In 2011, game designer Rob Daviau released Risk Legacy, a campaign-driven reimagining of the classic strategy game Risk. In the process, he created an entirely new way of thinking about board games.

Previous releases had largely been immutable, with players resetting games to their starting states every time they were played, like the orderly arrangement of pieces on a chess board. Daviau’s approach threw this assumption out the window. His take on Risk saw players permanently alter the game as they played—writing on the board, destroying cards, and revealing new components hidden in sealed compartments.