Cascadia Animal Spotlight – Grizzly Bears

February 10, 2025

Cascadia Digital releases on February 19th on Steam, Android, and iOS!

Cascadia reminds us about the interconnectedness of ecosystems and the importance of biodiversity, with wildlife being integral to the game’s essence. As we move closer to Cascadia Digital’s release, we’ll be taking a deeper look at the game’s five central animals in our Animal Spotlight series!

Grizzly Bears

In today’s Animal Spotlight, we delve into the world of the grizzly bear, a majestic and powerful creature that embodies the wild spirit of the Pacific Northwest. Known for their immense strength and territorial nature, grizzly bears are apex predators that command respect and caution.

The grizzly bear (Ursus arctos horribilis) is the largest of the North American bear species and can tower 8 feet tall when standing on their hind legs. About 75% of a grizzly’s diet is typically berries, fruits, and nuts. However, they’re opportunistic omnivores, meaning they will eat a variety of plants and animals.

Playing Grizzly Bears in Cascadia

Bear scoring is inspired by their habits in real life, representing different sizes of bear groups that occur naturally in their home habitats. More than any other animal in Cascadia, these group sizes are instrumental to the ways that bears score.

Grizzly Bear Tips:

Scoring Card A - Mating Pairs

Grizzlies will not score unless they’re paired, so be intentional about placing them; you want to be reasonably confident you’ll be able to pair them up later! It’s important to have a plan when you’re placing bears. And also be sure to remember that no other bears can be adjacent to each pair! (This applies to all forms of bear scoring)

Scoring Card B - Mother and Cubs

Be very careful about placing “new” bears before you’ve finished a group of three — this is all or nothing scoring, so each bear placed away from an unfinished group demands at least two more. Remember that you only have 20 turns and plan accordingly! This is even higher-risk than Card A, because you could have up to two bears placed together and still get nothing!

Scoring Card C: Families

Try to build one of each group for that +3 bonus for maximum scoring efficiency! And be sure to consider your order of operations – for example, it’s easy to place a solo bear at any point, but much harder to build a group of three later in the game.

Scoring Card D: Big Groups

Remember that the points per bear increase with each group size — one group of 4 is more valuable than two groups of 2!

Fun Bear Scenarios in Cascadia Digital

In addition to being one of the five main animals in Cascadia, grizzlies also feature heavily in two fun scenarios for players who want to get in touch with their inner bear.

Challenge – Hungry Bears: In this Challenge, the grizzly bears are on a feeding frenzy! Every time you place a bear, you can score points for each salmon adjacent to it, before removing their tokens. Yummy! For a more difficult version with bears that eat everything, try the Expert variant!
Solo Scenario 11: It’s bear mania! This Solo Scenario requires you to score at least 30 points with bears. That’s 9 grizzly bears total — almost half of all the animals you’ll play in the game! Bears, bears, and more bears.

Discover the Pacific Northwest

Every animal in Cascadia challenges you to play a certain way, with no two of them sharing the same strategy. Join us in our next Animal Spotlight, where we’ll be taking a look at the towering Roosevelt Elk!

Cascadia Digital releases on February 19th on Android and iOS, and is currently available on Steam. The hiking trail beckons — will you answer the call?