| Mechanic |
Description |
Examples
|
Acting
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A game where players must represent another/perform theatrically.
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Times Up!
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Action/Movement Programming
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Players secretly choose the next X turns, and then each player plays their turns out according to the choices made. A game has the programming mechanic if it provides choice of several actions with a mechanism of executing those actions such that things could go spectacularly or amusingly wrong, because the status of the game changed in ways one did not anticipate before the action is executed.
|
Shogun, Robo Rally
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Action Point Allowance System
|
Players get a set number of points each turn to devote to various actions, at their discretion.
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Tikal, Cartagena, Arimaa
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Alliances
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Games with partnerships offer players a set of rules for alliances and teams. Partners are often able to win as a team, or penalities are enforced for not respecting alliances.
|
The Resistance, Dune, Tragedy Looper, Ultimate Werewolf
|
Area control/Area influence
|
Control of an area is awarded to the player that has the majority of units or influence in that area.
|
Eclipse
|
Area Enclosure
|
This term refers to the mechanism that has a player attempting to surround or fence off an area - usually in order to control it, cause it to score, or eliminate it from play.
|
Go, Boxes
|
Area Movement
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A mechanism used chiefly for war games: movement traverses irregular areas rather than a grid and this choice makes the game develop on more than one front.
|
El Grande, Dead of Winter, War of the ring
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Area-Impulse
|
Game is articulated through a series of impulses, a mean of activating map areas and moving units in those areas to accomplish movement and combat.
|
Storm over Arnhem, Thunder at Cassino, Turning Point: Stalingrad, Breakout: Normandy
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Auction/Bidding
|
Players bid or auction on resources to get them and win.
|
Modern Art, Ra, For Sale
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Betting/Wagering
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Players act evaluating cards value, discarding them, making a guess on the result and bidding on it.
|
Tichu
|
Campaign/Battle Card Driven
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Cards or campaign text depict events, and the challenge is in making decisions and plan their usage to win.
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We the people, Hannibal: Rome vs Carthage, Twilight Struggle
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Card Drafting
|
Players select cards from a subset of the available cards to form a deck or hand or to select the next card to play. Often done in turns until a requisite number of cards have been drafted. Also done with components other than cards.
|
Through the Ages, Mage Knight, 7 Wonders
|
Chit-Pull System
|
Commonly used in war games to address the problem of simulating simultaneous action on the battlefield and issues of command and control. In such a system the current player randomly draws a chit or counter identifying a group of units which may now be moved. Schemes include moving any units commanded by a particular leader, moving units of a particular quality or activating units not for movement but for fighting.
|
Zulus on the ramparts, A victory lost
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Co-operative Play
|
Players work together toward a common goal. In purely cooperative games all players win or lose together. Semi-cooperative games may have unknown traitors. Cooperative play sometimes coexists in tension with competitive scoring.
|
Pandemic, Escape, Battlestar Galactica, Castle Panic
|
Commodity Speculation
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Players buy and sell resources or company shares in the hopes of predicting price changes and making money.
|
Acquire, Kanban, Merchant of Venus
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Crayon Rail System
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Players draw tracks between cities. See also Route/Network building.
|
Empire builder, Eurorails
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Deck/Pool Building
|
Players start the game with a pre-determined set of cards / player pieces and add and change those pieces over the course of the game. Many deck-building games provide the players with a currency that they use to "buy" new items that are integrated into the deck or pool. These new resources generally expand the capabilities of the player and allow the player to build an "engine" to drive their future plays in the course of the game.
|
Dominion, Star Realms, Marvel Legendary
|
Dice Rolling
|
Players roll dice to determine inputs or outcomes.
|
Roll for the Galaxy, Mice and Mystics, Yahtzee, Wingspan, Grand Austria Hotel
|
Grid movement
|
The board is completely covered in squares (as in Chess) or hexagons (as in Hey!, That's my Fish!) that allow unrestricted or nearly unrestricted movement in any direction and to any square or hex. This movement mechanic is commonly used in both abstract strategy games and wargames.
|
Space Hulk, Forbidden Desert
|
Hand Management
|
Managing your hand means gaining the most value out of available cards under given circumstances. Players are rewarded for playing the cards in certain sequences or groups. The optimal sequence/grouping may vary, depending on board position, cards held and cards played by opponents. Cards often have multiple uses in the game, further obfuscating an "optimal" sequence.
|
Android: Netrunner, Through the Ages
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Hex-and-Counter
|
Classic wargame mechanic, played with 'Counters' on a map with an Hexagonal grid allowing to move the counters in more directions (6) as opposed to a square grid with only four directions.
|
Twilight Imperium, Advanced Squad Leader,
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Line Drawing
|
Games using the line drawing mechanic involve the drawing of lines, for example to connect objects, to isolate objects, or to create areas.
|
Telestrations, Pictionary, Cranium, Sprouts
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Memory
|
Players are required to recall previous game events or information in order to reach an objective.
|
Codenames, Hanabi, Coup, Sleuth, Clue
|
Modular Board
|
The playing area consists of tiles, cards, or other pieces, usually identical in size, that can be placed in multiple arrangements. Placement may be random or fixed according to a scenario.
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Settlers of Catan, Mansions of Madness, Blue Moon City, Kingdom Builder
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Paper-and-Pencil
|
The game is developed using paper and pen to mark and save responses or attributes that, at the end of the game, are used to score points and determine the winner.
|
Eat poop you cat, Scattergories
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Pattern Building
|
Players place game components in specific patterns in order to gain specific or variable game results.
|
Castles of Mad King Ludwig, Aquarius
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Pattern Recognition
|
Markers, usually with a color or pattern, are placed or added on different random or pre-determined locations relative to a board or the markers themselves. As the markers move during play the player has to recognize a known pattern created by the markers to gain a good, points or win the game.
|
Quirkle, Ingenious, Ubongo, Jungle Speed, Cathedral, Pentagon
|
Pick-up and Deliver
|
Players must pick up an item at one location on the playing board and bring it to another location on the playing board. Initial placement of the item can be either predetermined or random. The delivery of the item usually gives the player resources to do more actions with. In most cases, there is a game rule or another mechanic that determines where the item needs to go.
|
Merchants and Marauders, Indonesia, Genoa
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Player elimination
|
Player elimination occurs in multiple-player games (>2) when a player can be eliminated from the game and play continues without the eliminated player. There are also games where achieving the win condition will eliminate you from the game and the last person remaining is the loser.
|
Magic: The Gathering, King of Tokyo, Diplomacy
|
Point to Point Movement
|
On a board of a game with point-to-point movement, there are certain spots that can be occupied by markers, e. g. cities on a map. These points are connected by lines, and movement can only happen along these lines. It is not enough that two points are next to or close to each other; if there is no connecting line between them, a player cannot move his or her piece from one to the other.
|
Arkham Horror, Tales of the Arabian Nights
|
Press your Luck
|
Games where you repeat an action (or part of an action) until you decide to stop due to increased (or not) risk of losing points or your turn. Press Your Luck games include both Risk Management and Risk Valuation games, in which risk is driven by the game mechanisms and valuing how much other players value what you also want, respectively.
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Goa, Ra, Incan Gold
|
Rock-Paper-Scissors
|
A kind of unit, move, or strategy is balanced, winning against some alternatives and losing to others. The best play varies, depending on what the opponent chooses.
|
Sid Meier's Civilization, Yomi, Dungeon Quest
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Role Playing
|
Some board games incorporate elements of role playing. It can be that players control a character that improves over time. It can also be a game that encourages or inspires Storytelling. This mechanic can be viewed as an extension of Variable Player Powers.
|
Chaos in the old world, Descent: Journeys in the Dark
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Roll/Spin and Move
|
Players roll dice or spin spinners and move playing pieces in accordance with the roll.
|
Monopoly, Marrakech, Formula Dè
|
Route/Network building
|
Game play features network(s) (interconnected lines with nodes) using owned, partially owned or neutral pieces, with an emphasis on building the longest chain and/or connecting areas or fixed points on the board. See also Crayon Rail System.
|
Power Grid, Railways of the World, Food Chain Magnate
|
Secret Unit Deployment
|
Gameplay contains hidden information. Only the player controlling certain playing pieces has perfect information about the nature (or even the whereabouts) of those pieces. This mechanic is often used in wargames to simulate "fog of war".
|
Letters from Whitechapel, Fury of Dracula
|
Set Collection
|
Players seek prescribed combinations of items, such as three-of-a-kind. Turning in sets typically yields rewards or fulfills a victory condition.
|
Gin Rummy, Lords of Waterdeep
|
Simulation
|
Simulation games are games that attempt to model actual events or situations.
|
Memoir '44, Flash Point: Fire Rescue
|
Simultaneous Action Selection
|
Instead of taking turns in order, all players choose their moves and then reveal them simultaneously to be resolved.
|
7 Wonders, Jamaica
|
Singing
|
Players hum or sing familiar tunes in order to fulfill certain game requirements.
|
Cranium
|
Stock Holding
|
Stock holding is a subcategory of Commodity Speculation, in which instead of purchasing or selling an entire commodity, players purchase and sell (or hold) a share in a given company, commodity or nation.
|
Mombasa, Rapa Nui, Tesla vs Edison
|
Storytelling
|
Players can be provided with conceptual, written, or pictorial stimuli which must be incorporated into a story of the players' creation. Alternatively, players don't create their own stories, but instead experience a story from the inside as one of the participants. Games along those lines might present players with a particular narrative situation, after which the player will make a choice that affects which end to the narrative is told — with the results of this narrative affecting the player's standing in the game.
|
Tales of the Arabian Nights, Dixit, Rory's Story Cubes
|
Take That
|
Maneuvers that directly attack an opposing player's strength, level, life points or do something else to impede their progress, while usually providing the main engine for player interaction in the game. Usually used in card games.
|
Cosmic Encounter, Saboteur, Bang, Munchkin
|
Tile Placement
|
Players take turns in laying tiles in positions allowed by the rules. Tiles may constitute a modular board (see above), but not all modular boards are laid by players' choice.
|
Carcassonne, Keyflower
|
Time Track
|
A variable player-turn order mechanism by which the player who is last on the time track goes next. The function of this mechanism can allow a player to have multiple sequential turns due to being last after each one. The basic premise is that you can choose to do a longer, slower task in the game, but in the meantime, a player taking shorter, quicker actions might change the "landscape" of the playfield. It is arguably a derivative of "action point" systems, except in the case of time tracks, the player doesn't have a fixed number of points she can or must use on her turn.
|
Horus Heresy, Tokaido
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Trading
|
Players exchange game items between each other.
|
Tikal, Antiquity, Fief, Bohnanza
|
Trick-taking
|
Players lay down cards, typically following the suit of the first card in each round. The values of the cards determine the winner, that collects all cards played in that round. A certain number of tricks may be needed to win, or certain cards taken in tricks may give positive or negative points.
|
Hearts, Haggis, Rook
|
Variable Phase Order
|
The order in which Game Phases occur can be varied throughout the game.
|
Puerto Rico, Race for the Galaxy, Citadels, Myth
|
Variable Player Powers
|
Players play according to slightly different rules due to that there are different factions or roles in the game.
|
Cosmic Encounter, Dominant Species, Sentinel of the Multiverse
|
Voting
|
Players vote to determine a group's decision.
|
Werewolf, Battlestar Galactica, Patchistory
|
Worker Placement
|
Sometimes called "action drafting" or "action blocking", players select actions to be taken each round by placement of tokens (or "workers") from a limited resource pool, often into restricted action selection areas.
|
Agricola, Terra Mystica, Caylus, Caverna, Le Havre, Orleans, Ora et Labora
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