Worker Placement

Rock Hard: 1977

It's 1977. You're an up-and-coming musician, dreaming of making it big with your band. Over the next few months you'll rehearse, play gigs, write songs, and promote your band. With careful planning and a little luck, you'll earn the most fame and become the best new artist of the year.

Designed by Jackie Fox (member of the 1970s rock band "The Runaways", four-time Jeopardy! champion, and designer of the narrative adventure trilogy The Adventures of the Chubby Slugz) and illustrated by Jennifer Giner, Rock Hard: 1977 allows games for groups of between 2 and 5 players, from 14 years old, in games lasting about 45-90 minutes.

Rock Hard: 1977 is played over a maximum of nine rounds, each representing a typical day of one month in 1977, from April to December. You win the game by accruing the most fame. How? Increasing reputation, chops and songs; achieving production, performance, and publicity bonuses; getting record deals and earning royalties; playing concerts; and hanging out at the hottest after-hours spot. Ready to live like a rock star?

—description from the publisher

Looot

In Looot, you need to gather resources and capture buildings to develop your fjord. Fill your longships and complete your construction sites in order to rack up your victory points. Store up the most riches, and you’ll be crowned Jarl of the Vikings!

Looot is a clever management game, using a double placement mechanism.

On the Common board Players are Viking conquering a new territoy, which allows you to recover resource/building/objective tiles.

On your Personal board: You build your village with the tiles previously recovered fromthe Common board to unlock victory points.

It will call upon your optimization logic, favoring the best combinations for this race for victory points.

—description from the publisher

Doggerland

Doggerland was a landmass that connected Great Britain to mainland Europe that disappeared under the North Sea after the last ice age. Humans lived on these fertile lands where multiple resources and animals were found.

In Doggerland, you play a clan at around 15,000 BCE. Your goal is to expand your clan in order to leave a trace of its existence for centuries to come. Players increase their population, make crafts, paint murals in caves, raise megaliths for the gods, and (most of all) survive the rigors of the seasons. To do this, they explore the surrounding territory and adapt to the resources at their disposal. The territory differs in each game, thanks to modular tiles.

Each round, players program their actions, then carry them out. These actions vary, based on available resources, abundance or scarcity around their villages, and also based on the actions of other players. As time passes, resources run out, and clans must migrate to find what they need for their development and survival.

In each clan, there is a leader who brings bonuses, and a shaman who allows powerful and unique actions thanks to knowledge and magic. After 6-8 seasons, the clan with the most points wins.

Kingsburg (Third Edition)

At this time, it's not clear whether Kingsburg (Third Edition) differs substantially from the second edition, so BGG is creating a listing for this item that will perhaps be merged away in time. In any case, the setting is the same:

Kingsburg: 3rd Edition includes the most updated rulebook and the best expansion modules developed since its 1st edition, such as the Soldier tokens, the Governor cards, and the extra buildings. Furthermore, the artwork and design have been restyled while components have been redesigned.

The realm of Kingsburg is under attack! Monstrous invaders are gathering at the borders, aiming to invade and plunder the realm! Your king has chosen you to take charge of a province on the border; you will manage your province and help defend the realm. To accomplish this, you must influence the King's advisors and the Royal Family to obtain gold, wood, stones, and soldiers to expand and defend your lands. But you are not the only governor seeking the aid of the advisers! The other players also seek to collect the best resources for their own territories.

King Tritus is waiting for you. Will you be able to be the most influent and powerful governor of the realm?

The game of Kingsburg takes place over five years, a total of twenty turns. In every year, there are three production seasons for collecting resources, building structures, and training troops. Every fourth turn is the winter, in which all the players must fight an invading army. Each player must face the invaders, so this is not a cooperative game.

The resources to build structures and train troops are collected by influencing the advisers in the King's Council. Players place their influence dice on members of the Council, and each adviser awards different resources or allocate soldiers, victory points, and other advantages to the player who was able to influence that adviser for the current turn. The player with the lowest influence dice sum is the first to choose where to spend their influence; this acts as a way of balancing poor dice rolling. Even with a very unlucky roll, a clever player can still come out from the Council with a good number of resources and/or soldiers.

At the end of five years, the player who best developed their assigned territory and most pleased the King through the Council wins.

Cities

You've been tasked by the city council to put together a plan to transform a whole neighborhood in the city. You have the opportunity to build new housing, office buildings, parks, and leisure areas near the waterfront. It is in your hands to make the city a better place.

Cities is a city-building game in which you draft the best projects and arrange them in your own playing area. Designed by Steve Finn and Phil Walker Harding and illustrated by Jorge Tabanera, it allows games for groups of 2 to 4 players, ages 10 and up, lasting about 40 minutes. With action and resource draft mechanisms, it will give you the opportunity to visit the cities of Sydney, Venice, New York, Barcelona, Rio de Janeiro, Lisbon, Mexico City, and Buenos Aires. Can you design the most magnificent neighborhood?

The game is played over eight rounds (or four rounds in a two-player game). Each round, players use their workers to collect 1 scoring card, 1 city tile, 1-2 feature tiles, and 2-4 building pieces. City tiles are made up of park spaces, water spaces, and building spaces. Building pieces are placed on building spaces of the same color to form buildings, which can be 1-4 stories high. Whenever a player fulfills an achievement, they place one of their discs on the achievement board. At the end of the game, players add up the points they have gained from all of their scoring cards and achievements.

—description from the publisher