Hand Management

The galaxy just got a whole lot smaller...

Two mighty empires are about to collide. Play your cards right and become the ultimate ruler of this microcosm!

Eminent Domain: Microcosm is a quick-playing two-player card game which brings you all the thrill of building a space empire in just 15-20 minutes. Each turn you take a card into your hand from the supply, then you either play a card and carry out its instructions, or pick up your discard pile to refill your hand. Each card also has a scoring condition on it, and to win you'll want to maximize those conditions.

As in the grandfather game Eminent Domain, actions you take can be "boosted" by revealing other cards sharing the same icon. Colonize and attack planets, do research, and take advantage of politics to score the most influence by the end of the game!

The harvest is in, and the artisans are hard at work preparing for the upcoming festival. Decorate the palace lake with floating lanterns and compete to become the most honored artisan when the festival begins.

In Lanterns: The Harvest Festival, players have a hand of tiles depicting various color arrangements of floating lanterns, as well as an inventory of individual lantern cards of specific colors. When you place a tile, all players (you and your opponents) receive a lantern card corresponding to the color on the side of the tile facing them. Place carefully to earn cards and other bonuses for yourself, while also looking to deny your opponents. Players gain honor by dedicating sets of lantern cards — three pairs, for example, or all seven colors — and the player with the most honor at the end of the game wins.

Redevelopment of Lost Cities, first published with altered rules as Keltis, and then published by Rio Grande as Lost Cities: The Board Game with Knizia's original rules and theme.

Reiner Knizia: "The original version that we developed is exactly what Jay [Tummelson, owner of Rio Grande Games] has now published [LCBG]"

Primary differences between Lost Cities: The Board Game and Keltis:

1. In LCBG you play 3 rounds, scoring at the end of all 3 for the monuments you collect. (Normal scoring occurs each round.) In Keltis, you only play 1 round, and score everything each round. This is not just a rule difference, as the scoring is different for the monuments/stones based on the number collected.

2. In Keltis, you may play your cards in either order, descending, high to low, or ascending, low to high. In LCBG, you must play in ascending order.

Note: the rules for LCBG have the Keltis rules as variants, and have the board elements necessary for #1 above. Keltis does not have the rules nor board elements to play LCBG.

Kosmos (Keltis publisher) changed the card play to ascending and descending order to lower the luck level and add balance to the game.
Kosmos changed the theme to fit in with other Kosmos abstract game series.

There are more differences, which are non-substantive. Lost Cities: The Board Game has a different-looking board, tiles and figures (meeples) to connect with its predecessor. Card-play in descending order is an optional variant in this edition. The numbers have been multiplied by 5 to strengthen the relation to the card game, and instead of a scoring track you collect your points as golden coins.

From the Keltis entry:

Players play cards to move their playing pieces along stone paths. There are cards with 5 different colors/symbols, each corresponding to one path; in addition, each card shows a number (0-10, twice each). In each color, each player can play his cards either ascending or descending. Like Lost Cities, it's better to concentrate on a few paths, since the last spaces grants high points, but ending early gives negative ones.

The player in turn plays one card (out of a hand of 8), or discards one. He moves the corresponding playing piece on the path. Many of the spaces have a token that grants some bonus - either direct points (counted on the scoring track), an extra move on a path, or wish stones that are needed at game end to avoid negative points.

The game ends when a total of 5 playing pieces have reached the 7th space (or more) on their paths. Now, scoring happens:

Pieces which only moved 1-3 steps give negative points (-4, -3, -2).
Pieces with 4+ steps grant points (1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 10).
One piece of each player is higher and scores double.
Fewer than two wish stones grants negative points (-3 / -4)
5+ wish stones yield a bonus of 10 points.
All this is added to the points scored during the game

In 11th century Ireland players try to gather amulets with the help of five druids. Each amulet is divided in 9 parts and the player with the most complete amulets wins the game.

Other Celtic games.

Monty Python themed version of Fluxx. The random and chaotic nature of the Fluxx engine makes it a perfect vehicle for the crazy world of Monty Python!

At the start of the game, each player holds three cards and on a turn a player draws one card, then plays one card. By playing cards, you can put new rules into play that change numerous aspects of the game: how many cards to draw or play, how many cards you can hold in hand or keep on the table in front of you, and (most importantly) how to win the game.

The card mix focuses on Holy Grail with other references added from Flying Circus and other Python material. For example, one win condition card might require you have to have the Knights who Say Ni and a Shrubbery card face up in front of you.

Part of the Fluxx series.