Designed by Derek Croxton and published by Play to Z Games, King's Coalition is a set collection card game played over six rounds where the 2-6 players will each recruit a card from the draw pile or face-up display and dismiss a card from their hand to the face-up display where it can be recruited by a subsequent player.
The cards in King's Coalition are in eight 'classes' (ie: suits) with face values that vary in range according to the suit. For example, the Peasant cards are the most numerous (12 cards) but their face values are all 1 or 2; by contrast, there are only six Noble cards but these have face values in the range 7-12. At the end of the six rounds, each card in your hand scores for its face value as well as for sets of three or more, sequences, and whichever additional scoring cards are in play for the game. In addition, each suit has a special power which can affect game play and scoring. For example, a Knight lets you appoint a Peasant, Artisan, Gentry or Merchant card to treat it as another Knight...
Four of the six scoring cards are selected at random and start off face down, only revealed one by one at the start of a round. Some of these only score if particular suits are missing from your hand, so they may well push players to adapt their strategy over the course of the game. It's these gradually revealed scoring cards that principally distinguish King's Coalition from the otherwise similar Fantasy Realms (WizKids) and its variants Star Trek: Missions and Marvel: Remix. The cards in King's Coalition generally have simpler interactions than those in the WizKids games, so this card game could prove to be the easiest to introduce to novice players.
Play to Z have also published, as a promo, four Jester cards. The Jester adds a ninth short suit with potentially powerful effects but with face values of zero or negative points.