18Dracula 2019

18Dracula is a print-and-play 18XX board game where the players buy and sell shares in fronts, and operate those fronts to hire monsters to send on rampages to harvest blood. The winner is the player who is worth the most blood at the end of the game - being their blood supply, and the combined value of their shares in fronts.

Functionally, the game is very close to being a retheme of 1830. Despite lacking trains, it is very much a train game.

Besides its theme, it is also novel for its map, monsters (which replace trains), and associates (which replace privates). The map uses cubes and nodes instead of tiles (like most 18xx games). You clear routes by removing cubes from the routes.

Some monsters have special rules - such as a ghost being able to pass through a token, or a werewolf that roams adjacent towns instead of a solid route. Associates have some odd abilities, like opening a route between any two towns.

—description from the designer