Perrianne Lurie is doing Board Game Demonstrations at Capclave. She has several games she could demo, but a limited amount of time. Here are the games that she could demo. let us know your game preference:

7 Wonders

7 Wonders lasts three ages. In each age, players receive seven cards from a particular deck, choose one of those cards, then pass the remainder to an adjacent player, as in Fairy Tale or a Magic: the Gathering booster draft. Players reveal their cards simultaneously, paying resources if needed or collecting resources or interacting with other players in various ways. (Players have individual boards with special powers on which to organize their cards, and the boards are double-sided.) Each player then chooses another card from the deck they were passed, and the process repeats until players have six cards in play from that age. After three ages, the game ends.

In essence 7 Wonders is a card development game along the lines of Race for the Galaxy or Dominion. Some cards have immediate effects, while others provide bonuses or upgrades later in the game. Some cards provide discounts on future purchases. Some provide military strength to overpower your neighbors and others give nothing but victory points. Unlike Magic or Fairy Tale, however, each card is played immediately after being drafted, so you’ll know which cards your neighbor is receiving and how his choices might affect what you’ve already built up. Cards are passed left-right-left over the three ages, so you need to keep an eye on the neighbors in both directions.

Agricola

In Agricola, you’re a farmer in a wooden shack with your spouse and little else. On a turn, you get to take only two actions, one for you and one for the spouse, from all the possibilities you’ll find on a farm: collecting clay, wood, or stone; building fences; and so on. You might think about having kids in order to get more work accomplished, but first you need to expand your house. And what are you going to feed all the little rugrats?

The game supports many levels of complexity, mainly through the use (or non-use) of two of its main types of cards, Minor Improvements and Occupations. In the beginner’s version (called the Family Variant in the U.S. release), these cards are not used at all. For advanced play, the U.S. release includes three levels of both types of cards; Basic (E-deck), Interactive (I-deck), and Complex (K-deck), and the rulebook encourages players to experiment with the various decks and mixtures thereof. Aftermarket decks such as the Z-Deck and the L-Deck also exist.

Agricola is a turn-based game. There are 14 game rounds occurring in 6 stages, with a Harvest at the end of each stage (after Rounds 4, 7, 9, 11, 13, and 14).
Each player starts with two playing tokens (farmer and wife) and thus can take two turns, or actions, per round. There are multiple options, and while the game progresses, you’ll have more and more: first thing in a round, a new action card is flipped over.
Problem: Each action can be taken by one player each round, so it’s important to do some things with high preference.
Each player also starts with a hand of 7 Occupation cards (of more than 160 total) and 7 Minor Improvement cards (of more than 140 total) that he/she may use during the game if they fit in his/her strategy. Speaking of which, there are countless strategies, some depending on your card hand. Sometimes it’s a good choice to stay on course, and sometimes it is better to react to your opponents’ actions.

Amun-Re

Everyone knows of the pyramids on the Nile – eternal monuments of a powerful and beautiful culture, that can still take our breath away. The pharaohs choose their sites, build their pyramids, and thank Amun Re and the other Gods for their bounty.

Each player wants, as pharaoh, to build the most pyramids. To accomplish this, he must first acquire a province, where he can trade and farm. With his profits, he can buy new provinces and building stones to erect pyramids. For all his actions, the player must make clever use of his power cards, and always offer appropriate sacrifices to Amun Re. Players must always keep his eyes on his goal of the building of the eternal pyramids or risk falling behind in points.

Carson City

Carson City is a strategic game. The game is played in 4 rounds and in each one of them the players choose a character (there are 7 available) that gives certain advantages, after that cowboys are placed on action fields on the board to build Carson city. Players can claim ground, erect special buildings, houses or construct roads. When there are several players on 1 action field, a duel is fought. During play, money (to construct) & points can be earned. The player who earns most points wins the game.

Eminent Domain
Survey the galaxy to expand your civilization – will you colonize nearby planets, or take them over by force? Harvest resources for trade, and do research to improve your technology. Build the best civilization and win the
game!

Eminent Domain is a civilization-building game in which your civilization’s abilities are based on a deck of Role cards. At the beginning of the game each player has the same deck of cards, with just two cards for each Role in it. Every turn you must choose a Role to execute (and like Glory to Rome or Puerto Rico, your opponents will get a chance to follow suit), and in doing so you will add one of those Role cards to your deck. When executing a Role, you can boost its effect by playing cards out of your hand matching the Role you have chosen. For example, the more you Research, the better you get at Researching (because you’ll have more Research cards in your deck).

Innovation

This game is a journey through innovations from the stone age through modern times. Each player builds a civilization based on various technologies, ideas, and cultural advancements, all represented by cards. Each of these cards has a unique power which will allow further advancement, point scoring, or even attacking other civilizations. Be careful though, as other civilizations may be able to benefit from your ideas as well!

To win, you must score achievements, which you can attain by amassing points or by meeting certain criteria with the innovations you have built. Plan your civilization well, and outmaneuver your opponents, and with some luck you will achieve victory!

Lords of Waterdeep

Waterdeep, the City of Splendors – the most resplendent jewel in the Forgotten Realms, and a den of political intrigue and shady back-alley dealings. In this game, the players are powerful lords vying for control of this great city. Its treasures and resources are ripe for the taking, and that which cannot be gained through trickery and negotiation must be taken by force!

In Lords of Waterdeep, a strategy board game for 2-5 players, you take on the role of one of the masked Lords of Waterdeep, secret rulers of the city. Through your agents, you recruit adventurers to go on quests on your behalf, earning rewards and increasing your influence over the city. Expand the city by purchasing new buildings that open up new actions on the board, and hinder – or help – the other lords by playing Intrigue cards to enact your carefully laid plans.

Power Grid

Power Grid is the updated release of the Friedemann Friese crayon game Funkenschlag. It removes the crayon aspect from network building in the original edition, while retaining the fluctuating commodities market like Crude: The Oil Game and an auction round intensity reminiscent of The Princes of Florence.

The object of Power Grid is to supply the most cities with power when someone’s network gains a predetermined size. In this new edition, players mark pre-existing routes between cities for connection, and then bid against each other to purchase the power plants that they use to power their cities.

However, as plants are purchased, newer, more efficient plants become available, so by merely purchasing, you’re potentially allowing others access to superior equipment.

Additionally, players must acquire the raw materials (coal, oil, garbage, and uranium) needed to power said plants (except for the ‘renewable’ windfarm/ solar plants, which require no fuel), making it a constant struggle to upgrade your plants for maximum efficiency while still retaining enough wealth to quickly expand your network to get the cheapest routes.

Qwirkle

While Qwirkle is as simple as matching colors and shapes, it is a game that also requires tactical maneuvers and well-planned strategy. The game consists of 108 wooden blocks with six different shapes in six colors. Using the blocks, players attempt to score the most points by building lines that share a common attribute – either color or shape. Qwirkle is a quick game to learn, but you’ll soon discover that you’ll need to think strategically in order to score the most points.

Race for the Galaxy

In the card game Race for the Galaxy, players build galactic civilizations by playing game cards in front of them that represent worlds or technical and social developments. Some worlds allow players to produce goods, which can be consumed later to gain either card draws or victory points when the appropriate technologies are available to them. These are mainly provided by the developments and worlds that are not able to produce, but the fancier production worlds also give these bonuses.

At the beginning of each round, players each select, secretly and simultaneously, one of the seven roles which correspond to the phases in which the round progresses. By selecting a role, players activate that phase for this round, giving each player the opportunity to perform that phase’s action. For example, if one player chooses the settle role, each player has the opportunity to settle one of the planets from their hand. The player who has chosen the role, however, gets a bonus that applies only to him. But bonuses may also be acquired through developments, so one must be aware when another player also takes advantage of his choice of role.

Saint Petersburg

On May 16th, 1703, Czar Peter laid the cornerstone for the first building in Saint Petersburg. Quickly, glorious buildings were added, always being expanded, so that Nobility (bringing victory points) may want to move in. But to accomplish this, one needs merchants who can bankroll the necessary Rubles, or the glory is over. The competition isn’t sleeping either, and can sometimes steal a desired card right out from under your nose.

Saint Petersburg has a board to tally victory points and to set out the four types of cards. It is the cards themselves that players need to collect. In each round – with the number of rounds dependent on the number of players and the randomness of card availability – players first pay for CRAFTSMEN who supply money for further purchases; then BUILDINGS to score points; then ARISTOCRATS, who are needed for money, points, and end-of-game scoring; and finally, unique cards from all three categories which give greater benefits. During the first rounds, players never have enough money to buy every card they want. During later rounds, they have plenty of money, but the cards they’d like to buy may have already come and gone…

Small World

In Small World, players vie for conquest and control of a world that is simply too small to accommodate them all.

Designed by Philippe Keyaerts as a fantasy follow-up to his award-winning Vinci, Small World is inhabited by a zany cast of characters such as dwarves, wizards, amazons, giants, orcs, and even humans, who use their troops to occupy territory and conquer adjacent lands in order to push the other races off the face of the earth.

Picking the right combination from the 14 different fantasy races and 20 unique special powers, players rush to expand their empires – often at the expense of weaker neighbors. Yet they must also know when to push their own over-extended civilization into decline and ride a new one to victory!

Ticket to Ride

With elegantly simple gameplay, Ticket to Ride can be learned in 3 minutes, while providing players with intense strategic and tactical decisions every turn. Players collect cards of various types of train cars they then use to claim railway routes in North America. The longer the routes, the more points they earn. Additional points come to those who fulfill Destination Tickets – goal cards that connect distant cities; and to the player who builds the longest continuous route.

“The rules are simple enough to write on a train ticket – each turn you either draw more cards, claim a route, or get additional Destination Tickets,” says Ticket to Ride author, Alan R. Moon. “The tension comes from being forced to balance greed – adding more cards to your hand, and fear – losing a critical route to a competitor.”

Ticket to Ride continues in the tradition of Days of Wonder’s big format board games featuring high-quality illustrations and components including: an oversize board map of North America, 225 custom-molded train cars, 144 illustrated cards, and wooden scoring markers.

Since its introduction and numerous subsequent awards, Ticket to Ride has become the BoardGameGeek epitome of a “gateway game” — simple enough to be taught in a few minutes, and with enough action and tension to keep new players involved and in the game for the duration.

Vegas Showdown

Players compete to build the most famous hotel/casino. Room tiles representing slot machines, lounges, restaurants, and other casino-related places appear on a central board and the players hold auctions to win the rights to have those rooms in their building, garnering them income, population, or fame. Bidding wars escalate, values fluctuate, and designers renovate until finally the hotel/casinos are put to the test to determine whose garners the most fame.

Walnut Grove

Walnut Grove is a cross between jigsaw puzzles and worker placement, with the players as farmers who find their plots merging into a single landscape as time passes and their holdings grow. Come fall they must head to the city with their goods as winter will soon return.

Walnut Grove could be described as a light mashup between Carcassonne and Agricola. The goal of the game is to develop your own ranch. The better the ranch, the more points you will score at the end of the game. Players can improve their ranch during the game by adding new land tiles to it, hiring more workers, building improvements, etc

The game play is divided into eight years, and each year is divided into Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter phases. During Spring, players add land tiles to their ranch. During Summer, players place their workers to gather resources from the fields. When Autumn comes, all players get to visit the city. Finally, during the Winter phase, players need to feed their workers and heat their homes.

In the city you can hire workers, trade goods to coins, build improvements, and so on. Each player may do only one action in the city though. The city is a kind of rondel that is divided into halves; each time you cross the midline you have to pay a coin. Therefore it is wise to move as slowly as possible on the rondel, but then again, you have consider what actions you want to take!

The land areas will produce resources when you place the workers there. Also, the tiles do not need to match, but you want them to, as larger areas of the same type will give you greater production.

Spring, Summer and Winter phases can be done simultaneously, providing fast game play.

Yspahan

1598. Yspahan the fair becomes the capital of the Persian empire. Thus, being placed at the center of the world, the city enjoys a period of cultural and economic blossoming. The cities and villages of the region intend to take advantage of this expansion. Caravans loaded with goods and jewels set out for the desert, bearing the promises of a radiant future….

The players embody merchants trading with Yspahan. Meaning to take advantage of the coming of the Shah’s supervisor, they score points by placing their merchandise in the right shops, by sending them to the caravan, and by constructing buildings.