Overview
At a glance
Is this game right for my group?
ABG editorial scores on a 1–5 scale.
Easier to teach
High replayability
Highly interactive
Scales well
Deep strategy
More strategic control
How it plays
How does it play?
Deploy worker beeples across shifting flower fields, secure majorities, and turn pollen into a prestigious hive and palace for the queen.
Core mechanisms
Key systems that shape the decisions players make.
Area Majority
Compete to have the strongest presence in areas that award control or points.
Set Collection
Gather related items that become more valuable when scored together.
Worker Placement
Commit limited workers to action spaces before opponents occupy them.
Market
Buy and sell through a shared supply whose availability or prices can change.
Contracts
Complete specific requirements to earn rewards, income, or victory points.
Modular Board
Build the play area from interchangeable sections that vary between games.
See all 8 mechanisms
Read the full game description
Propolis is a compact worker-placement and engine-building contest set among rival medieval bee colonies. Landscape cards form shared realms where beeples gather colored pollen and compete for influence. Placing or fortifying workers improves a colony’s claim on a realm, while controlling landscapes supplies resources and glory. Pollen is spent on structure cards that expand a personal hive, add ongoing abilities, create new scoring routes, and satisfy the requirements for increasingly valuable queen’s palaces. Double-sided landscape and structure cards make the market and map change from game to game, and the small worker supply makes timing important: a strong position can produce repeatedly, but every bee committed to defense is unavailable elsewhere. The result combines accessible placement rules with a layered race over shared spaces, resource conversion, card synergies, and the prestige of building the finest home for the queen.
