King's Gate
| Game | King's Gate | Complexity | Low |
| Company | Fantasy Flight | Time | 45 min |
| Setting | Medieval Fantasy City | Players | 2-4 |
| Type | Tile Laying | Rating | 7.5 |
Overview
The old king is dying without a heir and players are lords who arrive in the capital city with the aim of taking control over the capital.
Mechanics
There are 10 location (2x1) tiles up for grabs sequentially within the city. Each player with a hand 6 influcnce (1x1) tiles out of a total pool of 22 tiles. Players take turn placing influence tiles (number 0 to 5 in influence points) adjacent to the location tile under contest. When a location tile is completely surrounded it is scored, with the player with the largest influence getting the most score.
Basic influence tile placement is as follows:
- A player must play at least 1 tile during his turn.
- A player may play as many "1" tiles as he wants to, or 1 tile with a value greater than 1, but not both.
- A player may play the "0" tile either by itself or in conjuncture with other tiles
- A player may play the dragon tile either by itself or in conjuncture with other tiles. A dragon tile destroys the stack of tiles in the space, opening it up for future tile placements.
Thus far, the mechanics are pretty straightforward. To add spice to the game, the following
Locations are divided into two different categories, peaceful or dangerous. In peaceful locations, players may only place tiles in empty spaces adjacent to the location tile in question. In dangerous areas, players may choose to place tiles over another player's tiles, provided that the tile played is greater in value than the one being covered. The dragon may also be placed onto tiles adjacent to such locations to completely destroy the tile. [Exception: Strength 3 tiles, representing barracks, cannot be covered by other tiles or attacked by dragons.]
Special Areas
Several areas have different rules for tile placement and scoring.
Graveyard- No more than 2 tiles of any type may be played adjacent to the graveyard per player turn.
Garrison- No more than 1 "1" tile may be played adjacent to the garrison per player turn.
Tourney Ground- The player with the lowest influence in this area loses 3 VPs.
Heroes
In addition, some areas contain special hero characters that affect the normal game play. Winning these areas allies these heroes to a player's cause, and makes them available for subsequent placement. Heroes protect the tile they are placed on, and may affect game play in other ways.
| Character | Area | Effect |
| King | 1 | Changes the color of the location played in. |
| Bishop | 2 | All tiles count as 1 for location played in. |
| Wizard | 3 | May place a second tile of the same value tile greater than 1 at the location. |
| Guildmaster | 5 | Adds 2 to the strength of tile played on. |
| Merchant | 5 | None. |
| Soccerress | 9 | May move one friendly played tile to another location. |
Victory
Player with the most victory points at the end of the game wins. Simple.
Rule Clarifications
These questions arose during our first game, and I picked these off the rec.games.board net discussion forum and the official website.
Burning tiles- When you "burn" another tile/stack of tiles with your dragon, the entire stack is removed, and not only the top tile.
Tile Orientation- Tiles must be placed in the same orientation. This affects the placement of new location tiles, as they may not be placed perpendicular to each other.
Graveyard Location- The restriction of the graveyard is in additional to normal rules of tile placement, and not in place of it.
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