Hand Management

In Edo, players represent daimyo in mid-second millennium Japan who are trying to serve their shogun by using their samurai to construct castles, markets and houses in Tokyo and surrounding areas.

At the start of Edo – which won "best evening-length game" in the 2010 Hippodice Game Design competition under the name Altiplano – each player has five samurai tokens, seven houses, one market and three square action cards, each of which has four possible actions on it. One card, for example, allows a player to:

Collect rice (up to four bundles depending on the number of samurai applied to the action),
Collect $5 (per samurai),
Collect wood (up to four, with one samurai on the action and one in the forest for each wood you want), or
Build (up to two buildings, with two samurai on the card and one in the desired city, along with the required resources)

Each turn, the players simultaneously choose which actions they want to take with their three cards and in which order, programming those actions on their player cards, similar to the planning phase in Dirk Henn's Wallenstein and Shogun. Players then take actions in turn order, moving samurai on the board as needed (paying $1 per space moved) in order to complete actions (to the forest for wood, the rice fields for rice, cities to build, and so on). Before a player can move samurai, however, he must use an action to place them on the game board; some actions allow free movement, and others allow a player to recruit additional samurai beyond the initial five.

One other action allows you to recruit additional action cards from an array on the side of the game board, thereby giving you four (or more) cards from which to choose for the rest of the game.

Building in cities costs resources and gives you points as well as money; as more players build in a city, the funds are split among all present, with those first in the city receiving a larger share. Players can also receive points or buy stone by dealing with a traveling merchant.

Once at least one player has twelve points, the game finishes at the end of the round, with players scoring endgame bonuses for money in hand and other things. The player with the most points wins.

Edo includes separate game boards for 2-3 players and for 4 players.

The king has died with no clear successor! The players—potential heirs all—are scrambling to put together their power bases by dispatching trusted agents and allies to garner support across the breadth of the kingdom. Nobody wants open warfare, but some conflict is sure to break out.

Fealty is a game of positioning and territory control. Each turn, all players add one piece to the game board, with increasing constraints on placement as time goes on. Some pieces have an effect when brought into play. At the end of the game, all pieces place influence in order of speed, claiming territory and blocking slower opposing pieces. The player who has maneuvered his or her pieces to place the most influence onto the board wins.

Game description from the publisher:

The not-so-Dark Ages is blowing up! Skilled workers clamor to get into your Guildhouse. Organize them into chapters and put them to work. Each additional worker you add to a chapter provides a bigger bonus to the workers you play in the future – but look out as your opponents might steal your valuable workers for their own chapters!

In Guildhall: Job Faire, 2–4 players compete to create a prosperous kingdom by recruiting skilled laborers into their guild chapters. Collect sets of cards with unique abilities. Use completed sets to claim victory cards. But will you go for points or use a special power? Which will lead to ultimate victory?

Guildhall: Job Faire is a standalone game, but is also fully compatible with Guildhall: Old World Economy.

Integrates with:

Guildhall

Progress! That's what these Dark Ages need, someone with a little get-up-and-go. You've been a serf in this one-pig town long enough, and it's time to shake things up. You've opened a guildhall for like-minded professionals from all over Europe to work together, build their trades, and get some economic stability.

Now if only everybody else didn't have the same idea...

Well, you'll just have to do it faster than those other guys! Gather professionals into chapters, and use their combined might to reach for victory. Collect complete color sets of professions (all five colors of Trader, for instance), which you use to buy victory points (VP). The first player to gain 20 VP on her turn wins.

In Guildhall, each profession grants you special abilities, and these abilities grow stronger the more of the set that you complete. When you cash in the set for victory points, however, you lose the ability until you can build it up again. Which professions are worth risking VP to keep?

Integrates with:

Guildhall: Job Faire

It is a momentous time for the Post-Human Assembly. Having fully populated the Milky Way Galaxy, the Great Houses turn their eyes towards a neighboring galaxy – endeavoring to venture across the inter-galactic void to stake claim among uncharted stars. Each Great House seeks to dominate this new galaxy, for in the race to achieve hegemony, only one can be victorious.

Hegemonic is a fast-paced game of galactic expansion, empire-building, conflict, and intrigue. As the leader of a Great House, you must expand your control over the sectors of the galaxy, build up your industrial, political, and martial capability, develop awe-inspiring technologies, and carefully time your actions to outmaneuver the other empires.

Deep Strategy
The players are in control, shaping the unexplored galaxy to support their strategic plans instead of having choices dictated by chance.

Rich Tactics
Card-driven conflict mechanics and technology development focus on tough, tactical choices and timing, minimizing luck-based gameplay.

Multilateral Conflict
A player’s industrial, political, and martial systems can all be used offensively and to control regions of the galaxy.

The stars await: can you lead your Great House to victory?