Worker Placement

Québec

Québec puts you at the head of a rich family who wants to leave its name in history by building Québec city. The game spans four centuries during which you erect the most prestigious buildings and places of the city. Construction is not enough: you also have to ensure your presence in the great spheres of power. It is up to you and your opponents to build Québec City in your colors!

A game takes place over four centuries. Each player plays on average 5 to 7 turns per century. On each turn, players choose one of these actions :

Start a new building with his architect
Complete part of a building
Send a worker to a zone of influence
Take a leader card

By contributing to the numerous buildings, players acquire influence with the authorities of the time : religion, politics, commerce and culture. Players also help build the famous Citadelle.

At the end of each century, there is a scoring round where players get victory points for the workers they managed to send in the 5 zones of influence. Québec introduces a unique and addictive majority rule. The player with the majority in a zone cascades half of his workers by moving them to the next zone. Workers moved in this way allow a player to score even more points. If a player still has the majority in the next zone, his workers cascade again – a potentially devastating ripple effect. This mechanism illustrates the interrelationship between the great zones of influence. Players must not only fight to get majorities, they must also erect the most prestigious buildings.

The game ends after the fourth century. Players then receive points for the buildings they completed. The player with the most points is declared the winner.

Tzolk'in: The Mayan Calendar – Tribes & Prophecies

Game description from the publisher:

In Tzolk'in: The Mayan Calendar - Tribes & Prophecies, each player now becomes the leader of a particular tribe, each of which has a special ability that only that player can use. The game includes 13 tribes to provide plenty of variety, (You know that 13 is a spooky and magical number, right?)

With this expansion, the game of Tzolk'in: The Mayan Calendar is also influenced by three prophecies that are revealed ahead of time and fulfilled when the time is right. These prophecies give players other opportunities to score points, but they can also lose points if they don't prepare themselves for the prophecy effects. As with the tribes, the expansion includes 13 prophecies. (Woohoo, 13 again!)

This expansion also has new buildings and components that allow up to five players to compete.

Rise of Augustus

In Augustus, you vie with your fellow players to complete "objective" cards for special powers and ultimately for victory points. Each card has 2-6 symbols which you must populate with legionnaire meeples in order to complete the card. These symbols are drawn one at a time from a bag, with all players gaining the benefit equally, but interestingly, the bag contains more of some symbols than others.

So the pivotal skill you'll deploy is in making your choice of which three objectives you'll start the game with (you're dealt six) — balancing potential difficulty of completion against value of the reward — and then which of five available objectives you'll add to your plate each time you complete one of your three. The game ends when someone completes seven objectives.

Maharani

Game description from the publisher:

In Maharani, the players are architects helping the King to complete the Taj Mahal palace by placing beautiful mosaic tiles. These tiles come into play through a rotating rondel, which enables every player to place the tiles in different parts of the palace. Once the mosaic is complete, the best architect wins the game.

Mercante

A city as large and crowded as Tempest depends on the daily arrival of supplies and foodstuffs, and the wealthiest echelons of society demand the latest goods and luxuries almost as frequently. Domination of this bustling trade is the ultimate goal of every merchant house in the city.

In Mercante, you control one of these merchant houses. Deploy your trusted agents to purchase goods from arriving ships and sell them into the most profitable markets. You must also do more – from "enticing" senators to outright skulduggery – to claim your rightful place at the pinnacle of Tempest's merchant class. Do you have the business acumen and ruthlessness required to claw your way to the top?

Designed for 3–5 players, Mercante is a game of economic warfare. At the beginning of the game, each player controls one warehouse and two agents. On each turn, goods are purchased at auction and stored in the warehouse to be sold at the various markets when the time is right.

Players compete to accumulate crowns to finance their operations, and senatorial favors (victory points) to win the game. The player who accumulates the most money and favors will control all trade and profit in the City-State of Tempest!

Number 2 in the Tempest Shared World Game Series