Tag: Open Drafting

Games with Open Drafting mechanics allow players to choose new resources from a shared pool. The pool of resources is public, meaning all players will see available options.

Eternal Palace

| T3d-1978
Eternal Palace

Eternal Palace

In Eternal Palace, you are a noble family who has pledged to help the Emperor rebuild his palace left derelict for centuries so that you may gain his favor. You must send your team to collect resources and rebuild monuments. You will also honor the Emperor by painting a beautiful picture of his beloved gardens and palace — but others are trying to impress him, too, and only one will have the honor of being chosen as the Emperor’s favorite.

In this game, your team of workers is represented by dice, and by placing them on the game board you contribute towards rebuilding the different parts of the Eternal Palace. Each location is reached based on dice rolls, but if others have gone to an otherwise inaccessible location, you may visit it too by paying fish, one of the resources in the game. Complete tasks first — or contribute more than your competitors to these monuments — to earn tokens reflecting your overall effort. Recruit new workers to your team, and use the painting pieces you receive as each location is unlocked to “paint” a record of your work, layer by layer.

Who will contribute the most to the reconstruction and gain the favor of the Emperor? Find out in this tense and highly interactive Eurogame!

Game Mechanics:

  • Area Control
  • Dice Rolling
  • Open Drafting
  • Programmed Movement
  • Worker Placement

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 5 Players
  • 60 – 90 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.63

Eschaton

| T3d-1978
Eschaton

Eschaton

In the game of Eschaton, players seek to lead the most favored cult in the final days before Armageddon. As the world crumbles, the Dark One will favor only a single unholy mass to be his Chosen in the vastness of eternity following the cataclysm. All others will be obliterated by his depraved will. Through bloodshed on the field of battle, divination of the unholiest arcana, and initiation of powerful cultists, you will build your cult and earn your rightful place.

Eschaton is a strategy game driven by a deck-building mechanic. All players begin with the same basic cult (deck) and an equal presence on the realm map. As the game progresses, each player utilizes the evil Influence of their existing Cultist cards to initiate new Cultists into their deck as they seek to earn the most Points of Favor from the Dark One. These Cultists carry different specialties: some are masters at arms, others strong wielders of arcane magics, and others provide even greater Influence to recruit stronger members.

Game Mechanics:

  • Area Control
  • Deck Building
  • Hand Management
  • Open Drafting

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 6 Players
  • 60 – 180 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.80

Endeavor: Age of Sail

| T3d-1978
Endeavor: Age of Sail

Endeavor: Age of Sail

In Endeavor: Age of Sail, players strive to earn glory for their empires. Sailing out from Europe and the Mediterranean, players will establish shipping routes and occupy cities the world over. As they do so, players will leverage their growing industry, culture, finance, and Influence, building their engine and extending their reach into the far-flung regions of the world.

In this second edition, players will experience:

  • Double-sided board to accommodate different player counts
  • Variable starting set ups with new buildings
  • Exploits to enhance the mechanisms and story of the different regions
  • Updated visuals by the original artist and graphic designer, Josh Cappel

Game Mechanics:

  • Area Control
  • Open Drafting
  • Set Collection

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 5 Players
  • 60 – 90 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.81

Eleven

| T3d-1978
Eleven

Eleven

Eleven — the number of players you have on the pitch at any given time, with those players making all the difference between being the best team and the worst. But every team knows that to be the best in the league it takes a lot more than players; it also takes an incredible manager.

Eleven: Football Manager Board Game is an economic strategy game set in a world of sport. Your task is to manage and grow your own football club over the course of a season. During the game, you hire staff members, including trainers, physical therapists, PR specialists, and directors. You acquire sponsors, expand the stadium infrastructure, and take care of your club’s position in social media. Among the many tasks on the list are transferring new players and choosing the right tactics for each of the upcoming matches.

Eleven can be played multiplayer or solo. The solo mode includes six different scenarios that challenge players with different starting situations and goals for the season. In the beginning, the task is simple: You have to climb the steps of the football leagues and achieve the appropriate experience. You may have to manage the club in a crisis, and at other times you will have to rejuvenate a football team of players that are not so young anymore. You may also have to fight against time to try to complete the stadium before the deadline!

Game Mechanics:

  • Campaign
  • Closed Drafting
  • Dice Rolling
  • Economic
  • Open Drafting
  • Set Collection

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 4 Players
  • 60 – 120 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 3.27

El Grande Big Box

| T3d-1978
El Grande Big Box

El Grande Big Box

In El Grande, players take on the roles of Grandes in medieval Spain. The king’s power is flagging, and these powerful lords are vying for control of the various regions. To that end, you draft caballeros (knights in the form of meeples) into your court and subsequently move them onto the board to help seize control of regions. After every third round, the regions are scored, and after the ninth round, the player with the most points is the winner.

In each of the nine rounds, you select one of your 13 power cards to determine turn order as well as the number of caballeros you get to move from the provinces (general supply) into your court (personal supply).

A turn then consists of selecting one of five action cards which allow variations to the rules and additional scoring opportunities in addition to determining how many caballeros to move from your court to one or more of the regions on the board (or into the castillo—a secretive tower). Normally, you may only place your caballeros into regions adjacent to the one containing the king’s pawn. The one hard and fast rule in El Grande is that nothing may move into or out of the king’s region. One of the five action cards that is always available each round allows you to move the king to a new region. The other four action cards vary from round to round.

The goal is to have a majority of caballeros in as many regions (and the castillo) as possible during a scoring round. Following the scoring of the castillo, you place any meeples you had stashed there into the region you had secretly indicated on your region dial. Each region is then scored individually according to a table printed in that region. Two-point bonuses are awarded for having sole majority in the region containing your Grande (large meeple) and in the region containing the king.

El Grande Big Box, the 20th anniversary edition of El Grande, includes all previously published expansions: Grand Inquisitor & Colonies, Grandissimo, King & Intrigant, King & Intrigant: Players’ Edition and King & Intrigant: Special Cards as well as something currently known only as the “Anniversary Extension”.

Game Mechanics:

  • Area Control
  • Area Movement
  • Auction/Bidding
  • Hand Management
  • Memory
  • Open Drafting

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 5 Players
  • ~90 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.80

Egizia

| T3d-1978
Egizia

Egizia

Egizia: Shifting Sands is an updated version of the beloved strategy game Egizia. Players travel down the Nile, placing boats as they go, to collect resources that will help them construct some of Egypt’s most famous monuments. With new monuments to build, new cards to collect, and a constantly shifting river, Egizia: Shifting Sands Edition is a streamlined, modern update that both longtime fans and new players can easily pick up and enjoy.

In Egizia, players must place their pawns following the course of the Nile, moving northwards. 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 their remaining pawns only on the squares below the one they just occupied.

When the placement phase is over, the workers of the players (which are separate from the pawns) 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 doesn’t have enough grain for all their workers, they must buy it with victory points. After that, stones are received from the owned quarries and used to build the monuments (if the right to do so was reserved earlier) along with the workers.

In this new edition, players each get a chance to build across the Colonnade, a new monument. The more columns you build, the better powers you unlock to help you on the river. Perhaps once per turn you can place boats on occupied river spaces or upstream, or gain an extra point each time you place bricks in monuments. With randomized rewards from game to game, the Colonnade is a dynamic new monument to shake up traditional gameplay.

Below the Colonnade, where the graves once stood, lie the mysterious statues — a new monument unlike anything else in Egizia. These tiny build sites are cheaper than any other monument, but they hold the potential for high reward if you fulfill their requirements. Players must plan early as they can place only one brick in a statue per round, and each level they build has more strenuous requirements for endgame bonuses.

Egizia: Shifting Sands keeps all the painstaking risk/reward decisions of the original Egizia and adds new depths of strategy, balance, and gameplay for a fresh twist on a timeless classic.

Game Mechanics:

  • Open Drafting
  • Worker Placement

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~90 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.75

Dune Imperium

| T3d-1978
Dune Imperium

Dune Imperium

Dune: Imperium is a game that finds inspiration in elements and characters from the Dune legacy, both the new film from Legendary Pictures and the seminal literary series from Frank Herbert, Brian Herbert, and Kevin J. Anderson.

As a leader of one of the Great Houses of the Landsraad, raise your banner and marshal your forces and spies. War is coming, and at the center of the conflict is Arrakis – Dune, the desert planet.

Dune: Imperium uses deck-building to add a hidden-information angle to traditional worker placement.

You start with a unique leader card, as well as a deck identical to those of your opponents. As you acquire cards and build your deck, your choices will define your strengths and weaknesses. Cards allow you to send your Agents to certain spaces on the game board, so how your deck evolves affects your strategy. You might become more powerful militarily, able to deploy more troops than your opponents. Or you might acquire cards that give you an edge with the four political factions represented in the game: the Emperor, the Spacing Guild, the Bene Gesserit, and the Fremen.

Unlike many deck-building games, you don’t play your entire hand in one turn. Instead, you draw a hand of cards at the start of every round and alternate with other players, taking one Agent turn at a time (playing one card to send one of your Agents to the game board). When it’s your turn and you have no more Agents to place, you’ll take a Reveal turn, revealing the rest of your cards, which will provide Persuasion and Swords. Persuasion is used to acquire more cards, and Swords help your troops fight for the current round’s rewards as shown on the revealed Conflict card.

Defeat your rivals in combat, shrewdly navigate the political factions, and acquire precious cards. The Spice must flow to lead your House to victory!

Game Mechanics:

  • Deck Building
  • Open Drafting
  • Take That
  • Worker Placement

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 4 Players
  • 60 – 120 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 3.00

Dominion: Renaissance

| T3d-1978
Dominion: Renaissance

Dominion: Renaissance

It’s a momentous time. Art has been revolutionized by the invention of “perspective,” and also of “funding.” A picture used to be worth a dozen or so words; these new ones are more like a hundred. Oil paintings have gotten so realistic that you’ve hired an artist to do a portrait of you each morning, so you can make sure your hair is good. Busts have gotten better too; no more stopping at the shoulders, they go all the way to the ground. Science and medicine have advanced; there’s no more superstition, now they know the perfect number of leeches to apply for each ailment. You have a clock accurate to within an hour, and a calendar accurate to within a week. Your physician heals himself, and your barber cuts his own hair. This is truly a golden age.

Game Mechanics:

  • Deck Building
  • Hand Management
  • Open Drafting

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~30 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.62

Dominion: Nocturne

| T3d-1978
Dominion: Nocturne

Dominion: Nocturne

You’ve always been a night person; lately you’ve even considered becoming a vampire. There are a lot of advantages: you don’t age; you don’t have to see yourself in mirrors anymore; if someone asks you to do something, you can just turn into a bat, and then say, sorry, I’m a bat. There are probably some downsides though. You always think of the statue in the town square that came to life and now works as the tavern barmaid. The pedestal came to life too, so she has to hop around. The village blacksmith turns into a wolf whenever there’s a full moon; when there’s a crescent moon, he turns into a chihuahua. That’s how this stuff goes sometimes. Still, when you breathe in the night air, you feel ready for anything.

Game Mechanics:

  • Deck Building
  • Hand Management
  • Open Drafting

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~30 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 3.05

Dominion: Menagerie

| T3d-1978
Dominion: Menagerie

Dominion: Menagerie

Dominion, that’s what you’re trying to achieve. This time with animals! They each have a lesson to teach, whether it’s how to spit really far or what kind of grass tastes the best. It’s a lot to keep track of, but you’re like an elephant: you remember everything. And you’re afraid of mice. You’ve taken up riding. Horses are intimidating; they say you can lead a horse to water, but you haven’t managed it, so you’re working your way up, starting with dogs. So far so good; the dog hasn’t bucked you off yet. Your menagerie got off to a poor start, with just a goat, two rats, and the advisor who suggested starting a menagerie. You couldn’t get that fox you wanted, but it was probably bad anyway. Now you’ve got some camels, which are just as useless for sewing as you’d been warned, and a turtle that can hold its breath for longer than anyone can stay interested. Soon the animal kingdom will be yours.

Game Mechanics:

  • Deck Building
  • Hand Management
  • Open Drafting

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • ~30 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.80