Tag: Set Collection

Games with Set Collection mechanics require players to collect resources in sets to achieve various rewards.

Chili Mafia

| T3d-1978

Board Game Overview

Things are heating up in the Chili world, and you have all been assembled to come together to stop the reign of terror of the Chili Mafiosos. However, it’s not so easy to smooth over tensions, and despite holding a peace summit in Mexico, no one’s particularly interested in listening. That leaves one choice – you have to form your own chili gangs, overpower the Chili Mafiosos, and make them listen! In this fun set collection game, you’ll be forming gangs of different kinds of chilis – or all the same – using action cards to your advantage, and becoming more powerful than any of your opponents. Mafiosos don’t like ties, after all. 

Game Mechanics:

  • Set Collection
  • Take That
  • Team-Based

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 8 Players
  • 20 – 40 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.83

CATtitude!

| T3d-1978

This playful game pits you and your friends against each other to see which cat can cause the most trouble by collecting cards and moving around the board to steal, knock over, and destroy various items throughout the house! But be careful, players will also get a chance to play as the human and try to catch casts in the middle of their devious acts! Use evade cards to frame others for your mischief or sneak away to safety, but whatever you do– Don’t Get Caught!

Game Mechanics:

  • Pick-up and Deliver
  • Set Collection
  • Take That

Game Specifications:

  • 3 – 5 Players
  • 25 – 30 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.00

Cat Lady

| T3d-1978

In Cat Lady, players are cat ladies, part of an elite group of people including Marie Antoinette and Ernest Hemingway. During the game, you and your fellow cat ladies will draft cards three at a time, collecting toys, food, catnip, costumes, and of course lovable cats. But watch out! Make sure you have enough food for all of your feline friends or your hungry cats will subtract points from your score. The player with the highest total victory points wins!

Game Mechanics:

  • Open Drafting
  • Set Collection

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 15 – 30 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.38

Cat Ass Trophy

| T3d-1978

How low can you go? In Cat Ass Trophy, you want to score as few points as possible, but to do that you need to collect the right cards in hand.

The deck consists of 56 cards, with cards numbered 1-8 in seven colors. Each player starts with nine cards in hand, and five, seven or nine cards start face-up on the table depending on the number of players. On a turn, you either knock on the table to pass or you swap one card in hand for one card on the table. After the second knock, whether from the same player or a different one, all players other than the second knocker have one final chance to swap, after which they reveal and score their hands. If you have five or more cards of the same color or number in hand, then those cards score 0 points. For each other number you have, no matter how many copies, you score points equal to that card’s value. Thus, having one to four 7s in hand is worth 7 points.

If, however, you manage to collect both five cards of a color and five cards of a number in hand (with one card fitting in both sets), then you can declare “Cat Ass Trophy!” and end the round immediately, with everyone else scoring points as usual.

After a number of rounds equal to the number of players, whoever has the lowest score wins!

Game Mechanics:

  • Open Drafting
  • Set Collection

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 5 Players
  • ~20 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.23

Castles of Tuscany, The

| T3d-1978

The beautiful Tuscany region, in the 15th century, is the home of the Italian Renaissance. As influential princes, the players make creative decisions to build their region into a flourishing domain.

By supporting towns, villages, and monasteries, or by extracting marble and delivering goods, players see their lands grow, earning them victory points. Each round, players use cards to place useful tiles to expand their regions and gain new opportunities.

The winner is the person who has the most victory points after three rounds of play.

Game Mechanics:

  • Modular Board
  • Set Collection
  • Tile Placement
  • Variable Set-up

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 45 – 60 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.23

Castles of Burgundy, The

| T3d-1978

Castles of Burgundy is a legendary Board Game design created by Stefan Feld. In this 1-4 players tabletop experience, you will take on the role of an aristocrat controlling a small princedom. Trying to build a settlement with powerful castles, practice trades, exploit silver mines, and use the knowledge of travelers.
Now, this timeless game is coming back with an extremely polished, high-end special edition resulting from a collaboration between Ravensburger and Awaken Realms.

In this special edition, you can expect a complete re-design of art and layout to ensure that every piece will have great art and enhance in-game usability. Only the best materials (cardboard, cart paper, box, insert, etc.) will be used to provide endurance, and a premium feel. Many extra components will bring the gaming experience to the next level, such as double-layered player boards, special bags for hexes, 30% bigger tiles, or metal coins.

The Castles of Burgundy is set in the Burgundy region of High Medieval France. Each player takes on the role of an aristocrat, originally controlling a small princedom. While playing, they aim to build settlements and powerful castles, practice trade along the river, exploit silver mines, and use the knowledge of travelers.

The game is about players taking settlement tiles from the game board and placing them into their princedom, which is represented by a Duchy board that is placed in the Player board.

Game Mechanics:

  • Set Collection
  • Solo / Solitaire Game
  • Team-Based Game
  • Tile Placement

Game Specifications:

  • 1 – 4 Players
  • 70 – 120 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.83

Cargo Noir

| T3d-1978

In Serge Laget’s Cargo Noir – his fourth standalone box game from Days of Wonder – players represent “families” that traffic in smuggled goods in a 1950s noir setting. Each turn, you’ll set sail to various ports where cargo is known to get “lost” for the right price – Hong Kong, Bombay, Rotterdam, New York and more – and you’ll make an offer for the goods on display. If another family then offers more in that port, you’ll need to up your bid or take your money and slink away to look for goods elsewhere. Stand alone in a port, though, and you’ll be able to discretely move the goods from the dock to your personal warehouse. Says Laget in a press release accompanying the game announcement, “Everything in Cargo Noir grew from a core auction mechanism that is simple and trivial to explain – you can only bid up, and the last bidder standing gets the goods.”

Once you collect goods, you can trade them in to add more ships to your fleet – allowing you to scout for wares in more locations – purchase Victory Spoils, or take other actions. The more goods you collect, the more valuable they can be. The player with the most Spoils at game end wins.

Game Mechanics:

  • Auction / Bidding
  • Set Collection
  • Worker Placement

Game Specifications:

  • 2- 5 Players
  • 30 – 90 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.09

Brightcast

| T3d-1978

Brightcast is a fun, fast-paced, 2-player card game. It all starts with one basic rule: get one of each Spellcaster card or five the same Spellcaster card into play to win the game! Begin the game with 4 cards in your hand. Start each turn by drawing a card, then playing a card from your hand and performing that card’s action. Use your Spellcasters to claim victory and stop your opponent from trying to do the same!

Oh…and…watch out for Dragons!

Game Mechanics:

  •  Set Collection

Game Specifications:

  • 2 Players
  • 10 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.33

Bärenpark

| T3d-1978

Up to two thousand pounds in weight and over ten feet tall, the bear is considered the biggest and heaviest terrestrial carnivore in the world. Of course, there is not just “one bear;” on the contrary, there are plenty of subspecies that differ from each other in various aspects. For instance, only the Kodiak bear (ursus arctos middendorffi) weighs about 2,000 lbs. The polar bear (ursus maritimus) weighs “only” 1,100 lbs., but gets much bigger than the Kodiak bear, being as much as 11 ft. tall!

Bärenpark takes you into the world of bears, challenging you to build your own bear park. Would you like another polar bear enclosure or rather a koala* house? The park visitors are sure to get hungry on their tour through the park, so build them places to eat! Whatever your choices are, make sure you get the next building permit and use your land wisely! (* No, koalas aren’t bears but they’re so cute, we couldn’t leave them out of this game!)

In more detail, each player in Bärenpark builds their own bear park, attempting to make it as beautiful as they can, while also using every square meter possible. The park is created by combining polyomino tiles onto a grid, with players scoring for animal houses, outdoor areas, completed construction, and more. The sooner you build it, the better! Cover icons to get new tiles and park sections. The game ends as soon as one player has finished expanding their park, then players tally their points to see who has won.

Game Mechanics:

  • Modular Board
  • Open Drafting
  • Set Collection
  • Tile Placement

Game Specifications:

  • 2 – 4 Players
  • 30 – 45 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 1.66

Caper: Europe

| T3d-1978

Your role as criminal mastermind is to recruit a crew of thieves, send them to locations across Europe, and provide them with gear. It’s your job to utilize your resources efficiently to steal goods, but being a great mastermind is about more than the things you walk away with. It’s the thrill of a well thought-out plan coming together: the set-up, the sting. Properly deploy your thieves and gear to dominate locations, outmaneuver your opponent’s plans, and win the night. You’ve got six rounds to plan and play your cards. Nothing like a tight timeline to up the stakes!

Caper: Europe is a two-player drafting game. You take turns sending thieves to famous locations across Europe, vying for control through special card powers. These thieves have tricks up their sleeves, which you can enhance by adding gear to them. And controlling the locations isn’t everything because priceless stolen goods await the thief who’s clever enough to snatch them first.

Your goal is to score the most points by winning locations, collecting stolen goods, and equipping thieves with their preferred gear. The mastermind with the most points, tallied at the end of six rounds, wins.

Game Mechanics:

  • Area Majority / Influence
  • Closed Drafting
  • Set Collection

Game Specifications:

  • 2 Players
  • 25 – 35 Minutes
  • Difficulty Weight 2.11