Barony

You are an ambitious baron, and the land is up for grabs. Barony starts by building the board at random: every player adds nine tiles of three hexes each, in forest, plains, field, mountain or lake, so no two maps match. Then each of you places three cities with a knight inside, and from there you take turns doing exactly one thing: recruit knights, march them across the terrain, and more. Lakes block your knights, mountains and enemy cities hold them back, and every extra knight you shove into a contested space tilts the odds. It is a short, tactical land grab with almost no luck, a bit like a pocket-size Risk for people who like thinking ahead.