Hand Management

With elegantly simple gameplay, Ticket to Ride can be learned in under 15 minutes, while providing players with intense strategic and tactical decisions every turn. Players collect cards of various types of train cars they then use to claim railway routes in North America. The longer the routes, the more points they earn. Additional points come to those who fulfill Destination Tickets – goal cards that connect distant cities; and to the player who builds the longest continuous route.

"The rules are simple enough to write on a train ticket – each turn you either draw more cards, claim a route, or get additional Destination Tickets," says Ticket to Ride author, Alan R. Moon. "The tension comes from being forced to balance greed – adding more cards to your hand, and fear – losing a critical route to a competitor."

Ticket to Ride continues in the tradition of Days of Wonder's big format board games featuring high-quality illustrations and components including: an oversize board map of North America, 225 custom-molded train cars, 144 illustrated cards, and wooden scoring markers.

Since its introduction and numerous subsequent awards, Ticket to Ride has become the BoardGameGeek epitome of a "gateway game" -- simple enough to be taught in a few minutes, and with enough action and tension to keep new players involved and in the game for the duration.

Part of the Ticket to Ride series.

Re-implemented by:

Ticket to Ride: Europe
Ticket to Ride: Märklin
Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries
Ticket to Ride: The Card Game
Zug um Zug: Deutschland

The second game from Fragor Games, featuring a flock of sheep and their attempts to be in the right place at the right time. Much gambolling, some tupping, lots of shearing.

Publisher Blurb:

"'The Best Game Ewe Ever Herd!'

Ah, do ewe long for the life of a sheep? Bright summer days filled with games of tag and attempts to flock closer to Roger, the Heartthrob Ram? But, Watch Out! The shearer wants to drag you away from all the fun and games!

In Shear Panic, ewe maneuver your ewes to score points, playing tag, standing close to Roger, or trying to avoid the shearing scissors! Will your brave sheep score the most points, or will it be "Off with the wool" for ewe?"

The game includes eleven small figurines (which are somewhat fragile): Two each of four different colors, one black, one 'Roger', and one 'Shearer'. Also included are four player mats in different colors; a timing/scoring mat; 48 mutton buttons in four colors; four scoring markers; one flock marker; and two special six-sided dice.

There are two separate play areas: The one where the flock of sheep figurines are clustered; and the combination timing/scoring mat. (The timing mat is two-sided for 3 or 4 players.) Actions by the players each turn cause the timing marker to move faster or slower through each of the four fields, and the scoring is different in each field.

Field 1 is Team Tag. Players score higher for keeping their sheep closer together. Field 2 is Roger’s Field, where players score more the closer they are to Roger (the ram). Field 3 is Black Sheep Tag, and players score higher the closer they are to the black sheep. Field 4 is the Shear Panic Field, and the row of sheep closest to the shearer figure are eliminated each turn, while the remainder are scored individually. The timing marker indicates which Field the sheep are currently “in”.

Players have a total of twelve actions they may take during the course of the game, and as each one is used, a “mutton button” is placed over it, eliminating it from future use. Also, the more powerful the action, the farther (faster) the timing marker will move. If the timing marker lands on a red spot, the active player executes a free “lamb slam” by rolling the Panic Die and moving a sheep of the color rolled one space in any direction. If the Panic Die rolls white, the entire flock does a “ewe turn” ninety degrees in a direction of the active player’s choice.

Since all the player mats are visible to everyone, players need to keep an eye on what moves are still available to their opponents.

The game is intended for three or four players, but rules for a two-player variant are included.

Starting player is the person who most recently was sheared (had their hair cut).

In the game Rumis, the players construct an Inca building with their stones. All players receive three-dimensional pieces made of wood, which they will try to position adjacent to their already placed pieces of their own color. All of their own pieces are of different shapes, which is a challenge to the three-dimensional imagination.

Cubic, wedge-shaped, or pyramidal volumes are different building limitations, which are imposed by the various building scenarios. Playing RUMIS, you will find that no game is similar to any previous one. Once your mind has mastered the puzzling shapes of the RUMIS pieces, you will explore the depth of tactical and strategic possibilities offered.

The rebrand by Educational Insights is labelled 1 to 4 players on the box, adding solitaire puzzles such as building a 3x3 cube with one color and building the various shapes using all the colors, following the rules of the multiplayer games while leaving no gaps in the structure.

Expanded by:

Rumis+

Anyone who knows a little about Reiner Knizia’s games will know that the good Doctor loves games that deal with trying to get points in various different categories and then only score that category in which the player has the fewest.

The game is played on a hex board. 120 equally sized pieces, each consisting of two joined hexes, come with the game. There are symbols on each hex that make up the piece – some pieces have two identical symbols, some have two different symbols (not unlike dominoes). The goal of the game is, through clever placement, to obtain points in the different symbol colors. Points are claimed by placing a piece such that the symbols on it lie next to already-placed pieces with the same symbol.

The game ends when no more tiles can be placed onto the board or when a player reaches the maximum number in every color. Now each player looks to see how many points they scored in the colour they 'scored the least'. Whoever has the most points in their least-scored colour is the winner. Simple.

The author of the game has also come up with solitaire and team play, in which two teams of two play with each player not being able to see his partner’s tiles.

[From a preview by Spielbox]

Other Versions:

Ingenious: Travel Edition

The classic detective game! In Clue, players move from room to room in a mansion to solve the mystery of: who done it, with what, and where? Players are dealt character, weapon, and location cards after the top card from each card type is secretly placed in the confidential file in the middle of the board. Players must move to a room and then make an accusation against a character saying they did it in that room with a specific weapon. The player to the left must show one of any cards accused to the accuser if in that player's hand. Through deductive reasoning each player must figure out which character, weapon, and location are in the secret file. To do this, each player must uncover what cards are in other players hands by making more and more accusations. Once a player knows what cards the other players are holding they will know what cards are in the secret file. A great game for those who enjoy reasoning and thinking things out.