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International Toy Fair Nuremberg 2009
Internationale Spielwarenmesse Nürnberg 2009
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Alea
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The Romans were avid gamblers, so it is not strange that a game with dice involved has a Roman setting. By placing their dice in the various sections, players collect prestige/victory points.
All players have eight dice in their colour; in a turn they roll all and may use one or more of them to place in a location. When a player has placed his last die, a round ends; there are five or six rounds, depending on the amount of players.
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All is simple in the Temple: the first player places one die; the second player two, with the sum of these higher than that of the first player's die, the third player three with a higher sum, and so on. All players take two chits that have victory points from one to three, but only the player with the highest sum at the end of the round may keep both; all other players may only keep one.
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In the Senate, mission cards can be obtained. For this, a player places any straights here, with a minimum of two dice. The player with the largest or higher straight may take three mission cards and keep one of them, passing the other two to the player with the second best straigth who may keep one of these, discarding the other. The mission cards could give a player end bonuses.
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In the Castrum, equal dice rolls must be placed, for instance three ones, or two fives. At the end of the round, the player with the most dice may take a province tile from an open window of tiles that bring from one to four points, but only if the accompanying patricians from the Forum go with them.
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In the Forum Romanum, the lowest roll always is put leftmost, sliding higher rolls to the right, eventually sliding a die into the Latrina. Here a player may acquire one of the five to seven patricians,; the player having the leftmost die in the Forum may choose first, and so on. These patricians are important as they have to match provinces of their colour.
At the end of a round, all players that have dice in the Latrina, or those who came out empty handed in the Temple and Senate, may take a 'reroll' chit for later use.
After the last round players count their victory points and reveal their mission cards, eventually claiming points for it.
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Alea Iacta Est, Jeffrey D. Allers & Bernd Eisenstein, Alea/Ravensburger, 2009 - 2 to 5 players, 9 years and up, 45-60 minutes
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The treasure chest celebrating 10 years Alea comes with all kinds of goodies for several games of the Alea line.
New cards for San Juan, for instance the harbour that enables a player to put a just sold ware card underneath it, giving points at game end just like the chapel in the regular game does.
And new buildings for Peurto Rico, introducing nobles next to the colonists. A new large 'building', the garden, gives one victory point per noble on the island; the royal warrant holder can exchange 1 ware into 1 victory point per noble when the ccaptain is chosen, or the jeweller earns 1 money per noble in the supervisor phase.
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Also new cards for Notre Dame and Wie Verhexxt!, and tiles for Im Jahr des Drachen.



Schatzkiste, various authors, Alea / Ravensburger, 2009 - various players and playing time
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