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As you’re probably realising if you’ve followed this journey of board game mechanisms, there are a lot of mechanisms out there, and, perhaps with the exception of Dominion, games will have more than one thrown in there. So to save the future confusion, let’s discuss some more of the board game mechanisms out there!
Legacy Games – Stefano Paravisi
Legacy boardgames are a very peculiar campaign-based type of games where players are forced to alter some of the components of the game as they play it. In most cases, each campaign scenario or the outcome of a decision will require the players to write on, destroy or alter with stickers the cards or the game boards. The components altered this way will then have a different effect on the game and players will need to adapt to it as all the changes are designed to be permanent.
I personally love this aspect of Legacy boardgames as they offer a very unique experience. The first game of the genre I tried and the one I would recommend as your first Legacy game is My City. Your aim in this game is to develop your own city from early pre-industrial era to the end of the industrial revolution through 24 scenarios. In each of them, players will need to place Tetris-like building pieces on the board to score more points than their opponents. Game and scoring rules change periodically to align with the current era so that players will need to adapt their strategy periodically. Being one of those gamers that usually sleeves everything, I have to admit that I felt terrible the first time the scenario asked me to put a sticker on the game board. Once over my initial reluctance, I really enjoyed the uniqueness of this game and the feeling that all my choices had a real impact on the game.
Once you tried My City, two more great Legacy games with increasing complexity you may want to try are Pandemic Legacy and Gloomhaven (or Frosthaven). The first one is definitely the more accessible one with 12/24 episodes compared to the 65/100 required to complete the campaign of the latter.
Hidden Movement – Alex Chase
The most common type of game in the hidden movement genre is what’s known as asymmetric. In other words, one player is the hider and the others are the seekers. This is particularly popular in the detective genre where we find games like Scotland Yard and Whitehall Mystery (both great, though the latter is hard to find). In these examples, a criminal is sneaking round London and from the clues they leave, the police attempt to close the net and make an arrest.
No matter the theme though, whether it be espionage in Mind MGMT or vampires in Fury of Dracula, there are certain principles which remain the same. The pursuers can generally ask if the hider has been at their location, and there are usually some special movements that the hider can do if the enemy are getting a bit too close. Thirdly, there are usually moments when the hider is forced to reveal themselves. In Scotland Yard there are specific turns when Mr X appears, in Whitehall Mystery, Jack drops clues as he goes round London. This combination makes these games a combination of a logic puzzle and a test of how well you might know your opponent. Are they aggressive? Looking to move fast? Or will they be cautious and try to hide in the maze of streets? You can see why this mechanic is so popular and why it fits detective games so well!
The game I have to recommend though is a relatively new one that isn’t “pure” hidden movement in that the hider can fight back. That is Sniper Elite: The Board Game. An excellent game based on the video game series that sees a sniper infiltrate enemy bases during WWII, this is an excellent puzzle for all involved.
Multi-use Cards – Dan Street-Phillips
Although multi-use cards in board games have been around for a while, it feels like the mammoth of gaming, Gloomhaven really got people talking about it. The basic premise, wait for it, is that cards have more than one use. However, this can manifest in a number of ways. One entry version of the multi-use mechanism is in Pandemic. In your hand you will be collecting city cards, each with a different colour depending on where in the world they are. Throughout the game you can play these city cards to do a multitude of things. You might discard some to create a cure or to travel across the map, or even to build research centres. This might mean that the usefulness of the cards will change throughout the game. At the beginning the colour of the card is useful, however as the game continues you might need one from a specific city. On the other end of the difficulty spectrum, Gloomhaven, and now Frosthaven have cards that have both ‘top’ and a ‘bottom’ action available on each card, but you have to select only one of them to play that turn. This, in a hand of ten at any one time, means that essentially you have forty options to play with, a much more versatile prospect in such a complex game.
A newer example is in Ahoy. An asymmetric game of pirating and smuggling where each player takes on a different faction. In the game, you have access to hiring crew, all represented as cards in a market row. These cards are then added by your player board and offer ongoing abilities for the rest of the game. However, if you are playing as the smuggler, you have the option of hiring the crew as normal or tucking the card under your board as cargo. This is then discarded when delivered to its corresponding location. Ongoing powers or in game victory points? A great moment of decision. The more options a card can give the player the better, so come on designers give us more, not to mention think of the money you can save on printing!
Intro To Contracts – Favouritefoe
Contracts. Now, as a lawyer, that word has all sorts of ominous connotations. But as a gamer, the idea of fulfilling a contract is mega exciting. Because, if you haven’t played a game with them before, contracts mean points! And points mean prizes! Or at least being in with a shout at winning a game!
They’re usually mini goals – meta challenges if you will – that require you to do something. The range of contract conditions is as varied as the games containing them. But they can, for example, be collecting specific resources or matching certain patterns. And when they are achieved (either during a game or by the end), they often reward additional points. Sometimes, getting x number of contracts will be the goal of the game and act as an end game trigger. Other times, they weave their way into the fabric of the gameplay, and you work on them as an added extra. Sometimes there’s a race element whereby the first person to achieve them will gain more points than others. And they can be public for all to work towards, or your own private objective.
A game that introduces the idea in an easy-to-understand format is Welcome To. In Welcome To, contracts are both ways to achieve extra points, and an end game trigger. They generally require you to have collected (i.e. crossed off) a specific number of certain neighbourhood features or blocks of houses. And a game will immediately end if one player achieves all 3 in play in a given game.
I’m a huge fan of the Welcome To series. So much so that I have all the expansions as well as the standalone Welcome To Las Vegas and Welcome To the Moon. If you try contract fulfilment through the OG Welcome To, I’d highly recommend graduating to Welcome To the Moon. Whilst the basic game play is the same, the added challenges and crunch (not to mention 8 different game sheets) will give you all the practice you need to go forth and fulfil in future games!
Player Elimination – Hannah Blacknell
Player elimination is whereby the amount of players in a game steadily decreases until one. Traditionally the use of player elimination can be a negative experience. Think back to those times at kids birthday parties where the first person out in musical statues or musical chairs would usually be in tears at their elimination. Fast forward to when you were older and you were first out of an epic (as in long not necessarily good) game of Monopoly and you spent three hours just sitting around waiting for others to finish.
However, thankfully in modern board games, this mechanism has been overhauled into something way more enjoyable. My favourite example of this is King of Tokyo. This is a Yahtzee style dice rolling game where each of you embodies a monster character standee and takes the dual health and VP wheel. These characters are things like Cyber Bunny; a pink metal giant bunny with all the gadgets, or Meka Dragon; a huge metal mech in the shape of a dragon. During this game you are chucking dice to try and beat each other down to zero health whilst simultaneously gaining stars. There are two win conditions, either be the last monster standing or else be the first to 20 stars. This is a frantic frenzy of praying to lady luck and rerolling smartly to try and maximise each of your turns.
What makes the player elimination sing here though is that as soon as one player falls and drops out, that spells a quick demise for everyone else too. So you won’t be sitting out the game for long at all. If you fancy a bit of high energy, high stakes playing then I really think you should give King of Tokyo a go! There are also new versions in King of New York, and a co-operative version in King of Monster Island available. If you fancy some more aggressive player elimination then why not try out Munchkin (which comes in 100 flavour themes).
[Author’s note – now that I think about it, Dominion has at least two mechanisms – deck building and variable set up...]