Medieval

Carcassonne: the Castle takes place in the city of Carcassone itself. The theme is development of the city within the "castle walls", which might be more appropriately called the city walls, but Carcassonne: The City was apparently already in development.

It is not an expansion, but a stand-alone tile-placement game with the Carcassonne mechanics adapted specially for two players. The goal is to lead the race around the castle wall, which is also the scoring track for the game. There are bonus items on the wall for the first player to reach that point.

Play is very similar to Carcassonne but all the tiles must be played within the walls, which often constrains the choices. The followers used for scoring are heralds (on paths), knights (on towers), squires (on houses) and merchants (on courtyards which are more valuable if they have a market). And, the player with the largest "keep" (largest house completed during the game) scores points for the largest contiguous undeveloped area (unplayed tile spaces) at the end of the game. The bonus tiles collected from the walls add twists to the scoring, such as doubling one of a particular scoring structure or scoring one uncompleted structure.

From the publisher:

The knights set off from their castles to conquer the surrounding land. For the wealth of the big towns and the villages belonging to them is just too tempting.

Of course, once in possession, no knight wants to lose his newly acquired properties, so this means: caution. For the other players´knights are awake to any opportunity and the newly gained land may be lost again just as quickly to a new lord.

Bring your landscape tiles and above all your knights skilfully into play, secure your properties on all sides and watch out for enemy knights at all time.

Game Summary
Each player has an identical set of tiles, arranged with B's on top and E's on bottom. Of the 4 A tiles, choose a castle and another tile for your hand; the others (from all players) form a random starting play area.

On your turn, you place 1, 2 or 3 tiles, immediately drawing a replacement after each placement. These are played one at a time, and must be orthogonally adjacent to what's already on the board. They may not extend beyond the play area (7x7, 9x9, or 10x10 for 2er, 3er, or 4er). If a placed tile has a castle, you bring 0-5 knights (discs) into play onto that castle. Then, you may move those knights in a straight line, placing a number of knights on each tile entered (including the castle) based on terrain: plains=1, forest=2, mountains=3 (lakes impassable). Max total of 4 knights/tile at end of movement; if you can't enter a hex (e.g., forest with 3 knights present), you may not move beyond it. May not skip any tiles. If other player knights are present, place yours in a stack on top.

The game ends when everyone has played all their tiles. Earn VP based on tiles controlled (knight on top of stack controls tile): castle=1VP, village=2VP, town=3VP. Most VP wins! Tie-breaker = most unused knights.

"Squires, welcome to Medieval Academy, the place where you'll be trained to become a knight. You'll have to master the arts of Jousts and Tournaments, complete dangerous Quests, and polish your Education. You'll also have to serve the king, and show that you have a sense of Charity and Gallantry. Only one of you will be knighted by King Arthur, so it's time to show what you’re capable of." —Father Advevan Nicolus Emilius, chairman of the Medieval Academy.

In Medieval Academy, a "family+" game, each player takes the role of a squire who wants to outdo the others in the different training categories to score Chivalry Points. To achieve this goal, during the six turns of the game, the players must wisely draft the cards that are the most useful to them and play them at the right time to move their discs up the training tracks.

At the end of turn VI, the squire who has the most Chivalry Points wins the game and is knighted by King Arthur!

Basilica, a game for 2 players, presents the duel of two medieval master masons who are ordered to build a medieval cathedral together. Players are planning cathedral layout and overseeing work at the construction site in tandem, in the same time trying to gain advantage over the opposite player.

The temple is built by laying square tiles adjacent to the board or already built tiles. Tiles form the plan of the cathedral. These tiles, distinguished by four colors, represent different elements of the cathedral. The pool of tiles available to players is random. Later, the players place pawns on the tiles – these pawns are the teams of builders: foremen, masons and carpenters, who will make the design a reality.

The players strive to achieve two goals: to lay their cathedral tiles so as to create the largest possible areas representing a single color, and to have more pawns in these areas than their opponent.

Every tile bears also one special action that could be played instead of adding a tile to the cathedral. Using these actions player may move pawns from tile to tile, promote them (increasing their value) or manipulate the tiles. Execution of specific order excludes the tile from being used as part of cathedral, so choice between expanding the edifice and making some action is strategic. Planning and optimal use of available resources is important, as both participants share the same selection of tiles. Thus, tiles and actions shown on them not used by the player in her or his turn become immediately available to his opponent.

Some tiles trigger movement of a special King pawn, which moves along the scoring track. Every few moves, the King pawn comes to a space indicating a royal visit to the cathedral. During each royal visit, the progress of work is assessed and Victory Points are assigned to the players. The number of VPs each player is awarded depends on the size and number of the areas controlled by their pawns at the moment of scoring. The more areas the player controls, and the bigger these are, the greater the reward for the player. At the end of the game, the winner is the player who has claimed more Victory Points.

From the publisher's blog:

This will be our first two Specialist packs: a Dwarven Battalion and a Goblin Skirmishers set. These packs introduce new units to the game, along with the Specialist and Weapon summary cards necessary to field them. For now, let’s just say that they will significantly alter your game.

Contents:

4 Iron Dwarf Bagpipers
8 Iron Dwarf Spear Bearers (16 more are found in BattleLore: Scottish Wars)
8 Iron Dwarf Axe Swingers (8 more are found in BattleLore: Bearded Brave)
14 banners
2×1 Green Bagpiper
2×1 Blue Bagpiper
2×1 Red Bagpiper
2×2 Axe Swingers
2×2 Spear Bearers

4-page Rules booklet with 2 new adventures
3 Specialist cards (Iron Dwarves Axe Swingers, Bagpipers, Spear Bearers)
3 Weapon Summary cards (Bagpiper, Battle Axe, Spear Bearer)

Expands:

BattleLore