Five Tribes: The Djinns of Naqala
Move groups of meeples across Naqala, activate tribes, claim tiles and recruit Djinns in Bruno Cathala’s tactical action-selection game.
Select a tile, pick up all meeples on it and distribute them one by one across adjacent tiles using a mancala-style movement rule.
The color of the final matching meeple determines the tribe action, while the destination tile may also be claimed or activated. Turn order is bid for, adding another layer of timing.
Why We Love It
Five Tribes makes the board itself the action menu. Picking up one group of meeples and sowing them across adjacent tiles changes the options available to everyone after you.
About Five Tribes: The Djinns of Naqala
Select a tile, pick up all meeples on it and distribute them one by one across adjacent tiles using a mancala-style movement rule.
The color of the final matching meeple determines the tribe action, while the destination tile may also be claimed or activated. Turn order is bid for, adding another layer of timing.
Game at a Glance
Pick Up a Group
Choose one tile as the starting point for a mancala move.
Sow Meeples
Drop one meeple on each visited tile while following adjacency rules.
Trigger a Tribe
The final matching color determines the main action you receive.
Claim and Score
Control tiles, recruit Djinns and collect sets while managing turn-order bids.
What is Five Tribes: The Djinns of Naqala?
Five Tribes: The Djinns of Naqala is Bruno Cathala’s 2014 strategy game for 2–4 players. The board begins as a modular grid filled with colored meeples representing five tribes.
Each turn redistributes a group of meeples in a Mancala-style movement, then resolves the color of the final meeple and the destination tile.
How the game works
Players bid for turn order, select a tile, pick up all meeples from it and drop one meeple onto each tile along a path. The last meeple must match at least one meeple already on the final tile.
You then collect matching meeples from the destination and resolve their tribe action. Emptying a tile can let you claim it with a camel, while Djinns and market goods add additional scoring paths.
The decisions that define it
Every move changes the board for everyone. A high-scoring action may also leave a powerful setup for the next player, so tactical value and board exposure must be considered together.
Turn-order bidding is part of the strategy because acting early can matter more when a rare opportunity appears.
Who is it for?
Choose Five Tribes if you enjoy open-information tactical puzzles, variable setup and turns where one move can reshape several future options.
Consider a more linear worker-placement game if you prefer stable action spaces and less tactical recalculation.
Learn Five Tribes in depth
Publisher sources & scope
Checked September 16, 2026. This hub covers the Five Tribes base game, not Artisans of Naqala, Whims of the Sultan or Thieves of Naqala.