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The robots of the RoboRally automobile factory spend their weekdays toiling at the assembly line. They put in hard hours building high-speed supercars they never get to see in action. But on Saturday nights, the factory becomes a world of mad machines and dangerous schemes as these robots engage in their own epic race.It takes speed, wits, and dirty tricks to become a racing legend! Each player chooses a robot and directs its moves by playing cards. Chaos ensues as all players reveal the cards they've chosen. Players face obstacles like industrial lasers, gaping pits, and moving conveyor belts -- but those can also be used to their advantage! Each player aims to make it to each of the checkpoints in numerical order. The first player to reach all of the checkpoints wins.
In RoboRally players each control a different robot in a race through a dangerous factory floor. Several goals will be placed on the board and you must navigate your robot to them in a specific order. The boards can be combined in several different ways to accommodate different player counts and races can be as long or as short as player's desire.
In general, players will first fill all of their robot's "registers" with facedown movement cards. This happens simultaneously and there is a time element involved. If you don't act fast enough you are forced to place cards randomly to fill the rest. Then, starting with the first register, everyone reveals their card. The card with the highest number moves first. After everyone resolves their movement they reveal the next card and so on. Examples of movement cards may be to turn 90 degrees left or right, move forward 2 spaces, or move backward 1 space though there are a bigger variety than that. You can plan a perfect route, but if another robot runs into you it can push you off course. This can be disastrous since you can't reprogram any cards to fix it!
Robots fire lasers and factory elements resolve after each movement and robots may become damaged. If they take enough damage certain movement cards become fixed and can no longer be changed. If they take more they may be destroyed entirely. The first robot to claim all the goals in the correct order wins, though some may award points and play tournament style.
The game was reprinted by Avalon Hill (Hasbro/WotC) in 2005.
UPC 742818050029
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In First Class: Unterwegs im Orient Express, players try to score as many fame points as possible by building a rich network of rails, by building luxurious train cars, or by serving well-paying passengers.
From the Publisher's website:
In the early days of the twentieth century, rail is the preferred mode of transportation for the elite. Luxury lines scramble to accommodate the needs of business tycoons, diplomats, and even royalty. Step into this world and compete to build the most luxurious train lines possible in First Class. Guide your lines from humble beginnings into rivals of the fabled Orient Express itself as you carry out actions each round. Add cars to your trains, upgrade those cars to attract wealthier clientele, extend your lines towards Constantinople, and more. A limited number of action cards is available each round, so pick your actions carefully and choose a path for your rail lines. There are many ways to score points, but only a true railroad baron will accumulate the most points and win the game.
First Class is a card game that includes aspects of board games, creating a unique and dynamic experience every time you play. Cards represent your train cars and provide a visual reminder of your empire's growth as they extend out from your player board. On top of that, every game of First Class uses two of five interchangeable decks of action cards. Each deck provides new challenges for building your rail empire. One game might have you catering to the celebrities on your trains and fulfilling contracts along your route, while another game asks you to accommodate passengers and their luggage while you get swept up in a murder mystery. Each combination of modules opens many possible strategies and provides even more thematic flair. Return to a time when rail was king and grow your empire!
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Captain Swallow has always dreamed of pocketing a large nest egg in order to retire on a remote island – but he never counted on stiff competition from Captains Stanley Rackum, Dirk Chivers and others, greedy and cruel enemies who always manage to attack the same ships as him. If he wants to finally sink back and enjoy peaceful days in the sun, he must become the most cunning pirate!
In Libertalia, you must thwart the plans of competitive pirates over the course of three rounds while using cards that show the same crew members as your piratical comrades-in-arms. Yes, not only do they attack the same ships, but they employ the same type of ravenous scum that you do! Can you take advantage of the powers of your characters at the right time? Will you be outdone by a pirate smarter than you? Jump into the water and prove your tactical skills!
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Join other ambitious guild leaders in mining and developing the famous City of Silver during its period of rapid economic growth and expansion in the 14th century - from the first discovery of silver near the Cistercian monastery to the construction of Kutná Hora, which quickly became one of the most important cities in central Europe.
Kutná Hora: The City of Silver is a historical city-building Eurogame for 2-4 players that features a real-life supply and demand experience in which every action you take has an impact on the game's dynamic economic systems.
In each round, players take turns selecting actions from a hand of double-sided cards to engage strategic plans like mining, purchasing plots of land on which to build, gaining permits, raising buildings for their affiliated guilds, gaining profit from their production, and of course working towards the construction of Saint Barbara's Cathedral.
The asymmetrical nature of each player's available guilds makes for highly interactive rounds in which each decision impacts the economy and other players in interesting ways as they expand their mines and build infrastructure across a shared board.
Mine ore and smelt it into a fortune of silver for expanding this beautiful historic city, but take care to balance your personal goal advancement with the need to further the city's growth. Everything is connected, and sometimes the path to personal victory relies on the prosperity of the many.
-description from publisher
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Dinosaur Island: Rawr 'n Write is a roll-and-write version of the critically-acclaimed game Dinosaur Island.
Dinosaur Island: Rawr ‘n Write is a unique game in which players draft dice and then use those drafted dice as workers in a worker placement phase. Then, a fun polyomino puzzle ensues as you try and fit all your attractions and Dinosaurs into your park while buildings roads and routes to the exits for bonus points. At the end of the game, have more victory points than your opponents to win!
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Description from the publisher:
Welcome to Terrinoth, adventurer! Runebound is a fantasy adventure board game for two to four players, inviting you to play as one of six heroes wandering the realm and taking whatever quests you may encounter. But all is not well in the realm: evil is awakening once more in the form of Margath the Dragonlord or the Corpse King, Vorakesh. Only you and your rival heroes stand a chance of stopping this threat before all Terrinoth is consumed in darkness.
Two distinct scenarios give shape to your adventures in Terrinoth, challenging you to battle undead or outwit a dragon, even as you explore lost ruins and forgotten forests and take on quests across the realm. New adventure cards and story cards for each scenario make every game unique, alongside the ability to customize your hero with over one-hundred different skills and assets. Whether you play as a mage bristling with spells or a powerful warrior, every game of Runebound invites you to experience an incomparable adventure. Take your first steps into the world of Terrinoth!
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In the super-fast sushi card game Sushi Go!, you are eating at a sushi restaurant and trying to grab the best combination of sushi dishes as they whiz by. Score points for collecting the most sushi rolls or making a full set of sashimi. Dip your favorite nigiri in wasabi to triple its value! And once you've eaten it all, finish your meal with all the pudding you've got! But be careful which sushi you allow your friends to take; it might be just what they need to beat you!
Sushi Go! takes the card-drafting mechanism of Fairy Tale and 7 Wonders and distills it into a twenty-minute game that anyone can play. The dynamics of "draft and pass" are brought to the fore, while keeping the rules to a minimum. As you see the first few hands of cards, you must quickly assess the make-up of the round and decide which type of sushi you'll go for. Then, each turn you'll need to weigh which cards to keep and which to pass on. The different scoring combinations allow for some clever plays and nasty blocks. Round to round, you must also keep your eye on the goal of having the most pudding cards at the end of the game!
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Martin Wallace and Treefrog Games present Ankh-Morpork, set in the largest city-state in Terry Pratchett's Discworld. Lord Vetinari has disappeared and different factions are trying to take control of the city. Each player has a secret personality with specific victory conditions, which means that you're not sure exactly what the other players need to do in order to win.
The action takes place on a map of Ankh-Morpork, with players trying to place minions and buildings through card play. Each of the 132 cards is unique, and "the cards bring the game to life as they include most of the famous characters that have appeared in the various books. The rules are relatively simple: Play a card and do what it says. Most cards have more than one action on them, and you can choose to do some or all of these actions. Some cards also allow you to play a second card, so you can chain actions" (Wallace).
A team of artists have recreated the city and its residents for the cards, game board and box, with Bernard Pearson coordinating that team. Ankh-Morpork has been sublicensed to Mayfair Games for the North American market and Kosmos for the German market.
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London lies devastated after the Great Fire of 1666. This is your opportunity to build a new city on the ashes of the old. It is up to you how you employ the talents of the people of London to this end. Will you favor the business classes, who will earn you money? Or would you prefer to spend more money than you can rightly afford on grand monuments and sumptuous palaces? You must also deal with the problem of rising poverty and how to employ the many paupers of the city. Throughout the game you will be forced to make tough decisions. To achieve one aim you must sacrifice another, which may open an opportunity for a competitor.
London is a 2-4 player game with a playing time of approximately 90 minutes. Players select cards with varying powers of cashflow, victory points, and poverty penalties, and compete to manage them most efficiently. Nearly 250 years of progress is glimpsed in this game. Famous buildings and monuments of the era as well as engineering developments such as streetlights are illustrated on the cards.
As with a lot of games, London is about scoring the most VPs. Players manage their hand, selecting cards to play into their building display by laying them out in a line. At some point a player will choose to run his city. They can activate their buildings in whatever order they prefer. The resulting actions can generate money and VPs, reduce poverty or have some other effect specified on the card. Some cards have an entry cost which must be paid before the action can be performed.
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Before Ticket to Ride, before Santa Fe Rails, before Union Pacific – yet after Acquire – there was Airlines, one of the earliest published games from designer Alan R. Moon and publisher ABACUSSPIELE.
More than two decades after the publication of that game, Moon and ABACUSSPIELE present Airlines Europe, the design of which Moon began in 2007. According to the publisher, "He wanted to preserve the feel of the original game and its successor, Union Pacific, while confronting the player with even more exciting choices." The result of that redesign process is Airlines Europe, featuring a reduced playing time, a new point structure, a European setting, and 112 tiny detailed airplanes.
At its heart, Airlines Europe is a stock game, with players earning points for the stock they hold in particular airline companies when one of the randomly determined scorings takes place. On a player's turn, that player either expands an airline and claims a stock, plays stock onto the board and receives dividend, invests in a special airline called Air ABACUS or gets a certain amount of money from the bank. A player scores only for stock in play, but the value of an airline is determined by the value of the route licenses that airline owns – thus, you're torn in terms of what to play when.
Some changes compared to Airlines:
map of Europe
no flight cards
special Air ABACUS airline similar to the Union Pacific
share track system
separate victory point and money systems
airplane miniatures
no sabotage
up to 5 players
reduced playtime
Some changes compared to Union Pacific:
airplane theme
map of Europe
no track cards
Air ABACUS is acquired by trading in other shares
share track system
separate victory point and money systems
up to 5 players
reduced playtime
Re-implements:
Airlines
Union Pacific
Promo Expansions:
Airlines Europe: Flight Ban (adding the option to block routes)
Airlines Europe: New Bonus Connections (adding bonus connections for the black and the brown airline)
Airlines Europe: The Presidents (adds tie breaker for stock payouts)
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The Fox in the Forest is a trick-taking game for two players. Aside from the normal ranked- and suited-cards used to win tricks, fairy characters such as the Fox and the Witch have special abilities that let you change the trump suit, lead even after you lose a trick, and more.
You score points by winning more tricks than your opponent, but don't get greedy! Win too many tricks, and you will fall like the villain in so many fairy tales...
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Legends of Andor is a cooperative adventure board game for two to four players in which a band of heroes must work together to defend a fantasy realm from invading hordes. To secure Andor's borders, the heroes will embark on dangerous quests over the course of five unique scenarios (as well as a final scenario created by the players themselves). But as the clever game system keeps creatures on the march toward the castle, the players must balance their priorities carefully.
At the heart of Legends of Andor is its unique narrative, the linked scenarios of which tell an overarching story as the players successfully complete objectives. For each scenario, or "Legend", a legend deck conveys the plot of an ever-unfolding tale...one in which the players are the protagonists. A wooden marker moves along the board's legend track at key points during each scenario, triggering the draw of a new legend card, the introduction of new game-altering effects, and the advancement of the story's plot. In the end, the players must endeavor to guide the fate of Andor through their heroic actions, bringing a happy ending to their epic fantasy tale.
Will their heroes roam the land completing quests in the name of glory, or devote themselves to the defense of the realm? Uncover epic tales of glory as you live the Legends of Andor!
-description from the publisher
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The land of Valeria is under siege by hordes of monsters. You and your fellow Dukes must recruit citizens and buy domains to build up your kingdoms and slay the foul creatures that lurk in the surrounding lands.
Valeria: Card Kingdoms is a tableau-building game for 1-5 players and will feel familiar to deck-building fans. The cards you buy can work for you on your turn and on all the other player turns, as well. On your turn, roll two dice and activate citizen cards with the result of each individual die and the sum of both dice. Other players will simultaneously activate their citizen cards based on the roll. Next, take two actions from the following: slay a monster, recruit a citizen, buy a domain, or take 1 of any resource. The player with the most victory points at the end wins the game.
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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is dead. His last conscious action on his deathbed was composing the Lacrimosa movement of his Opus Requiem. You, as one of his sponsors, will meet with the widow in order to participate one last time in the funding of the works of the Austrian genius. Also, you will reminisce and retell all your memories alongside Mozart in order to make sure that she portrays you under the best light when writing her memoirs in order to enter history as Mozart's most important patron.
In Lacrimosa, players take the roles of patrons of the late musician, contributing with their fundings to the composer's works one last time. During the game, you play in two different timelines: the present and the past. In the present, you commission the missing parts of the Requiem from other composers in order to complete it. When developing past events, the game takes place in five epochs in which you contribute by buying new compositions from the composer to sell or exhibit, accompany him on the different journeys through the main courts and theaters in Europe, and gather the resources you need in order to support the musician during his career.
During the game, you play cards from a limited hand that you will improve as the game progresses. These cards can be played either as actions or as resource generators, and players need to optimize their resources and finances in order to support their best version of the story and their relationship with Mozart.
-description from the publisher
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Mythic Greece. As an upstart demigod, you want to earn the favor of the Olympians and become a figure of legend yourself. Gather heroes and powerful artifacts, please the gods and bear their power to write your own epic tale.
Let your allies achieve their destiny and enter the Elysium, home of the glorious and the brave. Once the stories are written, only one demigod will be chosen to stand at the side of Zeus.
Elysium is a game of set collecting and combinations in which players recruit cards representing heroes, items, powers and gods. These cards have many different powers and you can create powerful combination to earn gold (the help of the gods) and victory points (the favor of the gods). Each card belongs to one of the eight Olympians gods (a family), and shows a level (1 to 3).
During the five turns of the game, players will try to transfer their cards to the Elysium and write their own Legends, which are series of cards from the same family or from different families of the same level. The more epic the Legends, the more favor from the gods they’ll earn. But as they go to Elysium, most cards lose their power and players will therefore have to renounce some of their combinations !
A game of balance and opportunity with simple action, but constant dilemmas and complex strategies.
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Summary: This is a pirate-themed tactical race game with player interaction and side goals (e.g. detouring for treasure). The winner is the player who best balances their position in the race with their success at the side goals.
Setting: Jamaica, 1675.
After a long career in piracy, Captain Henry Morgan skillfully gets appointed to be Governor of Jamaica, with the explicit order to cleanse the Caribbean of pirates and buccaneers! Instead, he invites all of his former "colleagues" to join him in his retirement, to enjoy the fruits of their looting with impunity. Each year, in remembrance of the "good old days," Morgan organizes the Great Challenge, a race around the island, and at its end, the Captain with the most gold is declared Grand Winner.
Goal: The game ends on the turn when at least one player's ship reaches the finish line, completing one circuit around the island of Jamaica. At that point, players are awarded different amounts of gold in accordance with how far away from the finish line they were when the race concluded. This gold is added to any gold a player gathered along the way by detouring from the race to search for valuable treasure, by stealing gold or treasure from other players, or just by loading gold as directed by the cards the player played during the race. The player with the most total gold acquired through all these means is then declared the winner.
Gameplay: The game is played in rounds. Each player always has a hand of three cards, and a personal board depicting the five "holds" of their ship, into which goods can be loaded during the game. Each round, one player is designated as "captain," with the next clockwise player being captain in the following round, and so on. The captain rolls two standard D6 dice, examines her cards, then announces which die will correspond to the "day" and which to the "night." Each player then simultaneously selects a card from their hand and places it face down in front of them. Each card has two symbols on it, one on the left - corresponding to "day" - and one on the right ("night"). The symbols indicate either ship movement (forward or backward) or the loading of a type of good. After every player has selected a card, all cards are revealed simultaneously and then resolved clockwise one by one, starting with the captain's. When it is a player's turn to resolve her card, for first the left symbol on her card and then for the right symbol, the player will load a number of goods or move a number of spaces equal to the number of pips showing on the corresponding day or night die for that round. Thus the main decision each player makes during the game is which of their current three cards would best serve them on a particular turn, given the values of the day and night dice. Finally, during the race, when a player lands on a spot already occupied by another player, there is a battle. Battles are mainly resolved by rolling a "combat" die, but players may improve their chances by using "gunpowder" tokens from their holds, if they loaded any on previous turns. The winner of a battle may steal some goods or treasure from the loser.
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Regicide is a cooperative, fantasy card game for 1 to 4 players, played using a standard deck of cards.
Players work together to defeat 12 powerful enemies. On their turn a player plays a card to the table to attack the enemy and once enough damage is dealt, the enemy is defeated. The players win when the last King is defeated. But beware! Each turn the enemy strikes back. Players will discard cards to satisfy the damage and if they can't discard enough, everyone loses.
Rich with tactical decisions and a deep heuristic tree, Regicide is a huge challenge for anyone who is brave enough to take it on.
-description from the designer
For a dice-based, typo-inspired, April 1st-announced game from the same designers, try Regidice!
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The city of London has commissioned you to redesign its underground network! Optimise connections, serve as many sights as possible and exploit the tunnels that pass under the Thames. Be careful to respect the specifications set by the city.
Reveal the next Station card.
Draw a new section
Optimise the 4 tube lines
Who will be the best project manager?
Which of you will be the best project manager?
-description from the publisher
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In the fast and goofy family game Galaxy Trucker, players begin by simultaneously rummaging through the common warehouse, frantically trying to grab the most useful component tiles to build their spaceship - all in real-time.
Once the ships are launched, players encounter dangerous situations while vying for financial opportunities, each hoping to gain the most valuable cargo and finish with as much of their ship still intact as possible. Of course, that's easier said than done since many hazards will send pieces of your ship, your cargo, and your crew hurling into the depths of space.
The goal is to survive the trek - hopefully with at least some of your crew and ship intact - and have at least one credit by the end of the game. (Profit, yay!) Players earn credits by delivering goods, defeating pirates, having the best-looking ship, and reaching their destination before the others.
This version of Galaxy Trucker is a relaunch of the original 2007 release by Vlaada Chvátil that features new art, more ship tiles, tweaked card effects, and streamlined gameplay that consists of only a single flight through space. That said, should you want a longer, more challenging experience, you can play a three-flight game known as the "Transgalactic Trek".
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In his last will, your rich uncle stated that all of his millions will go to the nephew who can enjoy money the most. How to find out which nephew should be rich? You will each be given a large amount of money and whoever can spend it first will be the rightful heir. Visit the most exclusive theatres or eat in the most expensive restaurants. Buy old properties for the price of new ones and sell them as ruins. Host a huge party in your mansion or on your private boat. Spend like your life would depend on it. Spend to become rich! If you're the first to run through the money on hand, you'll receive the rest of his inheritance – oh, and win the game.
In Last Will, each player starts with a certain amount of money, an individual player board, two errand boys and two cards in some combination of properties and helpers. At the start of each round, lay out cards from the appropriate decks on the offering boards; the four regular decks are properties, companions, events, helpers and expenses, with special cards forming a deck of their own. The particular mix of cards varies by round and by the number of players.
Each player then chooses a plan for the round, with each plan indicating the number of cards the player draws (drawn immediately from the four regular decks in any combination), how many errand boys he can use later (one or two), the number of actions available to him that round, and his spot in the playing order that round. In the playing order for that round, players then take turns choosing an action with their errand boy(s), with those actions being:
Take a card on display and add it to your hand.
Draw a card from any regular deck – This can be chosen only once by each player.
Visit the opera and spend $2.
Adjust the value modifiers in the property market.
Take a player board extension, thereby giving you room to play more cards.
Players then take actions in the playing order for that round, with each player having as many actions as indicated on his plan. Actions let you play one-time events (which have a cost, possibly variable); helpers and recurring expenses (which are placed on your individual player board); and properties (which cost money and may depreciate over time). You can often play companions with events or recurring expenses – of course you should bring a date to the opera or a horse on your yacht! – to increase their cost. You can also use actions to activate cards on your player board, possibly with one or more companions and always with the goal of spending money. Helpers and special cards can provide you with unique powers to further boost your profligacy.
At the end of each round, you must discard down to two cards in hand, and properties that can depreciate do so; this is good as a player cannot go bankrupt if he owns properties, and the only way to get rid of properties is to sell them, which regretably puts money back in your hands unless the depreciation was intense or you manipulate the market.
If a player has no money and no properties, he declares bankruptcy and the game ends at the conclusion of that round; otherwise the game ends after seven rounds. The player who has the least money (or even who is most in debt) wins.
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In Archipelago, players are Renaissance European powers competing in the exploration of a Pacific or Caribbean archipelago. They will explore territories, harvest resources, use those resources in markets both internal (for their use and that of the natives) and foreign (to sell it in Europe), build markets, harbors, cities and temples, and negotiate among themselves (and maybe betray each other) – all this to complete their secret objectives. They will also need to guess the secret objective of the other players to be able to benefit from them.
But players also need to be careful of the natives; if they make them too unhappy or if too many of them are unoccupied, they could revolt and declare independence. Then everyone will lose!
According to the author, what he's tried to create is a "German" economic worker-placement game, but without the two things he dislikes in them: the superficial theme and the lack of interaction. Indeed this game includes a very present theme and a lot of negotiation and potential backstabbing.
The game includes three sets of objectives, enabling players to choose between a short, medium and a long game. Solo play is also possible with an expansion.
IN FRENCH
Archipelago retrace l’ère majestueuse de la découverte des archipels à travers le globe de 1492 (découverte des Antilles par Christophe Colomb) jusqu’à 1797 (colonisation de Tahiti).
Chaque joueur incarne un explorateur et son équipe, mandatés par une nation européenne pour découvrir, coloniser et exploiter les archipels. Ces missions sont censées s’effectuer de manière diplomatique, en répondant tant aux besoins de la population locale qu’aux demandes régulières du continent. Il faudra donc respecter l’archipel et ses autochtones sous peine de voir les natifs se révolter pour finir en guerre d’indépendance. Les limites entre expansionnisme et humanisme, économie et respect des valeurs locales, transmission de connaissances et industrialisation à outrance, ne sont pas toujours évidentes à trouver. L’équilibre de l’archipel dépendra donc beaucoup de la volonté que mettra chacun à faire de ces îles des colonies heureuses et productives, ou au contraire, à exploiter outrageusement les ressources et les natifs pour finir dans le chaos et la révolte.
Pour compliquer les choses, parmi vous se cache peut-être un indépendantiste ou un pacifiste. L’un comme l’autre tentera de faire pencher la balance respectivement vers la révolte ou vers la paix. Êtes-vous prêt à endosser votre rôle et partir à la découverte d’Archipelago ?
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Pagan: Fate of Roanoke is an expandable deduction card game set in the colonial America of 1587.
The essence of this asymmetrical game is a witch's struggle against a witch hunter. As the witch strives to complete a ritual of renaturation, the hunter tries to discover her true identity among nine villagers. Each turn, the two players use their action pawns on active villagers to draw cards, play cards, and gain influence. Each player has their own variable card deck of fifty cards; with these cards, the witch can brew powerful potions, improve their familiar, and cast enchantments and charms, while the witch hunter enlists allies, claim strategic locations, and ruthlessly investigates the villagers.
As the witch, your objective is to collect enough secrets to perform a ritual so potent that the entire region will fall under your spell and Mother Nature will reclaim the island. As the hunter, you gather all the allies and support you can muster to bring the witch to justice before her fatal ritual comes to fruition.
The prototype won the Danish design award Otto at the Fastaval for best game of show in 2018.
-description from publisher
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The isle of Atlantis, your home, is sinking. Will you be able to save your people in time?
Atlantis Rising is a co-operative worker placement game in which you must work together with up to six other players to deploy citizens across your homeland, gathering resources in order to build a cosmic gate that can save your people. Workers placed close to the shoreline are more rewarding, but are more likely to be flooded and the actions lost.
Every turn, each player draws a misfortune card that will flood certain locations along the ever-shrinking Atlantis shoreline, or may otherwise work to undermine your efforts to save your people. So you must race to gather the necessary resources to build and power the gate, before the island disappears beneath the waves forever.
This edition contains all new art and graphic design, created to bring even more attention to the thematic setting of the game. The Athenians Attack phase has been replaced with the Wrath of the Gods phase, requiring more strategic planning and adding to the sense of urgency. Now, instead of placing workers in an Atlantean Navy, players must cooperatively decide to flood a set number of tiles at the end of each round. To further aid them in their task, Councilor player powers have been expanded and made more impactful, and the knowledge deck has similarly been revised and expanded. The variable gate components, once built, no longer offer one-time bonuses, but create new worker placement spots where players can send Atlantean workers to unleash actions to help save their island.
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This is a tile-laying race game with players starting with boards that are identical, and one player drawing tiles that they all will use. They race to get their explorers to temples first and earn points. Along the way they can collect additional points by collecting items off the paths they create. The game ends when one player gets all of their explorers to their corresponding temples or whenever the last tile is drawn and placed. Most points wins.
Description from the English Ruleset:
Many moons have come and gone since your boats departed on the journey to Karuba. Once you arrive on the island, each player will lead an expedition team of four adventurers. Now you just have to navigate your way through the dense jungle to make it to the temples. „Just“ may be something of an understatement; the ancient jungle trails have to be found and uncovered first! Hurry up and be the first to reach the temples to collect the most valuable treasures. Many paths have dead ends and you need to be patient to find the right/best way (through the jungle). Look! A gold nugget! You can pick it up and collect it, same applies to the shiny crystals along the paths.
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Arrakis is a desert world seemingly dead and barren, yet here lies the most important resource in the galaxy: Spice. Without Spice, space travel is impossible, and humans become little clusters on isolated planets. The noble House that controls Arrakis and the production of Spice wields great power. The Emperor gave Arrakis to House Atreides, but then he conspired to replace them with their old rivals, House Harkonnen. Baron Harkonnen crushed the Atreides in a treasonous attack, and now rules the planet with an iron fist. But Paul and Jessica, heirs to House Atreides, are alive, and are mounting a rebellion with the aid of the formidable Fremen, the mysterious inhabitants of the barren expanses of Arrakis.
Only one House will emerge victorious from the coming struggle, while the other will be lost in the desert sands. It's into this grim reality that players will be thrust in Dune: War for Arrakis.
In this asymmetrical strategy game, players fight for control of the planet, maneuvering troops like the Fremen, the Fedaykin, and the fearsome Sardaukar, while sending Spice harvesters into the deep desert, daring to challenge the great Sandworms. The game features an action dice system with numerous event cards that will enable players to retell the Dune saga differently with each playthrough.
-description from the publisher
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You find yourself in a dystopian cityscape with a few workers at your disposal to make your mark on the world. Like most people in dystopian fiction, your workers are oblivious to their situation. This world is all they've ever known, and you may use them at your whim.
The world as we know it has ended, and in its place the city of Euphoria has risen. Believing that a new world order is needed to prevent another apocalypse, the Euphorian elite erect high walls around their golden city and promote intellectual equality above all else. Gone are personal freedoms; gone is knowledge of the past. All that matters is the future.
The Euphorians aren’t alone. Outside the city are those who experienced the apocalypse firsthand-they have the memories and scars to prove it. These Wastelanders have cobbled together a society of historians and farmers among the forgotten scrap yards of the past.
There is more to the world than the surface of the earth. Deep underground lies the hidden city of Subterra, occupied by miners, mechanics, and revolutionaries. By keeping their workers in the dark, they’ve patched together a network of pipes and sewers, of steam and gears, of hidden passages and secret stairways.
In Euphoria: Build a Better Dystopia, you lead a team of workers (dice) and recruits (cards) to claim ownership of the dystopian world. You will generate commodities, dig tunnels to infiltrate opposing areas, construct markets, collect artifacts, strengthen allegiances, and fulfill secret agendas.
Euphoria is a worker-placement game in which dice are your workers. The number on each die represents a worker's knowledge-that is, his level of awareness that he's in a dystopia. Worker knowledge enables various bonuses and impacts player interaction. If the collective knowledge of all of your available workers gets too high, one of them might desert you. You also have two elite recruit cards at your disposal; one has pledged allegiance to you, but the other needs some convincing. You can reveal and use the reticent recruit by reaching certain milestones in the game... or by letting other players unwittingly reach those milestones for you.
Your path to victory is paved with the sweat of your workers, the strength of your allegiances, and the tunnels you dig to infiltrate other areas of the world, but the destination is a land grab in the form of area control. You accomplish this by constructing markets that impose harsh restrictions of personal freedoms upon other players, changing the face of the game and opening new paths to victory. You can also focus on gathering artifacts from the old world, objects of leisure that are extremely rare in this utilitarian society. The dystopian elite covet these artifacts-especially matching pairs-and are willing to give you tracts of land in exchange for them.
Four distinct societies, each of them waiting for you to rewrite history. What are you willing to sacrifice to build a better dystopia?
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Vikings is a fast economic game. Despite the nominal "Viking" theme, no actual exploration or pillaging is involved.
The resources in the game consist of coins and several types of ship tiles, island tiles and meeples. In each of 6 rounds, a random set of 12 tiles and 12 meeples becomes available. Players take turns buying and placing pairs of meeples and tiles. There is no direct player interaction, only indirect contention for resources during the buying phase.
The most unusual aspect of the game is the pricing wheel, which pairs meeples with tiles and sets their prices.
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No moderator, no elimination, ten-minute games.
One Night Ultimate Werewolf is a fast game for 3-10 players in which everyone gets a role: One of the dastardly Werewolves, the tricky Troublemaker, the helpful Seer, or one of a dozen different characters, each with a special ability. In the course of a single morning, your village will decide who is a werewolf...because all it takes is lynching one werewolf to win!
Because One Night Ultimate Werewolf is so fast, fun, and engaging, you'll want to play it again and again, and no two games are ever the same.
This game can be combined with One Night Ultimate Werewolf: Daybreak.
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Northwest India at the beginning of the 18th century. The rule of the Grand Moguls is waning, and the Maharishis and princes seize the opportunity to take control of the region. By influencing the prominent forces, building magnificent palaces, and ensuring a steady supply of commodities, the princes increase their power until the most successful has won.
The goal of the game is to gain the most influence points. These can be obtained by building palaces and by acquiring commodities. A palace can be built after securing the support of the Vizier, the General, the Monk, the Princess, or the Grand Mogul. Commodities are gained by seizing control of a region or by retrieving them on a space where a palace has just been built.
There are twelve turns with an auction for the region control and the support of the Vizier, General, Monk, Princess, and Grand Mogul, each represented by a different symbol. Players use cards in four colors to bid for the various prizes, and each player may only play one color in any given turn. During your turn you can either increase your bid by playing more cards or withdraw. When you do, you gain the reward for every symbol you have the majority of. You place palaces, gain region tiles, and increase your score accordingly. There are bonus points for connecting palaces over several regions on the map.After the final area on the board is auctioned, the player with the highest point total wins the game.
This game is #3 in the Alea big box series.
Note: the 2018 edition from Fantasy Flight Games includes rules for 2 players. You use only the cards included in the game, so no additional components are required. Anyone could use these rules with any version of the game.
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Publisher blurb
Including a total of 180 plastic figures and dozens of unit types, Starcraft: The Board Game features an innovative modular board of varying sizes, which guarantees a new experience each and every game. An exciting card driven combat system allows players to modify and upgrade their faction with a wealth of powerful technologies. Players can unleash a Zergling rush, use powerful Protoss shields to halt an enemy invasion, or even send cloaked Ghosts out to guide nuclear missiles to their target.
Description
In StarCraft: The Board Game, players battle for galactic domination on a dynamic board of interconnected planets. Planetary setup is already part of the game - every player gets two planets to place, and will place their starting base on one of them. Planets are connected with direct and "Z-Axis" connections that are placed during setup, but can sometimes later be modified during the game, and movement is only possible within planets and through those connections (by means of purpose-built transports).
Each player controls a faction out of six, that belongs to one race out of three - Humans, Zerg, and Protoss. Each faction has a unique special victory condition, but all factions can also win through victory points that are gained by controlling special areas on some of the planets. Players build units and base upgrades with the resources they gather from the planetary areas that they control, and gain access to additional unit types through those upgrades.
Each turn is subdivided into first a planning phase, then an execution phase, and finally a regrouping phase (used for cleanup). In the planning phase, players take turns playing a number of order tokens into stacks on each planet, with orders placed later obstructing the ones that were placed before them. This allows players to set up combos of their own, but also to obstruct plans of other players. In the execution phase then, players take turns again, and when a player's turn comes up he can choose one of his order tokens on top of any stack and execute that one - if all of their orders are obstructed, they skip their action and draw an event card instead. The execution phase isn't over until all players executed all of their orders. Possible orders are Build (used for building both units and buildings), Mobilize (used for moving units and attacking enemies) and Research (see below), and orders can always be Standard Orders or Special Orders, with the special orders having prerequisites but stronger effects.
Players can also research new technologies and thus improve their combat deck in a precursor to more recent deck building mechanisms. Each player is given a combat deck unique for their race at the start of the game, and when they research new technologies then matching cards are added to that deck. This allows the players to customize what cards they will draw; when the last card of the deck is drawn, the deck is reshuffled. Most cards remain in the combat deck once researched, though some researched technologies add effects that are always in play, while some particularly strong combat cards are discarded after one use.
"Reimplements"
StarCraft (video game)
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Madeira is an island officially discovered early in the 15th century by Portuguese seafarers. Madeira, the Portuguese word for wood, refers to the dense forest that covered its wild, fertile landscape. This, and its strategic position far into the Atlantic Ocean made the island one of the most significant Portuguese discoveries. Madeira served as a “laboratory” for what would become the Portuguese Empire.
Wheat plantations were the first means for survival on the island. After that, when D. Henrique decided to increase the economy of the Empire, sugar became the core business of Madeira. Once sugar started coming from other places in the world, such as Africa and Brazil, profits from sugar were no longer enough, and production of the very famous Madeira wine became the most important economic product of the island.
Players try to adapt themselves to these constraints, working to find better fields for farming the right goods and for obtaining precious wood, essential for erecting new structures in the cities and for building ships. In turn, the ships are crucial for trading in foreign markets, as well as for taking part in new expeditions to discover other countries.
Madeira has been established just as it was in the original administrative division of the island under 3 captaincies (Funchal, Machico, and Porto Santo), where the ultimate goal is to develop the Island, gaining the most prestige under and for the Portuguese Crown.
The Crown of Portugal has a series of requests regarding expeditions, urbanization, opening trade routes, increasing wealth, and controlling the guilds on the islands. Three times during the game, the players gain prestige for fulfilling certain requests by the Crown. At two other times, the Crown requests that the islands change the focus of their agriculture due to the changes in the world.
Players must carefully choose the correct timing to show their achievements. Too early and you don’t gain as much prestige, too late and you risk someone else stealing the best opportunities. Will you have what it takes to excel in all of these endeavors?
Beware, wheat may become scarce, money is never enough, the population is hungry, and the shadow of piracy looms large….
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Aeon Trespass: Odyssey is a 1-4 player campaign game about adventures, exploration and fierce battles with giant monsters. It’s a co-operative, choice-driven boardgame experience played over multiple sessions. Set in an alternate Antiquity, where a reality-shattering cataclysm killed the Olympian gods and unleashed the otherworldly Primordials, Aeon Trespass: Odyssey places the players in the roles of Argonauts, the only people who can fight off the darkness and make things right.
Take control of the Argo and its crew, train them and send them on adventures into the dangerous and mysterious lands of Ancient Greece (and beyond...). Learn the world's secrets and create new technologies that will give you an edge in combat - and outside of it. Manage your resources and develop your base of operations. Build new Facilities, craft new Weapons and equipment. Gather allies and forge political alliances with the world’s factions. And, most important of all, tame the Titans, arm them, evolve them and ride them to battle with the fearsome Primordials.
You win by defeating the main villains or solving a crisis, you lose if your Argonauts die, your crew abandons you, your ship gets destroyed, the villains fulfill their plot or time runs out. There are many ways to lose, but only a handful paths to victory.
During Battles, 1 to 4 players must cooperate to defeat 1 giant Primordial boss-type monster controlled by a sophisticated AI system. Outside of Battles, Aeon Trespass: Odyssey uses choice chain and choice matrix mechanics to track your decisions throughout the game. Those decisions matter and will have a drastic impact on all future play sessions, campaigns and playthroughs.
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Play as trolls rebuilding your abandoned kingdom under the mountain in In the Hall of the Mountain King. With muscle and magic, you'll unearth riches, dig out collapsed tunnels, and carve out great halls as you raise the toppled statues of your ancestors to their places of honor at the heart of the mountain. Gameplay is driven by the innovative cascading production system. Timing and tactics are key as you work to restore your home to its former glory and win the crown!
Working on the same game board with the other players (but beginning at your own entrance), you'll dig a competing network of tunnels by spending increasingly valuable materials to lay polyomino tiles onto the map. You want to extend your tunnels to connect with buried gold and materials, with workshop locations that can transform resources, and especially with toppled statues. Statues are key to scoring, and you'll spend carts to move them through the tunnels to prime scoring locations near the heart of the mountain.
A major aspect of the game is the cascading production. You begin with a line of four trolls, and every troll shows the combination of resources - gold, stone, iron, marble, carts, runes, and hammers - that it produces. When a new troll is hired, place it above two other trolls, forming a "pyramid". The new troll activates, gaining its resources, and any trolls beneath it ALSO activate, gaining any resources that they have room to carry. In this way as you hire more trolls, you gain bigger and bigger windfalls of resources as the end of the game nears. The timing of your hiring turns versus your building turns is important as you try to maximize your cascades while making sure you get the trolls you want from the shared market and also stay competitive on the map.
The game ends shortly after the last player hires their sixth troll, then the player with the most honor (earned for digging tunnels of increasing quality, for excavating great halls, and for moving statues closer to the heart of the mountain, especially onto matching pedestals) is crowned the Mountain King and wins!
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Based on the popular game Time's Up!, Time's Up: Title Recall challenges players to guess the titles of books, films, songs, and more. Players try to get their teammates to guess the same set of titles over three rounds. In each round, one member of a team tries to get their teammates to guess as many titles as possible in 30 seconds. In round 1, almost any kind of clue is allowed. In round 2, no more than one word can be used in each clue (but unlimited sounds and gestures are permitted.) In round 3, no words are allowed at all.
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DVONN is played on an elongated hexagonal board, with 23 white, 23 black and 3 red DVONN-pieces. In the beginning the board is empty. The players place the pieces on empty spaces of the board, without restrictions. They place the DVONN-pieces first and their own pieces next. Then they start stacking pieces on top of each other. A single piece may be moved 1 space in any direction, a stack of two pieces may be moved two spaces, etc. A stack must always be moved as a whole and a move must always end on top of another piece or stack. If pieces or stacks lose contact with the DVONN-pieces, they must be removed from the board. The game ends when no more moves can be made. The players put the stacks they control on top of each other and the one with the highest stack is the winner.
This game is part of project GIPF.
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A mad scientist holds the world hostage with his terrifying inventions. An alien warlord from a far away galaxy brings his limitless army of bizarre minions to conquer the planet. A giant rampaging robot cuts a swath of destruction across the coast, destroying major population centers. And who will stand in their way? A team of heroes, all with impressive powers and abilities stand between the world and the forces of evil. Will you help them? Answer the call to protect the multiverse!
Sentinels of the Multiverse is a cooperative, fixed-deck card game with a comic book flavor. Each player plays as one of ten heroes, against one of four villains, and the battle takes place in one of four different dynamic environments.
Each player, after selecting one of the heroes, plays a deck of 40 cards against the villain and environment decks, which "play themselves", requiring the players to put the top card of the appropriate deck into play on the villain and environment turns. On each player's turn, they may play a card from their hand, use a power printed on one of their cards in play, and draw a card from their deck. Each round starts with the villain turn, continues clockwise around the table, then concludes with the environment turn. Each villain has various advantages, such as starting with certain cards in play, as specified by the villain character card. Play continues until the heroes reduce the villain to 0 or fewer HP, or until the villain defeats the heroes, either via a win condition or by reducing all the heroes to 0 or fewer HP.
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From Z-Man Games Webpage:
In Tales of the Arabian Nights, you are the hero or heroine in a story of adventure and wonder just like those told by Scheherazade to her spellbound sultan! You will travel the land seeking your own destiny and fortune. You will learn stories and gain wisdom to share with others. Will you be the first to fulfill your destiny? The next Tale is yours to tell! There is, of course, a winner in Tales of the Arabian Nights, but the point of the game is less to see who wins and more to enjoy the unfolding and telling of a great story!
In this new edition of the groundbreaking storytelling game, you enter the lands of the Arabian Nights alongside Sindbad, Ali Baba, and the other legendary heroes of the tales. Travel the world encountering imprisoned princesses, powerful 'efreets, evil viziers, and such marvels as the Magnetic Mountain and the fabled Elephant's Graveyard.
Choose your actions carefully and the skills you possess will reward you: become beloved, wealthy, mighty - even become sultan of a great land. Choose foolishly, however, and become a beggar, or be cursed with a beast's form or become insane from terror! YOU will bring to life the stories of the inestimable Book of Tales in this vastly replayable board game with over 2002 tales that will challenge, amuse, astound and spellbind you for years to come.
Re-implements:
Tales of the Arabian Nights
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Space Empires is a game in the finest tradition of 4X space games - eXplore, eXpand, eXploit, and eXterminate. Each player builds up a space empire and uses it to conquer the other players. Exploration on the mounted map is simple for players (and dangerous for their ships), revealing different space terrain that affects movement and combat.
Space Empires was developed to keep a rich theme without overcomplicated rules. The game includes carriers and fighters, mines, cloaking, a very large technology tree, fifteen ship classes, merchant shipping, colonization, mining, terraforming, bases, shipyards, black holes, warp points, and non-player aliens. Yet the rules are short and intuitive: The basic rules are 8 pages long and increase to 11 pages in length when the advanced rules are included.
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Unmatched Adventures: Tales to Amaze, which is themed around the pulp adventures, tall tales, and local legends of the mid-20th century, gives you a whole new way to play Unmatched.
In the game, players work together to defeat one of two villains: Mothman or the Martian Invader. Each villain has a unique battlefield with unique objectives. If the villain completes their objective (or defeats the heroes), the players lose. The villains are aided by a number of possible minions: Jersey Devil, Ant Queen, Loveland Frog, The Blob, Tarantula, and Skunk Ape. The enemies use special action cards and a simple targeting scheme to control their movement and attacks.
The set comes with four new heroes: Nikola Tesla discharges his electrified coils to power up his effects; Annie Christmas gets stronger when she's fighting from behind; The Golden Bat, the world's first superhero, has a variety of powerful effects; and Dr. Jill Trent, Science Sleuth, calls on a collection of gizmos.
Keeping to the Unmatched brand, you may use heroes from other Unmatched sets in Unmatched Adventures, and you can use the included heroes and battlefields to play competitive Unmatched.
-description from the publisher
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Your goal in Draftosaurus is to have the dino park most likely to attract visitors. To do so, you have to draft dino meeples and place them in pens that have some placement restrictions. Each turn, one of the players roll a die and this adds a constraint to which pens any other player can add their dinosaur.
Draftosaurus is a quick and light drafting game in which you don't have a hand of cards that you pass around (after selecting one), but a bunch of dino meeples in the palm of your hand.
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Horizons of Spirit Island features the core mechanisms of Spirit Island, but features a new double-sided game board with a streamlined set-up, punchboard components, and five new Spirits designed to be ideal for those playing a Spirit Island game for the first time. These new Spirits are compatible with all existing Spirit Island components, but to play with expansions like Jagged Earth, you would need a copy of Spirit Island itself.
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Carcassonne: Hunters and Gatherers is a standalone game in the Carcassonne series set in the stone age.
As in other Carcassonne games, players take turns placing tiles to create the landscape and placing meeples to score points from the map they're creating. The player with the most points at the end of the game wins.
Instead of cities, roads, and farms, Carcassonne: Hunters and Gatherers has forests, rivers, lakes, and meadows. Players' meeples can represent hunters (when placed in the meadows), gatherers (in a forest), or fishermen (on a river segment). They also have huts, which can be placed on rivers or lakes to get fish from the entire river system.
It includes many of the familiar mechanics from Carcassonne with a few new rules, including:
- A player who completes a forest with a gold nugget in it gets to immediately draw and place 1 of 12 bonus (menhir) tiles.
- A meadow is worth 2 points for every animal in it, except tigers, which negate certain other animals.
- A river segment is worth the number of tiles in the segment plus the number of fish in the lakes at each end.
- A fishing hut scores at the end of the game and is worth the number of fish in all the lakes connected by rivers.
The Devir edition includes (the relevant part of) the Carcassonne: King & Scout expansion
In the 2020 edition
- Some of The Scout special tiles are transformed into menhir tiles of which there are more now.
- A deer scores 1 point, an aurochs 2 points and a mammoth 3 points on meadows.
- Rivers score for fish in the river segments as well, not only the fish in the lakes at each end. Fishing huts likewise.
- Players each get 3 huts instead of just 2.
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Plunge into the modern era, where our planet's vast interconnected ocean scape is one of the last frontiers to discover and explore. Experience a deep new ever-changing adventure in this followup to the smash hit Endeavor: Age of Sail!
In Endeavor: Deep Sea, you head an independent research institute with the goal of developing sustainable projects and preserving the fragile balance of marine life. Throughout the game, you’ll recruit field experts and use their abilities to explore new locations, research dive sites, publish critical ecological papers, and launch conservation efforts.
Expand your expertise, develop your team, and learn as much as possible about the sea. The action your institute takes now, could mean a healthy ocean and a sustainable future for the planet.
Endeavor: Deep Sea is designed by Jarratt Gray and Carl de Visser, the same creative team behind the smash hit Endeavor: Age of Sail and Endeavor. This edition is set in a new era of nautical discovery, but uses streamlined rules which will be familiar to fans of the original game.
-description from the publisher
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Score the most victory points by delivering potions via Broom Service throughout the magical realm.
Broom Service is a card-based game that combines luck and skill and balances timely bluffing with clever hand management.
Remake of award-winning Witch's Brew:
New theme! Now with 3 types of roles: witches, druids, and gatherers.
Drizzelda, the weather fairy, helps chase away the bad weather.
New illustrations and game pieces.
Same style of play, and by the same game designer as Witch’s Brew.
New version also includes a 2-player version.
The game is played over 7 rounds, with 4 turns per round. Each round, players simultaneously select 4 of their 10 role cards, and then they take turns playing one role at a time. Each role has a brave action and a cowardly action; the brave action is stronger, but riskier, as another player could steal the action from you later; the cowardly action is safer, but not as robust. How well can you bluff your opponents?
Use the gatherer roles to collect ingredients to make potions, the witch roles to zoom around on your broom to different areas, and the witch or druid roles to deliver the potions, collecting victory points as you go. Chase away lightning clouds with the help of the weather fairy, and keep an eye on the event cards that change game play, one event per round.
The winner is the player with the most victory points after all 7 rounds are complete and end-of-game bonus points have been awarded.
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American baseball was on its last legs as a spectator sport. Football had become the predominant national pastime - that is until the year 2032, the year baseball decided to revolutionize the game and regain the throne!
Starting in 2032, baseball games were shortened to six innings. Pitchers were encouraged to have bionic arm implants to improve their pitching. These cyborgs, or 'Borgs as they're affectionately known, were immediately popular and soon ruled the league. In 2041, robotic players were introduced to get more offense back into the game. These robots were similar to designated hitters in that they were used only to bat and did not field. However, recent reports indicate fielding 'Bots are on the way.
Now in 2045, human players are still in the game and known as Naturals. They are the best fielders by far but are sorely challenged when it comes to hitting and pitching. Some Naturals have learned to hit by swinging before the pitcher starts his windup, which gives them a chance to hit the ball. Although it's hard for a Natural to get into the league, those who do are popular. Many Naturals have named themselves after the great players of pre-2032 baseball by taking a first and last name borrowed from different star players of the past. The fans love them, and their presence on the team ensures good revenue!
The stage is now set! The fans are energized and root fanatically for their new favorites, be they 'Bots, 'Borgs or Naturals!
Baseball Highlights: 2045 is like watching TV highlights of early 21st-century baseball games, with the gameplay being full of theme with no outs or innings and without bogging down in a play-by-play baseball simulation. In this quick and interactive game, two players build their teams as they play, combining both strategy (building your team) and tactics (playing the game) without any of the downtime. During each "mini-game", each player alternates playing six cards to simulate a full game's highlights. The mini-game includes defensive and offensive actions, and your single card play may include elements of defensive and/or offensive plays. Do you try to thwart your opponent's pending hits, put up strong offensive action of your own, or use your better players to do both? Players buy new free agents after each mini-game to improve their roster, and the team who wins the most mini-games in the series is the champ!
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Description from the publisher:
Build up the most prestigious kingdom by claiming wheat fields, forests, lakes, grazing grounds, marshes, and mountains. Your knights will bring you riches in the form of coins - and if you make sure to expand the towns on your lands, you will make new buildings appear, giving you opportunities for new strategies. You may win the Queen's favors ... but always be aware of the dragon!
Queendomino is a game completely independent from Kingdomino, while offering a choice of more complex challenges. Two to four players can play Queendomino independently, but also in connection with Kingdomino, allowing for games with 7x7 grids for four players, or for up to six players if you stick to 5x5 grids.
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You are Taylor Minde, rookie pilot of the Force’s Outer Rim. After a crucial battle you are stranded far away from your fleet, lost and alone. With resources running low you jump through warp gate after warp gate hoping to find the right combination home.
But home is not what you find. The warp takes you further out in the galaxy than the Force has ever gone. You are deep behind enemy lines and find yourself on the edge of a blackhole... and on the doorstep of the enemy’s mighty mothership.
You have a moment of bravery and approach the enemy’s fleet. Just maybe you can get through them and destroy the mothership... but before you have a chance to react the enemy is already upon you. Lasers fire. Photon cannons pierce through the blackness. A moment later your shields are gone, your laser battery empty, and your hull damaged. Your powerless ship splits apart as you fall from the enemy and into the black hole below.
Just as your ship crests gravity’s edge you and infinite blackness takes hold... you are back where you started. The enemy fleet is before you. The mothership looming in the distance. And, most importantly, your laser battery is full. You have a second chance at the edge of space and now you know what’s coming...
Warp’s Edge is a solo bag-building game of space combat. Pilot one of four starfighters, which each have their own unique weapon loadouts. You’ll be facing off against one of five alien motherships and its accompanying fleet. Every matchup offers a different challenge, pushing you toward new strategies and tactics. You have a limited number of warps to succeed, so choose wisely as you improve your arsenal and learn new skills!
In the box you will also find a 28-page choose-your-path storybook, Singularity, written by Banana Chan. This sets the stage for the events of the game and reveals Taylor’s backstory. You can even customize the game setup based on the narrative choices you make!
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Pax Porfiriana – Latin for "The Porfirian Peace" – refers to the 33-year reign of dictator Porfirio Díaz, who ruled Mexico with an iron hand until toppled by the 1910 Revolution.
As a rich businessman (Hacendado) in the turbulent pre-revolutionary borderlands of the U.S. and Mexico, players compete to build business empires of ranches, mines, rails, troops, and banks while subverting opponents with bandidos, Native Americans, and lawsuits. Each turn goes as follows:
1. Action Phase: Perform three actions, such as play new cards, get new cards from the market, speculate on cards in the market, buy land, or redeploy troops.
2. Discard Headlines: Remove any Headlines (i.e. cards with the Bull-Bear icon) that have reached the leftmost position in the Market.
3. Restore Market: Restore the Market to twelve cards.
4. Income Phase: Collect one gold per Income, Extortion, and Connection Cube in play. If Depression, pay one gold for each card in play (includes Partners and Enterprises in your Row, and all of your Troops).
Four "scoring" cards (Toppling) are in the game and their effect depends on the current form of government. The government can change if troops are played and as a result of other cards. The form of government also influences different production values of the game, such as how much mines produce. Players win by toppling Díaz, either by coup, succession, revolution, or annexation of Mexico by the U.S. If Díaz remains firmly seated at the end of the game, then the player with the most gold wins.
Pax Porfiriana includes 220 cards, but only fifty cards (along with ten for each player) are used in a game, so no two games will be the same!
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In Colosseum each player is a Roman impresario - producing great spectacles in his or her arena in the hopes of attracting the most spectators. Players earn wealth and glory for each event run, using it to create ever more ambitious events. They will need to improve their arena, find the best performers, lure the Emperor and his nobles, and manage assets for long-term success to be granted the title of Grand Impresario, with tales of your extraordinary spectacles acclaimed throughout the empire.
As commanded by the Emperor, the greatest celebration in Roman history has continued unabated for 99 days. All of Rome has borne witness to the grandest spectacles the empire has ever seen- all to commemorate the opening of the Amphitheatrum Flavium, the Colosseum.
Tens of thousands have flocked to the city to experience the sight of a hundred gladiators in battle...rare and exotic animals prowling the arena floor...and to hear and see the greatest musicians and entertainers from throughout the empire. But these events have only been a prelude to today - the closing finale! As a master impresario you have prepared for this moment your entire life. Titus himself has taken his seat in the Emperor’s Loge. At the drop of his hand, the final spectacle will begin. Your moment in the sun has come...
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Nexus Ops is a light-medium science fiction war game. The game boasts a hexagonal board that is set up differently every time, as well as (in the Avalon Hill edition) cool "glow" miniatures and lots of combat. Players control competing futuristic corporations that battle each other for control of the moon's Rubium Ore. By winning battles and fulfilling Secret Missions, you can obtain victory points.
Units are composed of various alien races and have stats similar to those used in the Axis & Allies series. Combat is also similar. Players who lose battles are compensated with Energize cards which grant them special powers later. Players can also obtain Energize cards by controlling the Monolith, a raised structure in the center of the grid. The first person to reach the required number of victory points wins the game.
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Move your knights, erect buildings, and go crusading to spread the influence of your Order. When the Orders get too strong, King Philip will become nervous and disband all Templar orders, ending the game.
Crusaders: Thy Will Be Done uses a combination of rondel and mancala mechanisms. Each player has their own rondel, which they can upgrade over the course of the game, that controls their action choices during the game. Your faction gives you a special power to control your rondel, and the buildings you erect will help you form a strategy.
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A forgotten evil stirs in the ancient land of Varisia. Dark magic once more thrums amid crumbling ruins, giants gather in titanic armies, cultists murder in the name of foul deities, and maniacal goblins plot a fiery end for the peaceful town of Sandpoint.
Launch a campaign to strike back against the evils plaguing Varisia with the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game: Rise of the Runelords - Base Set. This complete cooperative strategy card game pits 1 to 4 heroes against the traps, monsters, deadly magic, and despicable foes of the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game's award-winning Rise of the Runelords Adventure Path. In this game players take the part of a fantasy character such as a rogue or wizard, each with varying skills and proficiencies that are represented by the cards in their deck. The classic ability scores (Strength, Dexterity, etc.) are assigned with different sized dice. Players can acquire allies, spells, weapons, and other items. The goal is to find and defeat a villain before a certain number of turns pass, with the villain being represented by its own deck of cards complete with challenges and foes that must be overcome. Characters grow stronger after each game, adding unique gear and awesome magic to their decks, and gaining incredible powers, all of which they'll need to challenge greater threats in a complete Pathfinder Adventure Card Game Adventure Path.
The Pathfinder Adventure Card Game is an expandable game, with the first set containing nearly 500 cards. The Rise of the Runelords - Base Set supports 1 to 4 players; a 110-card Character Add-On Deck expands the possible number of players to 5 or 6 and adds more character options for any number of players. The game will be expanded with bimonthly 110-card adventure decks.
Errata: Early printings had the Loot card "Sihedron Medallion" listed as belonging to "B" (for Base Set). It is instead supposed to read "1" (for Burnt Offerings ). (It is unknown if this has been fixed in later printings)
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Boldly go where no one has gone before. In Star Trek: Ascendancy - a board game of exploration, expansion and conflict between the United Federation of Planets, the Klingon Empire, and the Romulan Star Empire - you control the great civilizations of the Galaxy, striking out from your home worlds to expand your influence and grow your civilization. Will you journey for peace and exploration, or will you travel the path of conquest and exploitation? Command starships, establish space lanes, construct starbases, and bring other systems under your banner. With more than 200 plastic miniatures and 30 star systems representing some of the Star Trek galaxy's most notable planets and locations, Star Trek: Ascendancy puts the fate of the galaxy in your hands.
The great unknown lies before you; with every turn is a new adventure as your ships explore new space systems, encounter new life forms and new civilizations, make wondrous discoveries, and face challenging obstacles, all drawn from the vast fifty year history of Star Trek. Will you brave the hazards of Rura Penthe to harvest vital resources, race to develop Sherman's Planet before your rivals stake their claim, or explore the mysteries of the Mutara Nebula on an ever-growing, adaptive map of the galaxy. With an infinite combination of planets and interstellar phenomena, no two games of Star Trek: Ascendancy will ever play the same!
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Dice Throne is a game of intriguing dice, tactical card play, powerful heroes, and unique abilities.
It's a fast-paced 2-6 player combat game (1v1, 2v2, 3v3, 2v2v2, or free-for-all). Select from a variety of heroes that play and feel completely distinct from one another. Attack opponents and activate abilities by rolling your hero's unique set of five dice. Accumulate combat points and spend them on cards that have a large range of effects, such as granting permanent hero upgrades, applying status effects, and manipulating dice directly (yours, your teammate's, or even your opponent's).
Let's take a look at a turn of a 1v1 game.
The game begins with 2 players selecting their heroes. Player One chooses Moon Elf and player two picks Barbarian. Each player begins the game with 50 HP (Health Points).
Player One (the Moon Elf) won the roll to go first. The Moon Elf draws their 4 starting game cards and begins the game with 1 CP (Combat Point).
Note- The player that wins the starting roll does not draw a card (above their starting hand of 4) or gain CP above their 1 starting CP.
The Moon Elf then checks for status effects (like poison, or Burn) to resolve.
The next phase is called Main Phase (1). This is where the Moon Elf player can upgrade their hero board with cards from their hands if they have enough CP to pay for the upgrades. They can also play any Main Phase Action cards (blue cards).
Then they enter the Offensive Roll Phase. The Moon Elf can take up to 3 roll attempts (with their 5 dice) to accomplish an action or attack from their hero board. After deciding on an action within the 3 roll attempts an action is declared.
Then the Defensive Roll Phase begins where the opponent (Barbarian) can use their defensive roll (as it appears on their hero board). The amount of damage or incoming status affects are resolved and that concludes the Defensive Roll Phase.
During Offensive and Defensive Roll Phase any player can play Roll Phase Action cards from their hand as long as they have the CP to pay for it.
The Moon Elf player enters their second Main Phase where they can do any final hero board upgrades or play blue Main Phase Action cards.
The Moon Elf then must discard any extra cards over 6 from their hand.
The Barbarian player begins his turn by drawing one additional card (over his starting hand of 4) and gaining one CP (Combat Point) for a total of 2.
The Barbarian then follows the same phases the Moon Elf.
The game alternates hero turns until one player is at 0 Health.
DiceThrone is for 2-6 players, ages 8+, and runs 20-30 minutes for a battle. With the ever expanding gallery of heroes the game feels fresh each time you jump in!
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In Roads & Boats, players start with a modest collection of donkeys, geese, boards, and stone. With these few materials, players work to develop their civilization. The emphasis in the game is logistical transport as you bring goods to producers to make new goods. But beware, the only thing you own is what is on your transporters, and anyone can use any production facility, or pick up any goods left behind.
In more detail, this massive set of pieces looks more like a modular game kit than anything else. You get a several small hexes in a number of colors for terrain type; hundreds of little counters for the commodities that are produced and the locations where they're produced; wooden disks for all of the donkeys, rafts, trucks, and other forms of transportation you can use; and a roll of acrylic with an erasable marker. The tiles are laid out in whatever scenario you wish to play, and then the clear plastic is taped over the top to secure the entire board. Roads and bridges are drawn on the plastic and chits are placed in the hexes to form the playing surface. The idea is that your transportation units (at first, a fleet of 3 donkeys) travel about and pick items that part produced. However, the only thing that you own is that which is carried by your transports. So you might have a nice, shiny, new truck factory or a gold-filled mine, but anyone can use it or take it, if they collect the necessary components and can transport them to the factory. The ultimate goal is to collect wealth, which is progressively more valuable and harder to manufacture: gold, coins, or stock certificates; and also contribute to the game timer in the form of monument blocks for victory points.
Third edition (and later) player transporter tokens were upgraded to shaped wooden tokens.
For its 20th Anniversary, Roads & Boats has an edition that contains the &cetera expansion: Roads & Boats: 20th Anniversary Edition
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“Natural disasters will soon be a thing of the past!” proclaimed Professor Sêni Lativ, Project Chief of Meteorological Manipulation at Lightning Technologies. Tests of his new invention, the Weather Machine, showed positive results. Visions of quelling floods, subduing cyclones, and ending droughts made him smile.
In Weather Machine, you are scientists on Prof. Lativ’s team, tampering with local weather: adjusting rainfall for farms, maintaining wind and clear skies for ecological energy sources, and tweaking the temperature for resorts and sporting events. The prototype is quite effective so far; however, a pattern has emerged, revealing a worrying side effect: Each use of the Weather Machine also alters the conditions elsewhere on the planet - a “butterfly effect”.
"We must build a new prototype,” he announces as the agents shoot him sidelong glances; “…but this time we’re going to get it right.” The agents silently give a single, crisp nod of confirmation. “The government is funding this, and we will succeed.” As Prof. Lativ explains the plan, the need to secure suppliers for sufficient bots and chemicals is clear. In addition to the materials, time is of the essence; you must be focused and efficient to have any hope of reining this growing global terror, Earth’s atmosphere before conditions are too harsh for Homo sapiens and other species.
Note: The solo mode is NOT included in the base game's box. It is part of Weather Machine: Upgrade Pack.
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The players are builders in Ancient Egypt, competing to get the most fame building different monuments requested by the Pharaoh (the Sphinx, the Obelisk, the Temple, and the Pyramid).
The game lasts 5 turns. In each turn, the players place their pawns on the board, along the banks of the Nile, getting the advantages shown on each square. On the right bank there are fixed squares where the players may get workers, improve their mercantile capabilities, influence the floods (and thus the fertility of the fields) and reserve the right to build the monuments (that are built only after all the placements are done). On the left bank the players may take cards that are deployed randomly on the 10 squares at the start of each turn; some of these cards are kept until the end of the game (cultivable fields, stone quarries, deities granting special advantages), while others are discarded after the use and offer multiple immediate advantages.
In Egizia, the twist on the worker placement mechanic is that the players must place their pawns following the course of the Nile, moving northwards (from the top to the bottom of the board, that is seen from the Mediterranean Sea). In this way, each placement not only blocks the opponents from choosing the same square (except monuments, where multiple players are always allowed), but also forces the player to place his remaining pawns only on the squares below the one he just occupied (note that "pawns" are placed, since "workers" are one of the resources of the game, like grain and stones).
When the placement phase is over, the workers of the players must be fed with the grain produced in the fields. The production of each field is based on the floods of the Nile, so some fields may not give grain each turn. If a player has not enough grain for all his workers, he has to buy it with Victory Points (the ratio is better for players with improved mercantile capabilities, recorded on a specific track on the board).
After that, stones are received from the owned quarries and used to build the monuments (if the right to do was reserved earlier) along with the workers.
When the game ends, the points scored during the game (mainly building the monuments) are added to the bonuses obtained fulfilling certain conditions on the Sphinx cards. Whoever has the highest total is the winner.
Online Play
Yucata (turn-based)
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Vinhos (Portuguese word for "wines") is a trading and economic game about wine making.
Despite its small size, Portugal is one of the world’s leading wine producers. Why not get to know the country around a table? Over six years of harvests, cultivate your vines, choose the best varieties, hire the best oenologists, take part in trade fairs, and show your opponents you are the best winemaker in the game.
The players, winemakers in Portugal, will develop their vineyards and produce wine to achieve maximum profit.
The object of the game is to produce quality wines that can be exchanged for money or victory points.
The best wines are then sent to a wine fair in order to achieve fame and win awards.
Awake your senses and have fun making and selling your own wine.
From back of Box Cover:
In Vinhos (a Portuguese word meaning “Wines”) you will play the role of wine producers in Portugal.
Over a period of 6 years, you will expand your business by establishing Estates in the different regions of Portugal, buying vineyards and building wineries. Skilled enologists will help you increase the quality of your wine, while top Wine Experts will enhance its features at the "Feira Nacional do Vinho Português", the Wine Tasting Fair.
Selling your wines to Portuguese local hangouts will establish a market presence for your company, help you secure the funds to expand your company, and to pay your enologists’ salaries.
But, as everyone knows, prestige cannot come from money alone. To ensure a good reputation on international markets you must meet the requirements of various Countries, by consistently exporting high-quality wines.
Periodically, a Wine Tasting Fair will be held. It is up to you to decide the best time to announce which wine you intend to present. The choice of the best wine by value and features is essential to the prestige of your company and will definitely make all the difference!
It is suggested that players do not play their first game with the maximum number of players.
Vinhos was previously known as Vinícola
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Detective: City of Angels, set in the dark and violent world of 1940s Los Angeles, is a game of mystery, deception, and investigation for 1–5 players. Most players will step into the shoes of LAPD homicide detectives, hungry for glory and willing to do whatever it takes to successfully close a case, even if that means intimidating suspects, concealing evidence, and hiring snitches to rat on their fellow detectives. One player, however, will take on the role of The Chisel, whose only goal is to stall and misdirect the detectives at every turn using bluffing, manipulation, and (often) outright lies.
Detective: CoA uses the innovative ARC (Adaptive Response Card) System to create the feel of interrogating a suspect. Suspects do not simply give paragraph-book responses; instead The Chisel carefully chooses how they will answer. When Billy O'Shea insists that the victim was a regular at Topsy's Nightclub, is he telling the truth or is The Chisel subtly leading the detectives toward a dead end that will cost them precious time? Detectives can challenge responses that they think are lies but at great risk: If they're wrong, The Chisel will acquire leverage over them, making the case that much harder to solve.
Detective: CoA includes separate, detailed casebooks for both the detectives and The Chisel. Each crime is a carefully constructed puzzle that can unfold in a variety of ways depending on how the detectives choose to pursue their investigations. As the detectives turn the city upside down, uncovering fresh evidence and "hot" leads, hidden suspects may be revealed and new lines of questioning will open up, creating a rich, story-driven experience.
Inspired by classic film noir like The Big Sleep, the works of James Ellroy (L.A. Confidential), and the video game L.A. Noire from Rockstar Games, Detective: City of Angels is a murder-mystery game unlike any other. Will one detective rise above the rest and close the case on L.A.'s latest high profile murder? Or will The Chisel sow enough doubt and confusion to prevent the detectives from solving the crime?
-description from the publisher
A "sleuth" mode allows 1 or more players to play fully cooperatively, solving the cases together.
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Triumph & Tragedy is a geopolitical strategy game for 3 players (also playable by 2) covering the competition for European supremacy during the period 1936-45 between Capitalism (the West), Communism (the Soviet Union) and Fascism (the Axis). It has diplomatic, economic, technological and military components, and can be won by gaining economic hegemony or technological supremacy (A-bomb), or by vanquishing a rival militarily.
The 22 x 34 area map covers Eurasia to India and the Urals, plus the Americas. Military units are 5/8" blocks, of 7 types (Infantry/Tank/Fortress/AirForce/Carrier/Fleet/Submarine), in 7 different colors (Germany/Italy/Russia/Britain/France/USA/Neutral). The mix of over 200 blocks allows great flexibility of force composition. There is a 55-card Action deck and a 55-card Investment deck, plus 30 Peace Dividend chits and 110 markers of various types.
The game starts in 1936, with all 3 Great Powers virtually disarmed: Germany has repudiated the Versailles Peace Treaty, initiating an arms race in Europe. With blocks, the nature of military buildups remain unknown to rivals unless/until military conflict breaks out. The game may end peacefully or there may be war. There are game sanctions for attacking neutral minors or declaring war on an opponent, and rewards for remaining peaceful (you get a Peace Dividend chit of value 0-2 for every year you remain at Peace).
You can win peacefully by:
• Economic Hegemony (total of Production + secret Peace Dividend values + Atomic Research is the greatest in 1945, or reaches 25 at any time) OR
• Technological Supremacy (build the A-bomb which takes 4 stages and be able to deliver it to a Main Capital).
If there is war, you can still win by either of the above methods (with extra Economic Hegemony victory points available), or by:
• Military Victory (capture TWO enemy capitals out of nine: each player controls three).
Economic production underlies all forms of power in the game. Production is the LEAST of controlled Population (cities), controlled Resources, and Industry (which starts low and can be built up with Investment cards), except that Resources can be ignored if at Peace.
Powers can spend their current economic Production on either:
• Military units (new 1-step units or additional steps on existing units), OR
• Action cards, which have Diplomatic values (to gain Population and Resources without conflict) and a Command value (to move military units), OR
• Investment cards, which have Technological values (to enhance unit abilities) and a Factory value (the only way to increase Industry levels).
Building a unit step or buying a card costs 1 Production. Simple. You can’t inspect cards bought until after you have spent all Production.
Initially, the Axis economy is Population/Resource limited, but ahead in [war] Industry, while the West and Russia are Industry-limited, with adequate empires of Population and Resources. Throttling/limiting rival economies by denial of Population/Resources is a key form of competition. In peacetime, this is primarily done via Diplomacy, committing Action cards to gain control of minor nations and their Population/Resources, or to deny or reduce Rival control of them. At war, this can be done more directly by military conquest on land, by Naval/Submarine blockade of trade routes at sea, and by Strategic Bombing of enemy Industry by air forces.
The early phase of the game tends to revolve around:
• Diplomatic infighting (using Action cards), to gain minor nations (Czech, Rumania, etc) for their Population and Resources, and
• Industrial buildup (via Investment cards), with
• Military buildups (with the nature of forces being built being unknown to opponents),
• Technology advancement (also via Investment cards), and some
• Military operations (using Action cards for Command), which can include Violating (attacking) neutral minors to gain Population/Resources when Diplomacy fails.
If the game continues peacefully due to imposing defenses or player inclination, pressure builds as players approach a Production of 20, as secret Peace Dividend chits may take someone over the 25 Victory threshold. Or players may succeed in developing the Atomic Bomb and steal a victory that way.
At some point, however, one Power (seeing opportunity or necessity) may Declare War on another. The victim gets immediate economic benefits in reaction, but military reality comes to the forefront from this point onward. The third party may well continue its economic development in peace. Or not.
Unit movement is by Command card, which specifies a Command Priority letter that determines order of movement/combat and a Command Value number that determines the maximum number of units that can be moved. Command cards are only valid during one specified Season (Spring/Summer/Fall), so a variety of Command cards in one’s hand is necessary for a Power to be able to move in every Season. But HandSizes are limited, so each player must balance competing demands for card resources with military security.
Combat occurs when rival units occupy the same area, and is executed by units firing in order by Type (defenders firing first amongst equal types), rolling dice for hits. Units have different Firepowers (hit values) depending on the Class of unit they are targeting (ground, naval, air, sub). Land combat is one round per Season while sea battles are fought to a conclusion. Ground units without a Supply line lose 1 step per Season and cannot build (except Fortress units which are immune to both effects but cannot move).
Triumph & Tragedy is a true three-sided game: there is no requirement that the West and Russia be on the same side (and in fact there are valid reasons to attack each other), and only ONE player can win the game. Table talk is allowed (and encouraged) but agreements are not enforceable. Alliances are shifting and co-operation is undependable. The game can continue as an economic battle of attrition or a sudden military explosion can change everything. There is immense replayability as players can pursue dominance in Europe via land, sea or air military superiority, technological supremacy, or economic hegemony without rivals realizing their strategy until it is TOO LATE! It is a highly interactive, tense, fast-moving game with little downtime between player turns, covering THE crucial geopolitical decade of the 20th century in 4-6 hours.
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As new villains appear to lay claim to the world of Indines, new heroes rise to challenge them. BattleCON: Devastation of Indines puts you in control of 30 mighty heroes and deadly villains to decide the fate of the world.
BattleCON: Devastation of Indines is a standalone dueling card game designed for head-to-head and team play. Each player selects a character who uses a unique gameplay mechanism to give them an edge in combat. Take control of guitar-playing summoner, a pair of tag-teaming werewolves, a prodigal paladin, a genius artificer, and more! Each character's play style requires new strategies, but uses the same foundational tactics, making a new character easy to learn, but challenging to master.
Players move along a seven-space-long board, trading blows and attempting to strike the opponent, using attacks formed by combining a character's unique styles and abilities with a set of basic cards that all characters share. The last player standing wins!
BattleCON: Devastation of Indines can be played on its own or combined with BattleCON: War of Indines to create an even greater pool of characters and play variants.
Included with the game: BattleQUEST Guide
The BattleQUEST Dungeon Guide contains six adventures (3 solo and 3 cooperative) for players. Using BattleQUEST, players can play alone or cooperatively against automated enemies in an attempt to defeat the final boss and claim victory!
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Unlock! Heroic Adventures features three "escape room" scenarios that you can play on your tabletop.
Unlock! is a cooperative card game inspired by escape rooms that uses a simple system which allows you to search scenes, combine objects, and solve riddles. Play Unlock! to embark on great adventures, while seated at a table using only cards and a companion app that can provide clues, check codes, monitor time remaining, etc. The three scenarios are...
"Sherlock Holmes" - The master detective faces a most bizarre affair and could use your assistance as he pursues his investigation.
"In Pursuit of the White Rabbit" - Discover Wonderland and its strange characters, helping Alice to escape in time.
"Insert Coin" - Complete the levels of a virtual adventure, and avoid "Game Over" to escape!
Note: All three of these have been released separately in the German market in addition to the box set.
Sherlock Holmes: Der scharlachrote Faden, Hinunter in den Kaninchenbau and Insert Coin
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News from the depths! The AquaSphere is a research facility stationed deep below the ocean's surface, and your skilled team - consisting of an engineer, a scientist, reprogrammable bots, and exploratory submarines - is trying to gather as much data as possible.
The game board in AquaSphere has two main areas: A research station comprising six sectors in which your scientist conducts experiments and a headquarters where your engineer supervises preparation of the bots. During each of the four game rounds, you take several turns, and on each turn you either:
Use your engineer in the headquarters to program a bot; each round you can choose from three of the seven actions.
Have your scientist bring a bot to a sector to perform an action.
Through actions such as improving your lab, sending out submarines, collecting crystals, and examining octopuses, you expand the abilities of your team or gather knowledge points, which are necessary to win. Additional challenges result from the limited size of your lab, which is your personal stock; you can increase the size of your lab, which makes life easier, but this costs valuable time.
AquaSphere is a challenging game of strategy and tactics with different paths to victory that requires planning in advance as well as skillful use of short-term opportunities.
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Tobago is an adventure game in which the players use representations of treasure maps to locate unknown treasures. During the game, more and more information about the location of a treasure is revealed and its possible locations are gradually narrowed down. When the location of one of the treasures is finally revealed players try to reach it as quickly as possible to secure the findings. The more clues you have provided, the more of a stake you will have in the loot.
Players can carefully play their clues and use bonus-action gems to influence where and when the treasure is found in order to ensure a more favourable outcome when the loot is finally 'dug up' and shared.
The game features a 3 piece, double-sided, modular game board which can be rearranged to create 32 possible island arrangements.
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Welcome back to the palace of Sintra! King Manuel I has commissioned the best garden designers of Portugal to construct the most extraordinary garden for his wife, Queen Maria of Aragon.
In Azul: Queen's Garden, players are tasked with arranging a magnificent garden for the King's lovely wife by arranging beautiful plants, trees, and ornamental features.
Using an innovative drafting mechanism, the signature of the Azul series, players must carefully select colorful tiles to decorate their garden. Only the most incredible garden designers will flourish and win the Queen's blessing.
-description from the publisher
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In 6 nimmt!, a.k.a. Category 5 and many other names, you want to score as few points as possible.
To play the game, you shuffle the 104 number cards, lay out four cards face-up to start the four rows, then deal ten cards to each player. Each turn, players simultaneously choose and reveal a card from their hand, then add the cards to the rows, with cards being placed in ascending order based on their number; specifically, each card is placed in the row that ends with the highest number that's below the card's number. When the sixth card is placed in a row, the owner of that card claims the other five cards and the sixth card becomes the first card in its row.
In addition to a number from 1 to 104, each card has a point value. After finishing ten rounds, players tally their score and see whether the game ends. (Category 5 ends when a player has a score greater than 74, for example, while 6 nimmt! ends when someone tops 66.) When this happens, the player with the fewest points wins!
6 nimmt! works with 2-10 players, and the dynamics of gameplay change the more players that you have. One variant for the game has you use 34 cards, 44 cards, 54 cards, etc. (instead of all 104 cards) when you have three, four, five, etc. players. This change allows you to know which cards are in play, thereby allowing you to track which cards have been played and (theoretically) make better choices as to which card to play when.
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Life in the forest is a lot of fun, at least while the sun is shining and the leaves are on the trees. Those days don’t last forever though, and long before the weather starts to change, the wise animals start to harvest for the long cold winter ahead. You will spend many months tucked into your burrow and you want to make it as cozy as possible. A nice bowl of soup, a comfortable rocking chair, and some toys and games will go a long way to make those dark winter days pass by quickly.
In Creature Comforts, you spend the Spring, Summer, and Fall gathering different goods from the forest and spending them to collect items that will make your home more inviting while the world outside is covered in a layer of snow. Each round you send family members out to various locations in an attempt to gain supplies. If they fall short of their goal, they’ll learn a lesson and be better prepared next time. The family that has created the most comfortable den wins the game.
-description from the publisher
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In Project: ELITE, players are members of the ELITE squad on a mission to stop the invading forces of an alien empire. Stopping the invasion requires players to speedily roll dice as they take part in real-time, two-minute combat rounds against waves of terrifying enemies. Once the ELITE members take their turn, the aliens react. The game continues in this fast-yet-tactical series of rounds until the scenario is won or the aliens take the Earth.
This new edition of Project: ELITE will have new art, new miniatures, new card designs, new weapons, new ELITE members, new enemies, and more.
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The walls were lined with iron shelves, each metal slat overfilled with glass jars containing formaldehyde and grotesque curiosities within. Pristine brass tools and refined metals of a quality I had never before laid eyes upon were strewn across sturdy slabs of rock and wood, their edges sharp with use. However, my eyes were soon drawn to a sturdy writing desk, its mahogany eaves inlaid with thin strips of copper, the center of which contained a well-worn leather-bound book. My father's journal - passed down to me and representing years of knowledge and countless experiments. And inside that weathered tome, atop the pearly parchment oxidized yellow at its frayed edges, were the deliberate quill marks of a crazed genius outlining the ambitious project he could never complete in one lifetime - his masterwork.
Without realizing it, my hands were shaking as I clutched the book to my chest. At once, I felt an ownership and anxiety for the scientific sketches scrawled so eloquently on those frayed sheets. It was at that moment that I began my obsession: I would restore this laboratory to its former brilliance and dedicate my life to completing my father's work!
In My Father's Work, players are competing mad scientists entrusted with a page from their father's journal and a large estate in which to perform their devious experiments. Players earn points by completing experiments, aiding the town in its endeavors, upgrading their macabre estates, and hopefully completing their father's masterwork.
But they have to balance study and active experimentation because at the end of each generation, all of their experiments and resources are lost to time until their child begins again with only the "Journaled Knowledge and Estate" they have willed to them - and since the game is played over the course of three generations, it is inevitable that the players will rouse the townsfolk to form angry mobs or spiral into insanity from the ethically dubious works they have created. The player with the most points at the end of three generations wins and becomes the most revered, feared, ingenious scientist the world has ever known!
-description from the publisher
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You are a paperback author trying to finish novels for your editor. Complete Westerns, Science Fiction, Romance or even the rare Best-Seller. Live the dream - and maybe pay the bills.
Word-building meets deck-building in the unique game Paperback. Players start with a deck of letter cards and wild cards. Each hand they form words, and purchase more powerful letters based on how well their word scored. Most letters have abilities that activate when they are used in a word, such as drawing more cards or double letter score. Players buy wilds to gain victory points. Variant included for cooperative play.
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You are head of a family in an Italian city-state, a city run by a weak and corrupt court. You need to manipulate, bluff and bribe your way to power. Your object is to destroy the influence of all the other families, forcing them into exile. Only one family will survive...
In Coup, you want to be the last player with influence in the game, with influence being represented by face-down character cards in your playing area.
Each player starts the game with two coins and two influence – i.e., two face-down character cards; the fifteen card deck consists of three copies of five different characters, each with a unique set of powers:
Duke: Take three coins from the treasury. Block someone from taking foreign aid.
Assassin: Pay three coins and try to assassinate another player's character.
Contessa: Block an assassination attempt against yourself.
Captain: Take two coins from another player, or block someone from stealing coins from you.
Ambassador: Draw two character cards from the Court (the deck), choose which (if any) to exchange with your face-down characters, then return two. Block someone from stealing coins from you.
On your turn, you can take any of the actions listed above, regardless of which characters you actually have in front of you, or you can take one of three other actions:
Income: Take one coin from the treasury.
Foreign aid: Take two coins from the treasury.
Coup: Pay seven coins and launch a coup against an opponent, forcing that player to lose an influence. (If you have ten coins or more, you must take this action.)
When you take one of the character actions – whether actively on your turn, or defensively in response to someone else's action – that character's action automatically succeeds unless an opponent challenges you. In this case, if you can't (or don't) reveal the appropriate character, you lose an influence, turning one of your characters face-up. Face-up characters cannot be used, and if both of your characters are face-up, you're out of the game.
If you do have the character in question and choose to reveal it, the opponent loses an influence, then you shuffle that character into the deck and draw a new one, perhaps getting the same character again and perhaps not.
The last player to still have influence – that is, a face-down character – wins the game!
A new & optional character called the Inquisitor has been added (currently, the only English edition with the Inquisitor included is the Kickstarter Version from Indie Boards & Cards. Copies in stores may not be the Kickstarter versions and may only be the base game). The Inquisitor character cards may be used to replace the Ambassador cards.
Inquisitor: Draw one character card from the Court deck and choose whether or not to exchange it with one of your face-down characters. OR Force an opponent to show you one of their character cards (their choice which). If you wish it, you may then force them to draw a new card from the Court deck. They then shuffle the old card into the Court deck. Block someone from stealing coins from you.
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In the age of exploration the players arrive at a new home far away from their homeland. They try to settle the big island and each player tries to explore one part of it by placing landscape tiles. Landscape tiles grant resources and those are used to erect buildings with special abilities. Barriers on the island have to be removed in order to explore the island even further. Players build valuable statues and supply ships get them the supplies from the old world they need to be a successful settler on Cooper Island.
The special thing about Cooper Island is the way the players mark their victory points. They sail with ships around the island to show their progress. On their way around the island they find smaller islands inshore that grant valuable benefits. After five rounds, a game of Cooper Island ends and the player who developed the best and went on furthest with their ships will win.
•••
The second printing of the German and English versions of the game, along with the Spanish version of the game, include the Solo Against Cooper expansion that was originally available separately as a bonus item.
-description from the publisher
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In battle, there are no equals.
"They show extreme intelligence, even problem-solving intelligence. Especially the big one." He has hunted many a dangerous predator, but against a pack of raptors, is Robert Muldoon the hunter or the hunted? In Unmatched: Jurassic Park – InGen vs Raptors, these clever girls use their speed and agility to surround their prey, getting stronger when they attack together. InGen's Game Warden and his Security Team lay traps to slow their opponent down and attack from range in a matchup 65 million years in the making.
Unmatched is a highly asymmetrical miniature fighting game for two or four players. Each hero is represented by a unique deck designed to evoke their style and legend. Tactical movement and no-luck combat resolution create a unique play experience that rewards expertise, but just when you've mastered one set, new heroes arrive to provide all new match-ups.
-description from the publisher
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Description from the publisher:
In The Colonists, a.k.a. Die Kolonisten, each player is a mayor of a village and must develop their environment to gain room for new farmers, craftsmen, and citizens. The main goal of the game is full employment, so players must create new jobs, educate the people, and build new houses to increase their population. But resources are limited, and their storage leads to problems that players must deal with, while also not forgetting to upgrade their buildings. Players select actions by moving their mayor on a central board.
The Colonists is designed in different levels and scenarios, and even includes something akin to a tutorial, with the playing time varying between 30 minutes (for beginners) and 180 minutes (experts).
The Colonists FAQ
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In December 1956, paroled rebel Fidel Castro returned to Cuba to launch his revolution with virtually no political base and-after a disastrous initial encounter with government forces-a total of just 12 men. Two years later, through masterful propaganda and factional maneuver, Castro, his brother Raúl, and iconic revolutionary Che Guevara had united disparate guerrillas and exploited Cubans’ deep opposition to their dictator Fulgencio Batista y Zaldívar. Castro’s takeover of the country became a model for Leftist insurgency.
Castro’s Insurgency
Following up on GMT Games’ Andean Abyss about insurgency in modern Colombia, the next volume in the COIN Series, Cuba Libre, takes 1 to 4 players into the Cuban Revolution. Castro’s “26 July Movement” must expand from its bases in the Sierra Maestra mountains to fight its way to Havana. Meanwhile, anti-communist student groups, urban guerrillas, and expatriates try to de-stabilize the Batista regime from inside and out, while trying not to pave the way for a new dictatorship under Castro. Batista’s Government must maintain steam to counter the twin insurgency, while managing two benefactors: its fragile US Alliance and its corrupting Syndicate skim. And in the midst of the turmoil, Meyer Lansky and his Syndicate bosses will jockey to keep their Cuban gangster paradise alive.
COIN Series, Volume II
Cuba Libre will be easy to learn for Andean Abyss players-both volumes share the same innovative Series: COIN (GMT) system. Like Volume I, Cuba Libre is equally playable solitaire or by multiple players up to 4-and with a shorter time to completion than Andean Abyss. But Cuba Libre’s situation and strategic challenges will be new. A deck of 48 fresh events brings 1950s Cuba to life and includes …
• The Twelve: The first wave’s escape to the Sierra Maestra-inspirational legend or harbinger of defeat?
• El Che and Raúl: Brilliant in the field, or bungling hostage-takers?
• Operation Fisherman: Can the rebels pull off a second invasion?
• General Strike: Urban disruption or rebel embarrassment?
• Radio Rebelde: Are the masses tuning in, or just the Army direction finders?
• Pact of Caracas: Can the rebels unite?
• Armored Cars: Mobile striking power, but in whose hands?
• Rolando Masferrer: Brutal pro-government tactics-will they help or hurt?
• Fat Butcher: Can the Mob’s enforcer protect its casinos?
• Sinatra: Frankie’s Havana show a boom or bust, and who collects?
… and much more.
New twists match the COIN Series system to the situation in 1950s Cuba:
• It’s the insurgents who build lasting capabilities, while the Government is limited to fleeting bursts of momentum.
• The Syndicate’s bases are Casinos-expensive to build, but so important to Cuba no army will destroy them.
• Syndicate special activities include calling in the “muscle” of Government troops and police to protect mob assets.
• Stacks of Syndicate cash awaiting launder can fall in anyone’s hands-even the corrupt Government’s.
• The Government has its own terror tactic-reprisals-and can skim a portion of Syndicate profits.
• The eroding US Alliance with Batista overshadows all Government actions, not just through aid levels but also through the day-to-day ability of troops and police to operate.
• Even if Batista flees, the struggle may not end-the counterrevolutionary government may even become stronger!
Multiplayer, 2-Player, Solitaire
Cuba Libre provides up to 4 players with contrasting roles and overlapping victory conditions for rich diplomatic interaction. For 2- or 3-player games, players can represent alliances of factions, or the game system can control non-player factions . Or a single player as the Cuban Revolutionaries can attempt to topple Batista and seize power for themselves. The non-player sides will fight one another as well as the players, but too much power in the hands of any one of them will mean player defeat.
More COIN Series Volumes to Come
Andean Abyss and now Cuba Libre present a game system on modern insurgency readily adaptable to other conflicts, particularly those featuring the interaction of many sides (thus the name COunterINsurgency Series). A rich and under-represented history of guerrilla warfare beckons, as modern insurgency offers virtually unlimited, under-gamed topics for the COIN Series. Volume III is A Distant Plain—Insurgency in Afghanistan. Volume IV is Fire in the Lake—Insurgency in Vietnam.
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In Knarr, you are the leader of a band of Vikings that you send to new destinations. Manage the recruitment of your crew, and choose the best territories to explore. Depending on the destinations reached (for trading or influence) and the Vikings who accompany you, you can increase your reputation to gain even more wealth. Each turn, you:
Place a new member in your Viking crew, activate the effects of all of them with the same icon, and get another one from those available under the matching color on the central board, or
Explore new destinations, with the opportunity to trade with those places and get more gains or reputation.
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One-hundred years ago, The Infinity Engine was shattered and its reality-bending shards have destroyed most of the world. Now, it falls upon you to gather your forces, defeat your adversaries, and rebuild the Infinity Engine! Will you survive?
Shards of Infinity combines an unprecedented level of strategy and customization into one small box. Rather than competing for points, players must outlast their opponents and reduce their health to zero, which can be done in a number of ways. Each player starts the game with a basic deck of cards, and they can acquire new cards from a central display of six cards (as in Ascension) and add these new cards to their deck or use them immediately, depending on what they are.
Every character starts with fifty health and zero mastery. On each turn, you can spend one gem (a.k.a., money) to gain a mastery point. The more mastery you have, the more powerful your cards become. This lets even the weak cards in your starting deck become more powerful as the game progresses. If you reach a total of thirty mastery, you can activate your Infinity Shard, which instantly defeats your opponent.
As you acquire new cards, you can employ allies and champions to craft your strategy. Mercenary cards can be added to your deck as in other deck-building games or they can be played immediately from the center row for their ability; this adds even more drama to each player's turn as a key mercenary flip can alter the very outcome of the game!
Will you neutralize your opponents before they can fully master the Infinity Shard? With careful planning and aggressive gameplay, only one player can emerge the winner!
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Struggle of Empires recreates the various wars fought between the European powers as they attempted to become the dominant force in Europe and the rest of the world during the eighteenth century. Build armies and fleets, make alliances, establish colonies, improve your economy, and ultimately wage war to expand your empire. Be careful, though, as a profligate country can end up being consumed by revolution.
From the designer:
Think of Civilization/Age of Renaissance set in the 18th century. Players take the role of one of the major powers of the period and fight in both Europe and the colonies. The twist to the game is that in each war, players must form into two alliances. Once allied with a player, you cannot fight each other. This means that you do not have the backstabbing of Diplomacy to worry about; if he's allied, he's with you until the end of the war. This means that a player has to think carefully about who he wants to fight against and who he wants to ally with. Very often he will want to ally with his natural enemy and go to war with the guy who doesn't really want to fight him. On top of this, you have lots of improvement tiles that you buy to shape your empire, plus alliances with minor powers, and the possibility of going into revolution. Even though it is a big empire building game, it will scale from 3 to 7 players and has pretty simple rules.
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Distant islands with golden treasures - who hasn't dreamed of that?!
Silver & Gold combines simple rules, fast action, luck, and planning as players try to complete treasure map after treasure map, with the maps being printed on wipeable cards to allow for endless adventures...
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HeroQuest is Milton Bradley's approach to a Dungeons & Dragons-style adventure game. One player acts as game master, revealing the maze-like dungeon piecemeal as the players wander. Up to four other players take on a character (wizard, elf, dwarf, or barbarian) and venture forth into dungeons on fantasy quests. This game was made in cooperation with Games Workshop Ltd. who designed the miniatures and helped in many of the production details including background world and art in the rule book and scenario book. The HeroQuest series consists of the main game and a number of expansions.
The game is played on a grid representing the interior of a dungeon or castle, with walls segmenting the grid into rooms and corridors. One player assumes the role of the evil wizard character (Zargon/Morcar), and uses a map taken from the game's quest book to determine how the quest is to be played. The map details the placement of monsters, artifacts, and doors, as well as the overall quest the other players are embarking upon. During a Hero's turn, the player can move before or after performing one of the following actions: attack, cast a spell, search for traps and secret doors, search for treasure.
The game ends when every player has either returned to the spiral staircase, exited by a door, or been killed by the evil wizard. If the objective of the quest has not been accomplished then the evil wizard character wins. Items collected during the quest may be kept for future quests. The quests usually form part of a longer story, especially the quests which are part of the expansion packs.
Additional material, which is generally missed since it is not technically an expansion, was published in the HeroQuest: Adventure Design Kit which did feature one more Heroquest adventure: A Plague of Zombies.
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Automobile is a 3-5 player game that bears a modern setting when compared to most of Wallace’s releases. Players are competing in the U.S. auto industry in the early 20th century, purchasing factories that turn out low-, medium- and high-valued vehicles, starting with the 1893 Duryea and moving through history from there.
Each player knows a portion of the market demand each round and must make his purchasing and manufacturing decisions based on the information. Players can fund distributors across the country, but if they don’t supply distributors with vehicles to sell, they go bankrupt, taking your investment with them. Alternatively, players can drop the prices on their cars to move their market share, or even temporarily improve sales rates at the cost of research. Special action spaces are available that give a player a one-turn special ability with the actions provided by Ford, Durant, Kettering, and others somewhat related to their actual business history.
As newer models make their way onto the market, they sell at the expense of the older models. Older factories give inefficiency cubes as time passes, encouraging you to keep pace with technology.
To get money, you need to build cars with your factories, but if you build more than there is demand they lose not only the money spent to make them, but gain inefficiency cubes that hurt them for the rest of the game. Whoever manages their car factories the best over this 120-150 minute game will win.
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Another Reiner Knizia standby, this game plays very well with varying numbers of people. The object is to accrue the most points during three rounds, which you do by spending your points to bid on sets of cards. Each turn the current player turns up one to three cards for all the players to bid on, with the highest bid taking all cards. The cards denote a commodity type and quantity/value. The round ends when each player's ships are full, or the commodity card deck is exhausted. After each round, points are awarded to each player having the most of a given commodity, and to the one with the most valuable total "cargo load".
Part of the Knizia auction trilogy.
One of the Knizia Florentine auction games.
Related Games:
Medici vs Strozzi (two-player version)
Strozzi
Mercator, included in Neue Spiele im alten Rom (ancestor to Medici).
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Game play in Coloretto is simple: Either draw a card to play to a row, or take a row of cards to add them to your collection. A row can have at most three cards, so at some point everyone is forced to take a row. Once all the rows have been claimed, players start a new round, drawing or taking once again.
What are you trying to do with these cards? Collect huge sets - but only in three colors as every color beyond the third will cost you points. Jokers are highly-prized as they always match what you want, and +2 cards provide sure points, giving you a back-up plan if everything goes south in terms of the colors you're collecting.
Once only a few cards remain in the deck, the round ends and everyone tallies their score, choosing three colors of cards to score positively while any other colors count against you. Each color is scored using a triangular number system: the first card in a color is ±1 point, the second card is ±2 points, and so on. The player with the high score wins!
A two-player variant is included with some versions of Coloretto, with the only change being that rows can have only 1-3 cards placed in them, depending on the icons on the row cards.
Nordic version include extensions: 'Coloretto: The Extra Cards', 'Coloretto: The Limit Cards' and 'Coloretto for two players'.
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In Bullet♥︎, players take on the role of heroines in a far-flung future Earth and use their incredible powers to defend the Earth from evil - as well as from one another! Each heroine's powers manifest in a different form, with players controlling sound, paper, technology, gravity, triangles, and more!
Turns are simultaneous. Place bullets in your sight, with the color of bullet determining the column and the number how far down in that column it is placed. Use actions to manipulate bullets to form configurations matching your patterns. Using a pattern removes bullets from your sight and sends them to the opponent. When placing bullets, you skip over existing bullets in the column you place it in, with the bullet hitting you if it is placed off your sight. At the end of the turn, you'll gain even more bullets from the center bag as well as what the opponent sent, ensuring each new turn is more hectic than the last!
Choosing what order to place bullets, use actions, and use patterns in is key to staying alive as long as possible! Playing with the optional timer makes for even more intense play!
Bullet♥︎ includes eight heroines to play and four game modes:
Battle Royale Mode: 2–4 players can duel in a free-for-all puzzle battle that plays in real-time!
Boss Battle Mode: 1–4 players can combine forces to survive against a single boss; the game includes eight bosses, one corresponding to each heroine.
Score Attack Mode: A lone player can play for a high score against increasingly difficult odds.
Team Battle Mode: Two teams of two players battle it out! The last team standing wins.
-description from the publisher
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Game description from the publisher:
Return to a bustling Plymouth Harbor in 1572 as an aspiring Elizabethan captain making preparations for three exciting voyages to the Spanish Main in search of fame and fortune! As captains, players will have to plan their missions and provision their ships accordingly.
Francis Drake is a race to see who can set sail and reach the Spanish Main first. The riches of the Aztec and Inca Empires await these swashbuckling captains. Many tough decisions must be made before each voyage:
How many crew members, guns, and trade goods will be needed?
What supplies will be needed to reach deep into the Caribbean?
Will a stronger galleon be needed to attack the treasure fleets?
Can special charts from the Spanish Admiral and Governor help?
Will the Queen or rich investors back the voyage?
What information can the informer give?
Will Drake himself be available to guide the voyage?
Who will get the use of the Golden Hind?
Each new voyage has its own challenges to overcome, but the captured gold, silver, and jewels should greatly please the Queen. Get ready for the voyage of a lifetime!
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October 1888: During the construction of the Metropolitan Police headquarters near Whitehall, which would later be known as Scotland Yard, the remains of a body were found. In September, a severed arm had already been discovered in the muddy shore of the River Thames.
There is another murderer roaming the streets of London in Whitehall, amusing himself by spreading the pieces of a poor woman around Whitehall, like some kind of macabre treasure hunt. The identity of this monster and his unfortunate victim are a mystery, the Whitehall Mystery.
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This sequel to the Zombicide: Black Plague will bring players back into a world of deadly medieval fantasy, this time filled with infected orcs and goblins who will put survivors to the ultimate test. This green menace is not only stronger than their human counterparts, but they also tend to gather into massive hordes that ambush the survivors when they least expect it.
Set in the same medieval era as Black Plague, players will take on the role of Survivors looking to defeat the shuffling, undead menace by any means possible.
In Green Horde, up to six players can join the battle for survival. They’ll combine forces and work cooperatively to accomplish their goals, and against all odds, stay alive. Fans of the Zombicide series have become familiar with the Walkers, Runners, Fatties, and Abominations that shuffle around, looking for victims. But the creatures they will face are not just zombie humans, they’re zombie orcs! The Survivors will have to gear up with a wide variety of medieval equipment if they hope to outlast these fearsome foes. Zombie Orcs are stronger than the classic zombie and represent a stiffer challenge to even seasoned undead-hunting veterans.
A new challenge for the Survivors is the Horde. It represents a growing group of Orc zombies that are ready to enter the board in an unexpected location and ambush the Survivors. As zombie cards with the Horde symbol are drawn, one extra zombie miniature of the same type is set aside, collectively forming the Horde. They will be locked into place until an “Enter the Horde!” card is drawn, spawning the Horde on the board. Any Survivor caught on their own near this roving menace would best beat a hasty retreat.
With such menacing new foes, the Survivors are going to have their hands full dealing with the Green Horde. Luckily, they’ll have some new weapons and spells on their side to help combat the rotting masses. Things like the Lava Burst, the Norse Sword, and the Bone Kukri will all be helpful when hacking through a pack of the undead. Oh, and if they should gather together too tightly, the Survivors can always hit them with the catapult...(did we not mention the catapult?).
Zombicide: Green Horde includes ten new challenging quests, featuring some of the toughest scenarios a Survivor has ever had to face. With new terrain, like ledges and water holes, and the ever-present threat of the Green Horde making an appearance, the team will have to plan their routes carefully. Sometimes avoiding trouble is better than facing it head on! Zombicide: Green Horde is the next chapter in the ever-evolving world of Zombicide. There’s no rest for the Survivors if they hope to battle their way to a new hope and a new beginning.
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Thebes is a game of competitive archeology. Players are archaeologists who must travel around Europe, northern Africa, and the Middle East to acquire knowledge about five ancient civilizations -- the Greeks, the Cretans, the Egyptians, the Palestinians, and the Mesopotamians -- and then must use this knowledge to excavate historical sites in the areas of these civilizations. Through the course of the game, expositions are revealed, and an archaeologist who has treasures from the requisite civilizations may claim the prize (this is a change from the first edition's handling of exhibitions). The archaeologist who learns the most about the civilizations, claims the greatest-valued artifacts, and collects the most exhibitions will win out over his or her colleagues.
The key element to the game is that it is played out over a period of two (or three) years, and each action a player performs takes a certain amount of time -- traveling is a week between cities, gathering knowledge takes time for the level of the knowledge, and actually digging at a cultural site takes time to yield a certain number of artifact tiles. The game uses a novel mechanism to keep track of this. There is a track of 52 spaces around the outside of the board. Each time a player moves and takes an action, he or she moves their player token forward in time. Players take turns based on being the one who is furthest back in "time". So, a player can go to an excavation site and spend 10 weeks digging for artifacts, but that will also mean that the other players will likely be taking several actions in the interim while that player waits for the "time" to catch up.
In addition, the artifact tiles for each civilization are drawn from a bag that also contains dirt. When a player excavates a site, that player pulls tiles from the bag, but some may only be worthless dirt instead of valuable treasure. That dirt is then returned to the bag, making the first draw more likely to provide useful tiles.
This is the new entry for the Queen printing of Jenseits von Theben. As the new game changes several mechanisms of the original, and is available in a much wider release, the two games should be regarded as separate entities.
Re-implements:
Jenseits von Theben
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Carson City is a strategic game played in four rounds, and in each one of them, the players choose a character from the seven available that gives certain advantages.
After selecting characters, your cowboys are placed on action track locations that allow you to construct buildings, houses, or roads; claim ground; earn money; or score victory points. When more than one player is on the same location, get ready, it is time for a duel! Roll the dice and see if you are the last one standing and lay claim to the goods!
During the game, you can take various actions that earn you victory points for your plots, pistols (the hired help), and buildings. At the end of the game, your buildings, houses, mountains, and money contribute to your victory points, and the person with the most points wins. So go round up your posse of gunslingers and get ready for some Wild West action in Carson City!
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Game description from the publisher:
The Battle of Five Armies – based on the climax of JRR Tolkien's novel The Hobbit – pits the hosts of the Elvenking, the Dwarves of Dain Ironfoot, and the Men of the Lake led by Bard the Bowman against a horde of Wolves, Goblins and Bats led by Bolg, son of Azog. Will Gandalf turn the tide for the Free Peoples? Will the Eagles arrive, or Beorn come to the rescue? Or will Bilbo the Hobbit perish in a last stand on Ravenhill?
The Battle of Five Armies features a game board representing the Eastern and Southern spurs of the Lonely Mountain and the valley they encircle, and a number of plastic figures representing troops, heroes and monsters.
The Battle of Five Armies is a standalone game based on the rules for War of the Ring, which is from the same designers, but with the rules modified to function on a tactical level as they describe a smaller battle rather than the entire war. Ares Games plans to expand the Battles game system in the future, releasing expansions depicting other battles from the Third Age of Middle-earth narrated in The Lord of the Rings, such as the Siege of Gondor and the assault of Saruman against Rohan.
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In Evolution, players adapt their species in a dynamic ecosystem where food is scarce and predators lurk. Traits like Hard Shell and Horns will protect your species from Carnivores, while a Long Neck will help them get food that others cannot reach. With over 4,000 ways to evolve your species, every game becomes a different adventure.
Evolution is played in a variable number of rounds. Each round, players draw 3 Trat cards to enhance their species, create new species or feed their existing animals. Play continues until the Trai deck has been finished and needs to be reshuffled. Reshuffling the Trait cards signals the final round of the game. At the end of the game the player with the most food, traits, and population wins.
Evolution packs a surprising amount of variety for a game with simple rules. The variety comes from the synergies between the trait cards and from the different personalities at the table. Some players thrive on creating Carnivores to wreak havoc on their fellow players. Others prefer to stay protected and mind their own business. Evolution encourages both play styles by giving each of them multiple paths to victory. And it is the mix of play styles at the table that ultimately determines the ecosystem in which the players are adapting. So gather your friends and see who can best adapt to the changing world around them.
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Zombicide is a collaborative game in which players take the role of a survivor – each with unique abilities – and harness both their skills and the power of teamwork against the hordes of unthinking undead! Zombies are predictable, stupid but deadly, controlled by simple rules and a deck of cards. Unfortunately for you, there are a LOT more zombies than you have bullets.
Find weapons, kill zombies. The more zombies you kill, the more skilled you get; the more skilled you get, the more zombies appear. The only way out is zombicide!
Play ten scenarios on different maps made from the included modular map tiles, download new scenarios from the designer's website, or create your own!
This is just a great game for zombie lovers!
Integrates with:
Zombicide Season 2: Prison Outbreak
Zombicide Season 3: Rue Morgue
UPC 817009014248
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Scholars of the South Tigris is set during the height of the Abbasid Caliphate, circa 830 AD. The Caliph has called upon the keenest minds to acquire scientific manuscripts from all over the known world. Players will need to increase their influence in the House of Wisdom, and hire skilled linguists to translate the foreign scrolls into Arabic. In this Golden Age of wisdom and knowledge, be mindful not to neglect one in pursuit of the other.
The aim of Scholars of the South Tigris is to be the player with the most victory points (VP) at the game’s end. Points are gained by translating scrolls, increasing knowledge in various areas of science and mathematics, influencing the 3 guilds, and by retiring translators after their years of faithful service. The game end is triggered once all 4 caliph cards have been revealed.
-description from the publisher
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Description from the publisher:
War and chaos are engulfing the lands of Westeros. The great Houses are vying for control of the Iron Throne using the old tools of intrigue and war. Yet while the war for Westeros rages, grave dangers gather in the cold North, and an ancient enemy is gaining momentum in the distant East.
In A Game of Thrones: The Board Game, players take control of one of the great Houses of Westeros. Via resource management, diplomacy, and cunning, they seek to win dominance over the land. Players must give orders to armies, control important characters, gather resources for the coming winter, and survive the onslaught of their enemies. A unique phase mechanic, battle resolution, and special ordering system make for an engaging game in which all players are actively involved at all times.
Reimplemented by:
A Game of Thrones: The Board Game (Second Edition) (2011)
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Game description from the publisher:
For a time, the humans of Sera knew peace...then Emergence Day came. The Locust horde arrived without warning, and countless horrors spilled forth from their underground burrows. The Coalition of Organized Governments (COG) struggled to fend off the subterranean threat, but their defenses were quickly crushed. With billions dead, humans turned their weapons of mass destruction on their own cities to deny the enemy control. Now the long struggle against overwhelming odds approaches one final, desperate stand.
Gears of War: The Board Game, designed by Corey Konieczka, is based on the wildly popular third-person shooter by Epic Games. One to four players take on the roles of COG soldiers cooperating to destroy the Locust horde, and must work together to complete missions against an ingeniously challenging and varied game system. In Gears of War: The Board Game, you’ll relive classic moments from Gears of War and Gears of War 2 – Roadie Run into cover, spray your enemy with blind fire, or rip him in half with your Lancer's chainsaw!
In Gears of War: The Board Game you must fulfill one of seven randomly constructed missions and support your fellow COGs as your team engages an unflinching enemy in furious, white-knuckle firefights! Only through teamwork and communication will you gain a tactical advantage, completing your mission and striking a blow for humanity.
You'll need every soldier you can get if you hope to send the Locust horde back to their holes. Leave no man behind!
ERRATA
- In the Roadblocks mission level 3, use tile 12A instead of 3A.
- In the rules, under Component List, the following three entries are incorrect:
-- 23 Wound/Dropped Weapon Markers, should be 22
-- 12 Grenade Tokens, should be 14
-- 36 Ammo Tokens, should be 44
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Inspired by the best-selling and award-winning War of the Ring board game, War of the Ring: The Card Game allows players to journey to the world of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings and create their own version of the dramatic conflict between the Dark Lord, Sauron, and the Free Peoples of Middle-earth.
In War of the Ring: The Card Game, up to 4 players compete in two teams, the Shadow against the Free Peoples, each player using a specific and different card deck representing the strengths and weaknesses of the different factions involved in the war.
The Free Peoples desperately try to complete their quest to destroy the One Ring, while at the same time defending their homelands from the encroaching hordes of Sauron and from his evil allies.
The Shadow players must strike quickly and decisively, before the Ring-bearers can complete their quest; or try to slowly corrupt Frodo, burdening him with wounds, toil, and the sorrow for the loss of his Companions.
During the game, players will take turns playing cards representing the characters, armies, items, and events of the War of the Ring. Each card they play will help or hinder the journey of the Fellowship as it progresses on its Path; or be used to defend or conquer the strongholds of Middle-earth, as they fight to control the new Battleground cards activated in each round.
With more than 100 original illustrations from the greatest Tolkienian artists in the world, including an amazing gallery of landscapes from The Shire to Mordor by John and Fataneh Howe, War of the Ring: The Card Game is more than a game – it also a memorable collection for all lovers of the world imagined by J.R.R. Tolkien.
This is your chance to forge the destiny of an age, like you never did before!
-description from the publisher
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Conan, designed by Fred Henry and based on the Conan universe by Robert E. Howard, is a scenario-based semi-cooperative asymmetric miniatures board game. One player is the Overlord, playing the opposition forces, and the other players (1 to 4) play Conan and his companions: Shevatas the thief, Hadrathus the Priest/Sorcerer, Belit the pirate queen, Valeria the warrior, etc. The game is based purely on Robert E. Howard's novels and short stories (and not the movies or other non-Howardian material). The publisher has hired Patrice Louinet, a Howard expert, to make sure the art and the scenarios are compatible with Howard's vision.
Each game is a scenario, played on a map. There are 4 maps included in the retail copy of the game, and each map can have several scenarios set on it. The game is fast, one hour approximately. It's possible to play several scenarios in a campaign, but you can also play each scenario individually. There are 9 scenarios in the base box.
At the beginning of a scenario, players choose their team (Conan and two or three other heroes). The Overlord gathers all the miniatures (picts, Necromancer, skeleton warriors, monsters, etc.), tokens, and cards from the chosen scenario. The game usually plays in a limited number of turns (ten, for instance). Each scenario can have very different objectives: find the princess captured by picts and hidden in a hut and leave the camp before the pict hunters return; find the magical key to open a sealed door, steal the jewel and leave; kill the Necromancer by the end of turn 10; survive by the end of turn 10; escape the prison; etc.
During their turn, the heroes can activate or rest. If they activate, they can spend "gems" from their energy pool to do all sorts of actions: move, fight (melee or distance), defend, pick a lock, reroll, etc. If they rest, they can move a lot of gems from their "spent" pool box to their "available" pool box. When they take an action, they throw a number of dice equal to the number of gems they put in their action. There are three different kinds of dice: yellow (the weaker dice), orange (medium) and red (strong). Each character has a color based on their specialty: Conan throws red dice in combat while the Sorcerer throws yellow dice in combat; the thief throws red dice in Manipulation actions, while Conan throws orange dice; etc. Each player can have equipment cards (armor, magic potions, weapons, etc.) which give them bonuses on their dice rolls.
The Overlord plays differently. He uses a board with eight slidable tiles, plus his own Energy gems. Each tile corresponds to one unit (1 to 3 miniatures) on the game mat, and all of the miniature abilities are written on this tile (movement, armor, attack, special abilities). The tile position on the board corresponds to the numbers 1-8. The Overlord has a pool of energy gems and each time he activates one unit, he needs to spend a number of gems matching the tile placement: tile#1 costs 1 energy gem, tile#2 costs 2 gems, etc. Whatever tile the Overlord chooses to activate, he spends the corresponding energy cost (moving his energy gems from the available pool to the spent pool), then takes the tile out and moves it to the end of the sliding track: If he wants to activate this unit again, it will cost him 8 gems, because the unit is now on position 8. The Overlord can activate a maximum of two tiles, and he regains only a certain number of gems each turn (depending on the scenario).
In a typical scenario, the heroes need to accomplish something and the Overlord wins if the heroes fail to reach their objective - but in some scenarios, the Overlord has his own objectives and the Heroes win if they prevent him from accomplishing his goal.
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Golem is an engine-building game by Simone Luciani, Virginio Gigli and Flaminia Brasini, the same team that brought you Grand Austria Hotel and Lorenzo il Magnifico.
The game is based on the 16th-century legend of the Golem of Prague, an anthropomorphic creature that Rabbi Loew animated from a clay statue to protect his people. In the game, players take on the role of rabbis who create and grow these powerful creatures that will be moved around the neighborhoods of Prague under the control of students. Be careful, because if a golem becomes too powerful, it will destroy everything it encounters on its way. Players can also kill their Golems in order to get bonuses.
Players also create powerful artifacts and acquire knowledge by collecting ancient books.
The game is divided into four rounds, and each round is composed of 7 phases:
Refresh
Golem Movement
Actions (2 marble actions and 1 rabbi action)
Turn Order
Influence Character
Income and Development
Golem Control
At the beginning of each round, the players will shuffle the colored marbles into the 3D synagogue that will split them into five lines corresponding to the five main actions available in the game:
Work: By paying Knowledge, you can activate the Golem placed in the city of Prague and get bonuses.
Golem: Obtain clay to create new golems and upgrade the developments on your personal board.
Artifact: Obtain coins and buy gold to build artifacts that offer permanent bonuses in the game and upgrade developments on your personal board.
Spells: Obtain Knowledge and perform spells (with a scoring for book collection) and upgrade developments on your personal board.
Mirror: Perform one action of your choice by paying 1 coin.
The number of marbles available in the corresponding action line determines how much the player gets from the action. When you choose an action, you collect one marble of your choice in the corresponding line and depending on the color of the marble you chose, you also move your student forward on one of the districts of Prague.
It's important to advance your students on those tracks to be able to keep your golems under control. At the end of the round, knowledge can also be used to control a golem that surpassed its students, but if one of these creatures is uncontrolled, it may become dangerous and destroy the neighborhood, after which you will have to destroy and bury it!
The marble color also matters, because at the end of the round, if you get the correct combination of two colors, you receive the favor of one of the powerful Prague characters, which will differ each round.
At the end of the fourth round, players score points for active or buried golems, artifacts, books, development on their personal board, and collected goal cards.
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Send out the scouts! Position the Flagship in tactical orbit! And reconfigure that Battlestation into something new! Your fleet of loyal ships, powered by the might of quantum probability itself, carries your empire to the far-flung stars. How will history remember you? As a ravenous destroyer? A clever tactician? A dauntless explorer? Command your armada, construct world-shattering technologies, and rally the remnants of humanity for a final confrontation.
In Quantum, each player is a fleet commander from one of the four factions of humanity, struggling to conquer a sector of space. Every die is a starship, with the value of the die determining the movement of the ship, but also its combat power - with low numbers more powerful. So a [ 6 ] is a quick but fragile Scout and a [ 1 ] is a slow but mighty Battlestation.
Each type of ship also has a special power that can be used once per turn: Destroyers can warp space to swap places with other dice and Flagships can transport other ships. These powers can be used in combination for devastating effects. You're not stuck with your starting ships, however: using Quantum technology, you can spend actions to transform (re-roll) your ships. Randomness plays a role in the game, but only when you want: Quantum is very much a strategy game.
You win by constructing Quantum Cubes - massive planetary energy extractors. Each time you build a new one, you can expand your fleet, earn a new permanent ability, or take a one-time special move. The board itself is made out of modular tiles, and you can play on one of the 30 layouts that come with the game or design your own. The ship powers, player abilities, and board designs combine to create a limitless set of possibilities for how to play and strategies for how to win.
With elegant mechanics, an infinity of scenarios, and easy-to-learn rules that lead to deep gameplay, Quantum is a one-of-a-kind game of space combat, strategy and colonization that will satisfy both hard-core and casual players.
Quantum won the 2012 Game Design Award at the IndieCade Festival of Independent Games, as a prototype game with the title Armada d6.
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GAME SYSTEM
This entry is to allow for discussion/rating of the game system as a whole. It is not for a specific product or release. Versions will appear on the individual item pages.
Unmatched is a highly asymmetrical miniature fighting game for two or four players. Each hero is represented by a unique deck designed to evoke their style and legend. Tactical movement and no-luck combat resolution create a unique play experience that rewards expertise, but just when you've mastered one set, new heroes arrive to provide all new match-ups.
Combat is resolved quickly by comparing attack and defense cards. However, each card's unique effects and a simple but deep timing system lead to interesting decisions each time. The game also features an updated version of the line-of-sight system from Tannhäuser for ranged attacks and area effects.
-description from the publisher
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Subsets and Splits