New Game Round-up: Cosmic Thrones Encounter Westeros, Invaders Arrive in Érin, and Thieves Invite Suspicion

New Game Round-up: Cosmic Thrones Encounter Westeros, Invaders Arrive in Érin, and Thieves Invite Suspicion
Board Game: Game of Thrones: The Iron Throne
• The sixth season of the Game of Thrones television series has ended, but before too long players will have a new way to re-enact all the struggles of that show thanks to Game of Thrones: The Iron Throne, a Q4 2016 release from Fantasy Flight Games credited to Bill Eberle, Peter Olotka, Greg Olotka, and Justin Kemppainen that takes the game systems from Cosmic Encounter and transports them to the world of Westeros.

FFG plans to demo Game of Thrones: The Iron Throne at Gen Con 2016, with the game scheduled for a Q4 2016 release. Here's a preview of how CE has been transformed:

Quote:
In Game of Thrones: The Iron Throne, which uses the game systems from Cosmic Encounter, you and your friends each command one of the Great Houses of Westeros, pitting iconic characters against each other in epic battles and schemes. Negotiate, bluff, forge alliances, threaten your rivals — use every tool at your disposal to spread your influence, establish supremacy, and claim the ultimate prize: the Iron Throne!

In more detail, each turn centers around the resolution of an encounter between two players. These encounters can result in hostilities, startling conquests, and the spread of influence, or they can result in the formation of temporary alliances. And though only two players in any encounter will be the "active" players, your friends might offer you their support — or turn around and offer it to someone else.

Win enough of these encounters, though — and find the right ones to lose — and you might find yourself in position to seize the Iron Throne. The goal of the game is to spread five of your influence to your opponents' House cards and take the crown for yourself.
Board Game: Suspicion
• I just highlighted the fab 1960s art of Ta-Da! in early July 2016, and here's another title bearing the same retro look: Suspicion from the design team of [person=4763]Forrest-Pruzan Creative[/person] and publisher Wonder Forge, with this title being available for demo games at Gen Con 2016. An overview:

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You are a jewel thief, and you've been invited to the mansion of someone who doesn't know that you engage in such nefarious doings. While at that mansion, you're going to try to nick as many jewels as possible, but *gadzooks* the mansion turns out to be filled with jewel thieves who are all trying to do the same thing. Can you out them publicly, while staying unknown yourself and bagging a nice collection of gems?

In Suspicion, ten characters start on the perimeter of the game board, and each player is secretly one of these characters. On a turn, you roll two dice, then move the two characters shown (or characters of your choice if you roll a joker). After this, you play one of the two action cards in your hand, and carry out one of the actions on that card: stealing a type of gem in the space where your character is located, moving any character, asking someone else whether their character can be seen by someone on the board, and so on.

Gems come in three types, and when one of the piles is empty, the game ends. Everyone guesses who is which character, then all identities are revealed. For each player you've guessed correctly, you score 7 points; for each set of three different gems, you score 6 points; and for each individual gem aside from the sets, you score 1 point. Whoever has the most points wins!
Board Game: The Arrival
• To continue with the theme of the past returning in new forms, I present The Arrival, which new German publisher Game's Up describes as a revamped version of Martin Wallace's Mordred, which was first released in 1999 by Wallace's Warfrog Games. (Note that the cover image shown is not final.) This title will debut at SPIEL 2016 in October, with rules in English and German. Here's an overview of the setting and gameplay:

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In a time long forgotten, the cruel Fomori rule over Érin, the green island. They praise their king Balor, who reigns from his fortifications in the north with an iron fist. Old paths and ruins spread over the island's face, which will be called Ireland many generations from now. But new tribes arrive at the island striving for permanent presence. Who will control Érin's fate over the next centuries to come?

Each player in The Arrival represents a tribe leader who tries to gain predominance over the mythical island of Érin while pushing back the demon-like Fomori. But the players are facing a dilemma, for spreading too quickly means becoming more and more corrupt and strengthening the Fomori in their power...

Over 4-6 rounds, the players determine their resources by means of a unique game mechanism, which will be used later on profitably. During a first phase (Earning Phase), players draw four cards, each showing three sections of different resources. Two of these sections are gradually blocked by the player, thus leaving one section. The resources shown on this section are the ones the player gets. During this phase, they have to decide which section is the best one; while the upper section of the cards offers many resources, it also results in unwanted Corruption Points. The middle and the lower sections offer fewer resources, but also less Corruption.

After that, the Action Phase takes place and the players must use their resources wisely while having the choice from different kinds of actions in order to get Fame Points.

The game ends when a certain number of rounds have been played or somebody reaches the corruption limit.

The winner is either the one with the highest amount of Fame Points or the one with the fewest Corruption Points. This depends on the scene of the board at the end: Do the tribes (players) control more locations on Érin than the Fomori do — or is it the other way around?
Board Game: The Arrival

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