Set collection

In Uchronia, you are the patriarch of a great Uchronian noble house, competing with the other houses that commit their wealth to building the city, enriching it with new constructions, and striving to win over the people.

In game terms, players start with six resource cards in hand, then each discard a card to the shared forum; each resource card shows the type of resource (with color-coded five resources in the game), an activity icon (with, for example, all yellow clay cards showing a pick), and an order (with yellow showing Production). Five building cards are placed face-up in the Great Works area and can be built by the players; any time a building is taken from this area, reveal another building card.

On a turn, you first move any card(s) played the previous turn to the forum, then you either Command or Plot. To Command, you play one card from your hand with the order you want to carry out or two identical cards, which allows you to take any order. The orders are:

Production: Place one card from the forum into your stock. For each Production activity you have, take the action again.
Exploration: Place one card from your hand into your stock. Repeat for each Exploration activity.
Draconians: Show one card from your hand, then move one card of this type from the forum to your stock; in addition, each player who commanded in his previous turn must give you a card of the same type from his hand, if possible. For each Draconians activity you have, you can show one more card, which lets you claim more from the forum and possibly more from opponents.
Trade: Transform one resource in your stock to an activity. Repeat for each Trade activity.
Construction: Start a new building (by discarding a matching color resource from the forum) or transfer a resource from your stock to a building in progress. Repeat for each Construction activity.

When you complete a building, you gain its special ability for the remainder of the game. You can have only two activities, plus one more for each completed building you own. If you have more of a particular ability than anyone else, you claim the monopoly card for this activity, making each of these activities worth 1 victory point (VP) and allowing you to claim a matching resource whenever anyone completes a building of this color.

If you Plot instead of Command, you first copy one order showing in another player's area (if you have an activity of the same color), then you either draw until you have five cards or draw one card (if you already have at least five).

The game continues until one or more players hits a VP threshold (14-20 depending on the number of players). After completing the round (giving everyone the same number of turns), the player with the most VPs wins.

In Continental Express, players add train cars to their station in the hope of fulfilling objectives and maximizing the value of their secret contract. To start the game, each player chooses one of two contract cards dealt to them; these contracts require players to collect icons of a particular color or groups of like-colored icons or icons and company tokens of differing colors.

Players then take turns drafting cards from three face-up rows; the card on the end of each row costs nothing, the card in the middle costs $1, and the card closest to each of the three decks costs $2. Players start with no money, however, and the only way to get some is to draft it – but naturally that means you'll be forgoing other cards. If a player has train cars matching one of the three face-up objective cards, he can choose to discard those train cars and claim the objective – and since the objectives have the icons that satisfy contracts, you'll probably want to do that.

In addition to train cars and money, players can draft characters, taking the special action of a character when he drafts one. Actions include things like taking a train car of your choice from the card array, stealing all money from one player, and taking a company token of the color of your choice. The card decks also include two events, and those cards flush either the objective cards on display or the smaller cards that players draft.

When a player claims his fourth objective, each other player takes one more turn, then the game ends. Players tally the points scored for their contract (if any), their claimed objective cards, and any money still in hand. Whoever has the highest score wins!

In The Builders: Middle Ages, the cards represent buildings or workers. Players score points (and gain money) by completing the construction of buildings, while placing a worker on a construction site costs money. Each building has four characteristics (carpentry, masonry, architecture, tilery) rated between 0 and 5, and the workers have the same characteristics valued in the same range. To complete a construction, the player must add enough workers to cover the four characteristics of the building.

Each player starts the game with 10 ecu and an apprentice. Five workers and five buildings are placed face-up on the table, with the others set aside in separate decks. On a turn, you can take three free actions, then pay 5 ecu for each additional action. The possible actions are:

Open a site - Take one of the five buildings, place it front of you, then draw a replacement from the deck.
Recruit a worker - Take one of the five workers, place it front of you, then draw a replacement from the deck.
Assign a worker to a building - Pay the cost of the worker (as he won't work for free!), then place him on a building; when the building's needs are met, you earn the points and coins indicated, then flip the building over. The workers return to your pool of available labor.
Get money - Forgo one, two or three actions to earn 1, 3 or 6 ecu.

Some completed buildings join your labor pool as they can be used to complete other buildings. As soon as a player reaches 17 points, players finish the round so that everyone has the same number of turns, then you tally points, with each completed card having a point value and each 10 ecu being worth 1 point. Whoever has the most points wins.

As Grade Two monastery initiates in Karesansui – the cutthroat game of Zen gardening – it will be your great honor to tend the Masters' rock gardens. Each morning the Grade Ones arrive with rocks they've gathered, then haul away the rocks that you don't need anymore – but there aren't enough Grade One initiates to go around, so there will be competition for the best selection of rocks. The Grade Ones will give their new rocks to whoever gives them the fewest old rocks to haul away.

Keep in mind while creating your garden, however, that certain combinations of rocks must be avoided! Every afternoon, the Feng Shui Masters come by to check your work. You'll receive demerits for any forbidden combinations – but you'll also receive demerits for your laziness if you don't add new stones each day, so you must find a balance.

The Masters' final evaluation will come with no advance warning. The Initiate who has the fewest demerits will advance to Grade Three, while the one with the most demerits will be kicked down to Grade One, joining the others in the daily search for new rocks...

Madame Ching is a hand-management game in which 2-4 players try to put together voyages that take their ships far across the waters, possibly all the way to Hong Kong.

Each player starts the game with four cards in hand, each card having a number from 1 to 50-something; the cards have a colored bar across the top, often with a symbol in them. In the first round, each player lays down a card, drafts one of the available cards, then moves one of her ships to the right on the ocean. Players then repeat this process, possibly starting a new journey — a.k.a., new row of played cards — or adding to the journey already begun by playing a higher-valued card that what was last played. In the latter case, if the color of the card matches the color of the card previously played, the ship moves directly to the right; otherwise the ship moves both down and right.

When a player can't add to a journey any more and must start a new one, she scores that voyage, possibly claiming one of the ship tiles on display based on the length of the voyage. (Each space on the game board's ocean has values on it, and the more times you move both down and right, the higher your score overall — doing this is more difficult than you'd hope for, however, since you must consistently have cards that are both of higher value and different color.) Each ship bears some combination of gems, and those are worth points at the end of the game.

If you have certain symbols on a voyage, you can claim bonus action cards that let you steal gems or cards from opponents, take cards from the discard pile, insert cards in a voyage, and so on. Get the right symbols, and you can claim the Madame Ching vessel, ending the game. Players then tally their points for destinations, gems, and so forth, and whoever has the highest score wins.