Tag: Deck Building

Deck Building is a mechanic where players build a deck of resources that is randomly drawn and used for future turns.

Dominion: Alchemy

| T3d-1978
Dominion: Alchemy

Dominion: Alchemy

There are strange things going on in your basement laboratories. They keep calling up for more barrels of quicksilver, or bits of your hair. Well it’s all in the name of progress. They’re looking for a way to turn lead into gold, or at least into something better than lead. That lead had just been too good of a bargain to pass up; you didn’t think, where will I put all this lead, what am I going to do with this lead anyway. Well, that will all be sorted out. They’re also looking for a universal solvent. If they manage that one, you will take whatever they use to hold it in and build a castle out of it. A castle that can’t be dissolved! Now that’s progress.

Game Mechanics:

  • Deck Building
  • Hand Management
  • Open Drafting

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~30 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.46

Dominion

| T3d-1978
Dominion

Dominion

You are a monarch, like your parents before you, a ruler of a small pleasant kingdom of rivers and evergreens. Unlike your parents, however, you have hopes and dreams! You want a bigger and more pleasant kingdom, with more rivers and a wider variety of trees. You want a Dominion! In all directions lie fiefs, freeholds, and feodums. All are small bits of land, controlled by petty lords and verging on anarchy. You will bring civilization to these people, uniting them under your banner.

But wait! It must be something in the air; several other monarchs have had the exact same idea. You must race to get as much of the unclaimed land as possible, fending them off along the way. To do this you will hire minions, construct buildings, spruce up your castle, and fill the coffers of your treasury. Your parents wouldn’t be proud, but your grandparents, on your mother’s side, would be delighted.

Game Mechanics:

  • Deck Building
  • Hand Management
  • Open Drafting
  • Take That

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~30 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.35

Disney Sorcerer’s Arena

| T3d-1978
Disney Sorcerer's Arena

Disney Sorcerer's Arena

Become the next Master Summoner in the battle arena game Disney Sorcerer’s Arena: Epic Alliances, an expandable tabletop game inspired by the popular mobile game Disney Sorcerer’s Arena.

Recruit from a battle-ready roster of Disney and Pixar heroes and villains — Sorcerer’s Apprentice Mickey, Gaston, Aladdin, Demona, Sulley, Dr. Facilier, Maleficent, and Ariel — then combine the cards for your characters into a single deck. You take turns playing standard actions and cards from your hand to move your characters and attack opponents. If you knock out rival characters or occupy certain spaces near the center of the arena until your next turn, you score points. When a player reaches 20 points or runs out of cards in their deck, the game ends at the conclusion of that round, and whoever has the most points wins.

The rules for Disney Sorcerer’s Arena: Epic Alliances Core Set are spread out across four chapters, with each chapter building on what’s come before to introduce players to new skills, upgrades, and abilities over multiple games. Multiple expansions will be released for the game line to allow for more team combinations.

Game Mechanics:

  • Area Movement
  • Deck Building
  • Grid Movement
  • Hand Management
  • Move Through Deck

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~35 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.50

Discoveries: The Journals of Lewis and Clark

| T3d-1978
Discoveries: The Journals of Lewis and Clark

Discoveries: The Journals of Lewis and Clark

The Lewis and Clark Expedition, which was commissioned in 1803 and ended in 1806, was the first party of men that went through the North American continent, then returned. During these three years, the leaders Meriwether Lewis and William Clark, along with Sergeant Gass and Sergeant Ordway, wrote page after page about their trip, describing the new plants and animals species they discovered and drawing the maps of unknown areas.

In Discoveries, you play one of the Expedition members: Lewis, Clark, Gass or Ordway. Your goal is to compile as much knowledge as possible in your journal, and in this way advance science thanks to your discoveries.

The Tribe/Discoveries cards you gain during the game score discovery points at the end. To get these cards, you have to perform exploration actions, and to do this you use dice. On your turn, you either:

  • Play the dice in your action area or on the game board; by doing this, you prepare or perform the exploration, change your dice, or get new possible actions.
  • Get dice back from the game board or from your opponents’ action areas.

Game Mechanics:

  • Deck Building
  • Dice Rolling
  • Set Collection
  • Worker Placement

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.36

DC Deck Building Game

| T3d-1978
DC Deck Building Game

DC Deck Building Game

Batman! Superman! Wonder Woman! Aquaman! The Flash! Green Lantern! Cyborg! The Justice League of America is ready for action – are you? Fight the never-ending battle for truth, justice, and peace in the DC Comics Deck-Building Game!

To start the game, each player chooses one of the seven over-sized hero cards, each of which has a special power, and starts with a deck of ten cards. Each turn, a player starts with a hand of five cards and can acquire or conquer the five types of cards in the game: heroes, villains and super-villains, equipment, super powers, and locations. To defeat villains, you’ll need to have power – but when a super-villain is defeated, a new one comes into play, attacking all the heroes while doing so. Make sure you’ve acquired defenses – like superspeed or bulletproof powers, or The Batsuit equipment – to protect yourself from harm.

Craft your hero deck into a well-oiled machine to take on the most vile villains in the DC Universe in your quest for victory (points)!

Game Mechanics:

  • Deck Building
  • Open Drafting

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 5 Players
  • ~45 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.00

Cowboy Bebop: Space Serenade

| T3d-1978

Cowboy Bebop: Space Serenade is a competitive deck-building game with 2 to 4 players in which you play one of the four members of the famous Bebop crew.

Each player tries to prove that he is the best bounty hunter by getting the most reputation points at the end of the game. To do so, they will have to capture the criminals wanted by the ISSP, in a spirit of limited collaboration.

During the game, players will be able to buy cards that will allow them to improve their personal deck, in order to better manage the resources necessary for their victory. They will also be able to move from planet to planet with gas or use their special abilities and even those of other players if they have in the same place as them.

The game ends when the terrible Vicious is captured or has fled.

Game Mechanics:

  • Deck Building

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 4 Players
  • 30 – 90 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.36

Clank! In! Space!

| T3d-1978
Clank! In! Space!

Clank! In! Space!

The evil Lord Eradikus has all but conquered the galaxy and is now on a victory lap across the sector in his flagship, Eradikus Prime. He may rule with an iron grip, but his most prized artifacts are about to slip through his cyborg claws. You and your fellow thieves have challenged each other to sneak aboard his ship, hack your way into its command module, and steal from him.

Along the way, you’ll recruit allies and snatch up extra loot. But one false step and — Clank! Careless noise draws the attention of Lord Eradikus. Hacking into his command module and stealing his artifacts increases his rage. You’d better hope your friends are louder than you are if you want to make it to an escape pod and get out alive…

Clank! In! Space! is built on the same game system as Clank!: A Deck-Building Adventure, with players building a personal deck of cards throughout the course of the game, with the cards allowing them to move through the spaceship, attack things, acquire new cards, and — oh yeah — make noise to attract Lord Eradikus and potentially seal their own doom.

Game Mechanics:

  • Deck Building
  • Open Drafting
  • Player Elimination
  • Push Your Luck

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 45 – 90 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.54

Clank! Catacombs

| T3d-1978

The catacombs of the skeletal dragon Umbrok Vessna are mysterious and dangerous. Portals transport you all around the dungeon depths. Wayshrines offer vast riches to intrepid explorers. Prisoners are counting on you to free them. Ghosts, once disturbed, may haunt you to death. Despite all that, it’s time to leave the board behind with Clank! Catacombs, a standalone deck-building adventure.

Each trip into the catacombs is unique since you lay tiles to create the dungeon. You can play using only the all-new dungeon deck, or you can include cards from previous Clank! expansions.

Find your fortune (and escape the dragon!) in Clank! Catacombs.

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Points
  • Deck Building
  • Open Drafting
  • Player Elimination
  • Push Your Luck
  • Tile Placement

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 45 – 90 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.55

Clank!

| T3d-1978

Burgle your way to adventure in the deck-building board game Clank! Sneak into an angry dragon’s mountain lair to steal precious artifacts. Delve deeper to find more valuable loot. Acquire cards for your deck and watch your thievish abilities grow.

Be quick and be quiet. One false step and CLANK! Each careless sound draws the attention of the dragon, and each artifact stolen increases its rage. You can enjoy your plunder only if you make it out of the depths alive!

Clank! is a deck-building game. Each player has their own deck, and building yours up is part of playing the game. You start each of your turns with five cards in your hand, and you’ll play them all in any order you choose. Most cards will generate resources, of which there are three different kinds:

  • Skill, which is used to acquire new cards for your deck.
  • Swords, which are used to fight the monsters that infest the dungeon.
  • Boots, which are used to move around the board.

Every time you acquire a new card, you put it face up in your discard pile. Whenever you need to draw a card and find your deck empty, you shuffle your discard pile and turn it face down to form a new deck. With each shuffle, your newest cards become part of a bigger and better deck! Each player starts with the same cards in their deck, but they’ll acquire different cards during their turns. Because cards can do many different things, each player’s deck (and strategy) will become more and more different as the game unfolds.

During the game, you have two goals:

  • Retrieve an Artifact token and escape the dragon by returning to the place you started, outside of the dungeon.
  • Accumulate enough points with your Artifact and other loot to beat out your opponents and earn the title of Greatest Thief in the Realm!

Game Mechanics:

  • Action Points
  • Deck Building
  • Open Drafting
  • Player Elimination
  • Push Your Luck

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 30 – 60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.22

Challengers!

| T3d-1978

Challengers! is an interactive deck-management game for 1-8 players that plays in about 45 minutes independent of player count. With the tournament gameplay style, you meet another opponent every round.

In the Deck Phase, you choose new members and add them to your deck, which might consist of a wizard, alien, cat, gangster and kraken. 75 distinct characters with more than 40 exciting effects create a unique experience every game. Choose from six different sets and discover new strategies and synergies every game.

In the Match Phase, stay in flag possession to win the trophy of that round. Try to get the most fans and trophies over the course of seven rounds to be able to qualify for the final. If you can best your opponent in the final, you win Challengers!

(If you think that all sounds a lot like a board game adaption of a digital Autobattler, we are proud to tell you that this is the first of its kind!)

Game Mechanics:

  • Deck Building
  • Hand Management
  • Open Drafting

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 8 Players
  • ~45 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.00