Today we cracked open Dominion to have a family play - and once it got going, they were pretty happy with it - it seems fairly complex, but it is pretty easy; everyone starts the same deck of ten cards but over time the players start to gain Action and other money cards and build a deck of their own. When 3 piles of cards are used up or all of the top scoring Victory Cards are finished, its game over - whomever has the most Victory Card amount wins.
Sounds simple, but it is fairly complex in its approach and strategy, but its easy to pick - the girls were fine with it and enjoyed it. The best bit about the game for me is the fact that everyone starts with the same set of cards (7 copper and 3 Estate cards - worth 1 victory point each) and from there you determine your own strategy and overall fate in the game.
The Turn is three phases - play an Action card from your hand (if you have one), Buy another card with the money in your hand, Clean up the cards on the table.
An Action card is one card from 10 piles that can be purchased in the Buy phase - the cost of the card increasing depending on what is can do. For example one of the most expensive cards is Mine which when played allows you to turn a low amount treasure/coin card into a higher one ready for the Buy phase. In the box there are lots of different Action cards, but only 10 piles can be used per game, meaning lots of different combinations to play with.
You can also buy more expensive money to then use later on or in a future turn. Once a purchase is made, used cards and the purchased card go into a discard pile and a new set of cards is drawn from your personal draw pile. Once this is used up, at any point, the Discard pile is shuffled and cards can start to be drawn from it again.
It does sound complex, but it isn't. Our first game last 1.5hrs mainly for rules re-reads and catching up with play and mechanics, but I suspect our next game will be much quicker.
