Designer: Antoine Bauza

You are one of ancient earth’s great civilizations, competing with each other to build the mightiest wonder, or if nothing else, a good bathhouse.

7 Wonders is a card drafting game. Each player will be given a hand of cards. From that, they’ll choose the card that they want, and pass the rest to a neighboring player, who will then choose a card from that hand, and pass it around. Since all of these hands are rotating simultaneously, game speed remains quick even with 7 players.

What you build are resources, military outposts, scientific studies, various leisure rooms and, in the final round, cards that are worth victory points for whatever else you’ve managed to build. Those cards in particular are prone to hate-drafting (i.e. drafting nearly useless cards that you see as being highly valuable to the game’s leader).

Interesting Mechanic: Only Caring About Your Neighbors. 7 Wonders isn’t the most interactive game in the world, and given the need to keep the game moving, it would be reasonable if it were very close to solitaire. But it’s not, really – the game has you care primarily about only your neighbors. Your military is compared only to your immediate neighbors, for example, and if you lack resources you need, you can also purchase them from immediate neighbors. This system allows for, even in a game with 7 people, players to see all possible multiplayer interactions they have as they are all within easy eyesight.

7 Wonders is in a lot of game collections, not just because it’s a simple game with a relatively novel core mechanic (card drafting), but because it is very fast to play and comfortably seats 7. The Leaders expansion is also worth considering. While it adds perhaps too much iconography for the game for casual players, it also gives players strong identities and goals, and mixes up the core gameplay quite a bit.

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(Photo Credit: The Board Game Family)