topic of Spirit Island 2nd edition.
    Tags: Printings and Editions

~ World and Lore