pattern building

ION: A Compound Building Game is a card drafting game where players select from a number of available Ion Cards and Noble Gas cards with the goal of creating sets of compounds and inert noble gases.

Here’s how the game is played: Each player is dealt eight cards, must select one of those cards and then passes the remaining. Players must choose to either bond (pair) their selected card with another Element Card or set it alone (possibly to form an ionic bond at a later time). Throughout the game, players gain additional points for building specific compounds which are listed on the Compound Goal Cards and have available a set of Action Tiles which award them additional moves throughout the game. Players score points based upon the quantity and type of neutrally balanced compounds they construct and noble gas sets they collect. After three rounds, players add their total scores from each round, subtract points from Action Tiles used, and the player with the most points wins!

Before winter makes its appearance, a particularly warm fall bathes the forest in a golden shimmer. During the Indian Summer, New England blossoms one last time. Treetops are ablaze with countless colors — a living rainbow, from green to orange to red. Slowly the first leaves are starting to fall. Meanwhile, our steps and the diligent squirrels rustle the colorful foliage.

On our walks through the woods, we discover all kinds of little treasures; we collect berries, nuts, mushrooms and feathers. We pause for a moment to watch the shy inhabitants of the forest before we set off towards home once again. There, a good book and a hot tea are already awaiting.

Indian Summer is the second part of Uwe Rosenberg's puzzle trilogy following 2016's Cottage Garden, and this game is firmly geared towards experienced players. At the heart of the game are puzzle tiles with holes that are placed on individual forest boards to cover up treasures. When players get their hands on these, they gain more options and an edge over their opponents. All that counts in the end is to be the first to cover your forest floor completely with leaves.

Ticket to Ride Map Collection: Volume 6 – France & Old West includes a double-sided game board that features France on one side and the western half of the United States on the other.

In the France half of this expansion, 2-5 players collect train cards and claim routes in order to complete tickets in hand, but most of the tracks on the board aren't colored! Each time that you draw cards, you must take a colored tile that's 2-5 train cars long and place that tile on an empty track bed. Once you've done this, any player can claim that route by discarding the appropriately colored cards from hand, as in any other Ticket to Ride game. (Single-length routes are already colored, and the map contains a number of gray-colored ferry routes.)

Multiple track beds on the game board overlap, and once a tile has placed on the board, any track beds crossed by this tile are off-limits and nothing can be built on them. At the end of the game, players score their tickets, with bonuses being awarded for longest continuous route and most tickets completed.

In the Old West half of the expansion, 2-6 players start the game by choosing (in reverse player order) a starting location for one of their three city pieces. The first route that a player claims must have this city as one of the route's two endpoints, and each subsequent route claimed must connect to that player's existing network.

After claiming a route, a player can place one of their remaining cities on either end of that route by discarding a matching pair of train cards. Only one city marker can be in each city. Whenever a player builds a route that connects to a city owned by another player, the owner of the city claims the points for the route, not the player placing the trains. If both endpoints of the route have cities, then the owner of each city scores these points. Whoever completes the most tickets in this expansion scores 15 bonus points.

As a variant, you can play Old West with Alvin the Alien. No player can start the game in Roswell, and the first player who builds a route into Roswell scores 10 points, then places the Alvin marker in any city that they control. The next player to connect to this city scores 10 points, then moves Alvin as before. Whoever controls Alvin at the end of the game scores 10 bonus points.

Castell is the vibrant Catalan tradition of building human towers. Huge teams of people from all over Catalonia gather at festivals to celebrate Catalan culture and compete to build the highest and most difficult human towers.

Castell is a strategy game in which players guide castell teams through a year of festivals. Visit Catalan cities, expand your team of castellers, learn tower-building skills, and show off your tower-building prowess at local performances and festival competitions.

Harness your strength, balance, courage, and common sense to take your team to victory!

Guide your adventurers skillfully through the jungle!

Each turn in Karuba: Das Kartenspiel, you carefully select two path cards from your hand to try to outwit the other players. Whoever has the lowest sum loses a card, then all players use their cards to create a network of pathways to connect their adventurers with the temples. Who will best guide their adventurers through the jungle? In the end, the player who collects the most points with valuable treasure and temples wins.