Tag: Action Points

Action Points are a mechanic typically used in turn-based games. Players receive a number of action points and use those points to perform different actions on their turns. This is a common mechanic in games.

Photosynthesis

| T3d-1978
Photosynthesis

Photosynthesis

The sun shines brightly on the canopy of the forest, and the trees use this wonderful energy to grow and develop their beautiful foliage. Sow your crops wisely and the shadows of your growing trees could slow your opponents down, but don’t forget that the sun revolves around the forest. Welcome to the world of Photosynthesis, the green strategy board game!

Game Mechanics:

  • Abstract Strategy
  • Action Points
  • Area Control
  • Economic

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 30 – 60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.07

Pandemic: 10th Anniversary Edition

| T3d-1978
Pandemic: 10th Anniversary Edition

Pandemic: 10th Anniversary Edition

In Pandemic, several virulent diseases have broken out simultaneously all over the world! The players are disease-fighting specialists whose mission is to treat disease hotspots while researching cures for each of four plagues before they get out of hand.

The game board depicts several major population centers on Earth. On each turn, a player can use up to four actions to travel between cities, treat infected populaces, discover a cure, or build a research station. A deck of cards provides the players with these abilities, but sprinkled throughout this deck are Epidemic! cards that accelerate and intensify the diseases’ activity. A second, separate deck of cards controls the “normal” spread of the infections.

Taking a unique role within the team, players must plan their strategy to mesh with their specialists’ strengths in order to conquer the diseases. For example, the Operations Expert can build research stations which are needed to find cures for the diseases and which allow for greater mobility between cities; the Scientist needs only four cards of a particular disease to cure it instead of the normal five—but the diseases are spreading quickly and time is running out. If one or more diseases spreads beyond recovery or if too much time elapses, the players all lose. If they cure the four diseases, they all win!

The 2013 edition of Pandemic includes two new characters—the Contingency Planner and the Quarantine Specialist—not available in earlier editions of the game.

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Points
  • Cooperative
  • Hand Management
  • Set Collection

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~45 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.41

On the Underground London/Berlin

| T3d-1978
On the Underground London/Berlin

On the Underground London/Berlin

The London Underground is the world’s first underground passenger railway, having opened in 1863. Its 11 lines move about 5 million passengers a day to 270 stations, along 400 km (250 mi) of track.

The massive network of London Underground stations makes up one of the most complex transportation systems in the world, and On the Underground challenges you to develop it. Build the most successful lines, connect them to landmarks, and attract passenger traffic!

Gameplay Overview

 

In On the Underground, the players build the Underground lines in London or the U-Bahn lines in Berlin. Each player controls 2-4 different lines, depending on the number of players.

On each turn, four destination cards are available, corresponding to stations on the map. You can take up to four actions; an action is either building track by placing one of your track tokens on the board or taking a branch token. A player may use two branch tokens to branch out of an existing line (whereas normally lines can be extended only at the endpoints).

After each player’s turn, a passenger token is moved along players’ lines, avoiding walking as much as possible, to reach one or two destinations determined at the beginning of the turn. The destination cards corresponding to the visited stations are then replaced by new ones, then the next player takes their turn.

Players score points in two ways:

  • By building track and connecting their lines to various types of stations, by building a circular line (in London), or at the end of the game if they have collected tiles from specific landmark stations (in Berlin).
  • By having the passenger use their lines when moving.

After all destination cards have been drawn and all players have taken the same number of turns, the game ends.

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Points
  • Network Building

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 5 Players
  • 45 – 60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.35

North Sea Saga: Explorers of the North Sea

| T3d-1978
North Sea Saga: Explorers of the North Sea

North Sea Saga: Explorers of the North Sea

Explorers of the North Sea is set in the latter years of the Viking Age. As ambitious sea captains, players seek out new lands to settle and control. They will need to transport their crew among the newly discovered islands to capture livestock, construct outposts and fulfill various other goals. So ready the longships, there are new horizons to explore!

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Points
  • Area Control
  • Grid Movement
  • Pick-Up and Deliver
  • Set Collection
  • Tile Placement

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 4 Players
  • 45 – 60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.13

Monster Slaughter

| T3d-1978
Monster Slaughter

Monster Slaughter

Flip the script on 80’s horror movies with Monster Slaughter!

This time, it’s your turn to hunt down and slay those insufferable teenagers who took refuge in an abandoned cabin in the woods. As the head of a family of monsters, you’ll have to carefully select in which order you’ll eliminate your victims… and then begin the slaughter!

Monster Slaughter is a tactical game inspired by horror movie classics, where each players takes control of a family of three monsters: father, mother and child, each with their own stats and family power. Their objective is to scour the cabin looking for five guests, find their hiding spot and “take care” of them! Each victim hides in a pile of cards that monsters must search through to find them, gathering items and traps as they do. Once revealed, a guest’s miniature is put on the board and can be attacked!

However, each player has secretly set a killing order for these guests, and killing them in order is worth more points. They can use their item cards to defend the guests against other monsters or scare the victims away to other rooms, so the guests die in a more favorable order!

Monster Slaughter also comes with a scenario book, giving new objectives and special rules to make each moonless night a new experience.

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Points
  • Dice Rolling

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 5 Players
  • 45 – 60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.15

Minecraft: Builders and Biomes

| T3d-1978
Minecraft: Builders and Biomes

Minecraft: Builders and Biomes

As in the original Minecraft digital game, in Minecraft: Builders & Biomes players explore the Overworld, build structures, and mine resources, earning points for structures and the largest connected biomes of forest, desert, mountain, or snowy tundra spaces on their player boards.

Familiar foes like Endermen, Creepers, and other mobs also appear throughout the game, and they need to be defeated using weapons collected from the board. Defeating mobs earn players points in addition to granting additional awards. Game scoring occurs as the resource cube’s layers are depleted. As soon as the third layer runs out, the adventure comes to an end, and the builder with the most points wins.

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Points
  • Grid Movement
  • Tile Placement

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 30 – 60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.93

Memoir ’44

| T3d-1978
Memoir '44

Memoir '44

Memoir ’44 is a historical boardgame where players face-off in stylized battles of some of the most famous historic battles of World War II including Omaha Beach, Pegasus Bridge, Operation Cobra and the Ardennes.

Memoir ’44 includes over 15 different battle scenarios and features a double-sided hex game board for both beach landings and countryside combat. Each scenario mimics the historical terrain, troop placements and objectives of each army. Commanders deploy troops through Command and Tactic cards, applying the unique skills of his units — infantry, paratrooper, tank, artillery, and even resistance fighters — to their greatest strength.

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Points
  • Area Control
  • Campaign
  • Dice Rolling
  • Grid Movement
  • Hand Management
  • Team Based
  • Wargame

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 8 Players
  • 30 – 60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.27

Mariposas

| T3d-1978
Mariposas

Mariposas

Every spring, millions of monarch butterflies leave Mexico to spread out across eastern North America. Every fall, millions fly back to Mexico. However, no single butterfly ever makes the round trip.

Mariposas is a game of movement and set collection that lets players be part of this amazing journey.

Mariposas is played in three seasons. In general, your butterflies try to head north in spring, spread out in summer, and return south in fall. The end of each season brings a scoring round, and at the end of fall, the player with the most successful family of butterflies — i.e., the most victory points — wins the game.

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Points
  • Grid Movement
  • Set Collection

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 5 Players
  • 45 – 75 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.14

Jaws

| T3d-1978
Jaws

Jaws

In JAWS, one player takes on the role of the killer shark off Amity Island, while the other 1-3 players take on the roles of Brody, Hooper and Quint to hunt the shark. Character and event cards define player abilities and create game actions for humans and the shark. Gameplay is divided into two acts — Amity Island and The Orca — played on a double-sided board to replicate the film’s story:

  • In the Amity Island phase, the shark menaces swimmers and avoids capture. Other players attempt to pinpoint the shark’s location and save swimmers from shark attacks.
  • In the Orca phase, played on the reverse side of the game board, Brody, Hooper and Quint are aboard the sinking ship engaging in a climactic battle against the shark, while using additional action and strategy cards to defend the Orca from targeted shark attacks.

If humans kill the shark, they win; if the shark attack on the Orca succeeds, the great white shark wins.

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Points
  • Area Movement
  • Hidden Movement
  • Player Elimination
  • Team Based

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.20

The Hunger

| T3d-1978
The Hunger

The Hunger

The Hunger is a race in which each vampiric player must optimize their card deck, hunt humans to gain victory points, fulfill secret missions, and eventually acquire a rose and return to the castle before sunrise. The more you hunt, the slower both you and your deck become, which will make it harder and harder to get back before daybreak. Can you become the most notorious vampire without burning to ashes at sunrise?

During the game, players spend “speed” to move their vampires around the map, hunt humans worth victory points, and add new cards to their deck.

The game ends at dawn, after which the surviving player with the most victory points on their cards wins!

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Points
  • Deck Building
  • Open Drafting
  • Push Your Luck
  • Set Collection

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 6 Players
  • ~60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.24