Strategy

Beer & Bread

Beer & Bread is a multi-use card game for two players. Its clever structure of alternating rounds puts a fascinating twist on player interaction, card drafting, and resource management.

Founded on the fruitful lands of an erstwhile monastery, two villages have held up the dual tradition of brewing beer and baking bread. While sharing fields and resources, they still find pride in their friendly rivalry of besting each other’s produce.

Each of you represents one of these villages. Over the course of six years - which alternate between fruitful and dry - you must harmonize your duties of harvesting and storing resources, producing beer and bread, selling them for coins and upgrading your facilities.

However, in order to win, you must maintain the balance between your baked and liquid goods. Because, after the sixth year, you only score the coins collected from the type of good - beer or bread - for which you earned less. The village with the higher score wins.

—description from publisher

Dune: Imperium

Some important links: The Official FAQ, the Unofficial FAQ, and an Automa (solo and 2p) Overview

Dune: Imperium is a game that finds inspiration in elements and characters from the Dune legacy, both the new film from Legendary Pictures and the seminal literary series from Frank Herbert, Brian Herbert, and Kevin J. Anderson.

As a leader of one of the Great Houses of the Landsraad, raise your banner and marshal your forces and spies. War is coming, and at the center of the conflict is Arrakis – Dune, the desert planet.

Dune: Imperium uses deck-building to add a hidden-information angle to traditional worker placement.

You start with a unique leader card, as well as deck identical to those of your opponents. As you acquire cards and build your deck, your choices will define your strengths and weaknesses. Cards allow you to send your Agents to certain spaces on the game board, so how your deck evolves affects your strategy. You might become more powerful militarily, able to deploy more troops than your opponents. Or you might acquire cards that give you an edge with the four political factions represented in the game: the Emperor, the Spacing Guild, the Bene Gesserit, and the Fremen.

Unlike many deck-building games, you don’t play your entire hand in one turn. Instead, you draw a hand of cards at the start of every round and alternate with other players, taking one Agent turn at a time (playing one card to send one of your Agents to the game board). When it’s your turn and you have no more Agents to place, you’ll take a Reveal turn, revealing the rest of your cards, which will provide Persuasion and Swords. Persuasion is used to acquire more cards, and Swords help your troops fight for the current round’s rewards as shown on the revealed Conflict card.

Defeat your rivals in combat, shrewdly navigate the political factions, and acquire precious The Spice Must Flow cards to lead your House to victory!

Tidal Blades: Heroes of the Reef

Welcome Heroes! Many magnificent contestants have signed up for the tournament but only a handful will be chosen to join the the Tidal Blades, the elite guards of our island realm. To succeed in the Tournament and be chosen as a Tidal Blade, you must compete in Challenges held in the 3 Arenas, rise to the top of the Champion’s Board, and protect the realm from the ever increasing threat of the Monsters from the mysterious Fold.

It has been fifteen years since the Great Battle; 15 years since the Arcanists from the Citadel of Time made their terrible choice and created the Fold; 15 years since the last assemblage of Tidal Blades. The Arcanists folded space and time to stop the onslaught of creatures from the depths, but now new Monsters have appeared, the hard-earned days of peace are coming to a close and the islands need protection. A tournament has been called, the Arenas are ready, the inhabitants of all the islands are gathering, and young heroes from across the realm are showing up to compete to be named a Tidal Blade: Hero of the Reef.

In Tidal Blades: Heroes of the Reef, each player takes the role of a young hero competing to be named a Tidal Blade. The tournament takes place over 5 Days and Nights. By gathering the needed resources, signing up to compete in Challenges and timing your arrival at different islands you can make the most of your Hero’s turns and rise in the ranks of the contestants.

Each day you will send your hero to take actions on the different Locations and to undertake Challenges. Each action will gain you the resource or effect listed on the action space as well as the Location bonus. At the Arenas you may then attempt a Challenge that matches your Location, and at the Fold you may battle a monster. Completing Challenges and fighting monsters will advance your character in the four traits of Focus, Spirit, Resilience and Synergy.

Each Tidal Blade will be judged at the end of the 5 rounds based on the Challenges they have completed, the level of each of their Traits, their standing on the Champions Board, and the monsters they have fought.

Sagani

Welcome to Sagani where achieving harmony between the natural elements of Earth, Water, Air and Fire is the central goal of the spirits that populate this world. These spirits spend most of their time in their vessel-like dwellings. But when the elements are put in balance, the spirits emerge from their vessels and show themselves in their full form.

Each spirit embodies one of the four elements and influences the harmony between them. In Sagani, as you and your opponents create this colorful, harmonious world by employing your Sound discs, the spirits become fully visible. Every spirit that shows itself also brings you a step closer to victory.

—description from the publisher

Warp's Edge

You are Taylor Minde, rookie pilot of the Force’s Outer Rim. After a crucial battle you are stranded far away from your fleet, lost and alone. With resources running low you jump through warp gate after warp gate hoping to find the right combination home.

But home is not what you find. The warp takes you further out in the galaxy than the Force has ever gone. You are deep behind enemy lines and find yourself on the edge of a blackhole... and on the doorstep of the enemy’s mighty mothership.

You have a moment of bravery and approach the enemy’s fleet. Just maybe you can get through them and destroy the mothership... but before you have a chance to react the enemy is already upon you. Lasers fire. Photon cannons pierce through the blackness. A moment later your shields are gone, your laser battery empty, and your hull damage. Your powerless ship splits apart as you fall from the enemy and into the black hole below.

Just as your ship crests gravity’s edge you and infinite blackness takes hold... you are back where you started. The enemy fleet is before you. The mothership looming in the distance. And, most importantly, your laser battery is full. You have a second chance at the edge of space and now you know what’s coming...