Action Point Allowance System

Earth Reborn

After 500 years, two factions emerge from their underground cities into a new world, an Earth reborn from nuclear disaster.

12 highly detailed miniatures represent the two factions which are:

NORAD: military in thinking and origins. Scientists, engineers, add to their strength.

SALEMITES: occultists working with cadavers, bringing the dead to life.

Soon after emerging, these two factions meet - and it is determined that they cannot live together in peace.

Earth Reborn offers nine scenarios that take you through missions of rescue, retrieval, and escort through areas of labs, mansions, towns, and more. Each scenario builds upon the rules of a new chapter: the game system is built like a tutorial. There are core rules to start the game, and each chapter offers 1-3 new rules along with a scenario that uses these new rules.

The game also contains the innovative S.A.G.S. (Scenario Auto Generating System), where 2-4 players can make their own maps and mission objectives for near infinite replayability!

Other features include:

A Tetris-like board construction using polyomino floor tiles.
An order tiles system to give commands to your miniatures.
Interrupt Duels with Bluff, betting command points to interrupt an enemy character and act during another player's turn.
The I.P.S. (Iconographic Phrasing System) that allows almost any effect to occur with icons, totally language independent.
Colored base arcs on miniatures to simplify Line of Sight, shooting, and close combat. It also multiplies characters’ variations and possibilities.
The Search rule, giving a visceral feeling to searching in rooms to find equipment.
A Mission Points track that also serves as a Morale Points track.
Radio Scrambling to mess with your opponents' orders.

Conquest of Planet Earth: The Space Alien Game

A fast paced game of terrifying alien invaders, futile human resistance, and 50's SciFi Movie Action. Players each take on the role of a different alien Race, all part of invading armada, but each with their own unique abilities and ambitions. Unleash waves of flying saucers to blast human resistance into submission with death rays and terrifying weapons of war as you unleash powerful alien technologies on earth (and other alien races if they get in your way). But beware these pitiful humans are not defenseless. They will fight to the last to defend their planet, aided by countless platoons of army soldiers, powerful human heroes, and their most deadly weapon, the dreaded atomic bomb.

Featuring a modular game board, 10 different alien races to play (such as the Orzax, master of technology, or the Venezian Matriarchy, beautiful but deadly space amazons) a host of Human resistance to battle, and four game types - competitive, cooperative, team game, and Solo Play. Conquest of Planet Earth is a strategic game of maneuvering, backstabbing, and fantastic battles for alien conquest.

Main Features :

Features a collection of beautifully illustrated artwork including over 100 unique images.
Over 25 detailed plastic miniatures of alien saucers to conquer the world
Games come with an original CD soundtrack to set the mood for alien conquest
Four game types - race against friend in competitive or team play, and be the first to conquer earth to impress your alien overseers, or cooperate as complete alien armada to sweep over the world and defeat human resistance. Also this game may be played Solo.
No two games are ever the same! There are many alien races to play and large decks of game cards, giving a great variety of gameplay. By rearranging the different boards each game along with the amount of human resistance to battle the aliens, there is a high level of re-playability.
Fast Paced games with easy to learn rules allow players to jump right into the action while strategic depth and strong cooperative/competitive play keep player coming back for more.
Excellent bridge between simple family games and deeper, more advanced board games. Easy enough for casual gamers/non gamers to enjoy, while exciting and strategic enough for hardcore gamers to love.
Expandable Design allows for many expansions and strong web support to create a loyal fan base/community.

Source: product summary

Note: The summary is a little out of date, the game contains 16 alien saucers and 4 allied models. They are however all detailed and of a high quality.

Hansa Teutonica

The players act as traders trying to get victory points for building a network of offices, controlling cities, collecting bonus markers or for other traders using the cities they control. After controlling a line between two cities with your pawns you can decide to build an office (and maybe also establish control and/or get a bonus marker) or to get a skill improvement from some of the cities.

Players have to improve their traders' "skills" for the following effects: getting more VP from offices in their network, getting more available action points, increasing the number of available pawns, and getting the right to place pawns and get more special pawns.

This game appeared originally as Wettstreit der Händler at the Hippodice competition.

Macao

At the end of the 17th century, Macao – the mysterious port city on the southern coast of China – is a Portuguese trading post in the Far East. The players take on the role of energetic and daring adventurers. Many exciting tasks and challenges await the players, whether they are a captain, governor, craftsman, or scholar. Those who chose the wisest course of action and have the best overall strategy will earn the most prestige at the end.

Macao lasts twelve rounds, and in each round players select one new card from a display specific to that round, two of which were revealed at the start of the game and others that were revealed only at the start of the round. The deck of 96 cards includes all sorts of special abilities, with the more powerful actions costing more resources to put into play.

One player rolls six different-colored dice, then each player selects two of those dice (possibly the same ones chosen by opponents), then places cubes equal to the number and color of the two dice on a personalized "ship's wheel." For example, if a player chooses the blue die that shows a 5, he places five blue cubes on the ship's wheel position five spots away from the current round. (A player can never claim more cubes than the number of remaining rounds).

Players rotate their ship's wheels each round, then use the cubes available to them in that round to perform various actions: activating cards selected in that round or earlier rounds, buying city quarters and collecting the goods located there, moving that player's ship around Europe to deliver those goods, acquiring gold coins, taking special actions with card previously activated, and advancing on a turn order track.

Players score points by delivering goods, paying gold coins, using the powers on their cards, and building in Macao. Whoever has the most points at the end of twelve rounds wins.

Macao is number 13 in the alea big box series, with an estimated difficulty on the alea scale of 6/10.

De Vulgari Eloquentia

Italy, late Middle Ages. The fabric merchants need to write down their contracts in a language that everyone can understand and the literates are looking for an alternative to the elite of the traditional Latin language. So, the Volgare, the language spoken by the common people, taken from the dialects spoken in the various Italian regions, starts to gain relevance.
During this period, Francesco D’Assisi writes his famous Canticle of the Sun and Dante writes the Divine Comedy both written in Volgare.

The players will have to do their part in the creation of this new language! But who will provide them the proper knowledge to understand the manuscripts in the different dialects? Who will succeed to uncover the secrets of the books inside the Papal Library? Who will embrace the religious life and who will remain a merchant? Some of the players can become a famous banker, someone else can climb the church’s hierarchy to be the next Pope! But in the end, who will be the most appreciated and respected for his status and his culture?

The aim of the game is to obtain more Volgare points. The players will gain VP from reading manuscripts, looking for important documents like the Canticle of the Sun or "The Riddle from Verona". Players can also gain VP by improving their social status, for example, if the merchant become a banker or the Friar becomes a Benedictine Monk or the Cardinal becomes Camerlengo or Pope.
Moreover, VP can be gotten with money and with the support of Politicians, Noblemen, Abbesses, and of the Amanuensis.