Coronation
Coronation Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Components
I. Game board
II. Doctor Lind's card deck:
- 1 note (malyava) for the underground passage
- 6 cab tickets
- 15 traps
- 2 turn-skip cards
III. Detectives' card deck:
- 10 cab tickets
- 15 instruments, 3 cards of each kind:
- Respirator
- Revolver
- Money
- Lock pick
- First-aid kit
IV. 6 character cards
V. 92 location cards
VI. 6 character tokens with stands
VII. Rules
Setup
- Carefully open the box and take out the components. Punch out the character tokens and place them in the plastic stands.
- Lay out the board in the centre of the table.
- Divide the game cards into three decks:
- Doctor Lind's deck
- Detectives' deck
- Location deck
The game is built on the opposition between Doctor Lind and five detectives. Before the game starts, decide who plays the villain and who plays the detectives. One player is needed for the role of Doctor Lind, and the detectives are shared among all the others. Players may draw lots for the character cards, or decide who is best at the criminal's duties and who is best at working as a group. Players take the character cards they receive.
Attention: The detective team always consists of five virtuosos of detection. The player of Lind may be opposed by not five opponents; Coronation is easy to set up even for two. However, whatever the number of detective players, five characters are at their disposal. How should the heroes be divided? With two or six players the method is obvious. With any other number, one or two of the players will have to take charge of an additional character. If it is hard to decide who takes on the extra responsibility, lots will always help. The table below sums it up.
| Number of detective players | Card distribution |
|---|---|
| 1 | 5 |
| 2 | 3 x 2 |
| 3 | 2 x 2 x 1 |
| 4 | 2 x 1 x 1 x 1 |
| 5 | 1 x 1 x 1 x 1 x 1 |
One more variant: shared control of the detective team. All players who oppose Lind jointly choose the course of action of each character.
Roles are assigned. Now the detective cards must be dealt to the characters. Each character must receive 5 cards. We recommend giving each hero 2 cab tickets and 3 instruments, but the players choose. They may rely on chance and draw cards from the deck blindly, one at a time or five at once. Instruments may be separated from tickets so that players can plan which type of card to equip their detectives with. Finally, they are free to decide who receives which equipment.
Attention: Equipment is issued to the detective, not to the player. Even if one player directs two, three or even five characters, the property of each must lie separately from the belongings of their colleagues and be used only by that detective.
While the detectives arm themselves, the player of Lind receives and lays out his cards and the location deck as he likes, without revealing them to the opponents. If you play a detective, choose any location on the board from which your character will begin the search for Lind, and place the detective's token there. Lind's token is not placed on the board.
Now the game is ready: the right to the first action is given to Doctor Lind.
Game Process
A turn in Coronation consists of successive actions by six characters. Every turn is started by Lind, and after him each of the doctor's five opponents performs one action, in any order that suits all the detective players.
Doctor Lind moves around Moscow from point to point, leaving behind a trail of traps and clues, while his player builds a route out of location cards. The detectives, for whom it matters to pick up the criminal's trail, in turn comb the city's streets. They reveal the location cards on Lind's route and work out the paths of his possible escape.
Lind's Actions
Uninvited Guest
The first turn of the game begins with Doctor Lind appearing in Moscow. The player chooses an empty location card (one without a detective token) from the deck and places it face down on the table in front of himself. Lind performs this action only at the start of the game, and immediately after it he has the right to move. In the following turns, Lind's action consists of only one move and the accompanying steps (stealing jewels, setting a trap, discarding a ticket).
Moving Lind
Doctor Lind may leave a location in one of the following ways:
I. On foot, along a red line to an adjacent location.
II. By cab, along a green line to an adjacent location; the player discards 1 ticket.
III. Through the underground passage, if both locations have an entrance to the underground, and the player discards the note (malyava) into the underground passage.
Once Lind is moved to a new location, the player finds its card in the deck and places it face down next to the card of the location left behind. In the end, a long route of location cards will appear on the table. Place Lind's token on the last card laid out.
Attention: Among the 92 locations, the more of them Lind has passed through, the higher the probability that the player will forget where his character has been. However, if he does not reveal at least one location card visited by the detectives after him, this leads to a "technical defeat" for Doctor Lind. For example, if it turns out that Erast Fandorin was in location 21 on turn 13, and Lind, who left it on turn 10, did not reveal this card, the detectives win even if the time of the game has run out or the doctor has stolen all the jewels. We strongly recommend that all players write the numbers or names of the traversed sections into separate lists, for example "13. Fandorin, 21", or in whatever way is convenient and clear to the players. With such "route sheets", each player can verify, when checking Lind's route, that the rules were not broken.
When performing an action, Lind may not:
- visit the same location twice (its card is already lying on the table);
- move into a location occupied by a detective (he is caught immediately);
- stay in place.
Stealing Coronation Jewels
The coronation jewels that Lind hunts are guarded in several places in Moscow, specially marked on the board. When Doctor Lind leaves a location with the jewel symbol, one regalia at the House of the Romanovs becomes fewer. For a quick and decisive victory, Lind must pass through all such locations. Having left the last one, he must announce his victory and reveal all the route cards marked with a crown symbol, to confirm his words.
Setting Traps
When Lind leaves a location on foot along a red line, he may choose any trap from his deck and place it face down on the location card, without revealing it to the detectives. The doctor does not have time to set a trap when escaping through the underground passage or by cab.
Tickets and Notes in the Underground Passage
If Doctor Lind leaves a location by cab, the player must discard a ticket, that is, place it face down on the location card. In the same way, when using the underground passage, the player drops a note (malyava) into the underground passage. Since all of Lind's cards have an identical back, his opponents cannot tell which method of movement the criminal chose.
Turn-Skip Cards
Twice per game, Lind may hide in a location, that is, the player does not move his character. To do this, he places any location card (which he clearly does not plan to use further) face down in front of himself and puts a turn-skip card on it, in the same way as a ticket or a trap. For the detectives, this action looks like a normal move, but the villain in fact goes nowhere.
If the detectives later enter the location the player chose for the turn-skip card, nothing happens. Lind must not reveal this location, because he was not actually there; this card is used only as a marker.
Extraordinary Movement
The traps "Suspicious Snack", "Young Criminal" and "Hey, with the Wind!" allow Lind to leave a location immediately after a detective has suffered from the trap (that is, could not avoid it). The doctor moves from the location to any adjacent location along a red line. The card of the location he left must be replaced with a new one, without showing it to the detectives.
Detectives' Actions
As soon as Doctor Lind has finished his action, the detectives go into action. They move by the same rules as the criminal, except that they have no note for the underground passage. They remain to chase Lind by cab, spending tickets, or on foot. Moreover, a detective cannot skip a turn unless, of course, he is gathering information in a special location (see below).
Hot on the Trail
A detective's service is dangerous and hard. It is not enough to turn over every stone in a huge city in search of the criminal, constantly risking a trap. But the efforts are rewarded with clues. Doctor Lind leaves traces almost at every step ("almost", since he is not obliged to set traps if for some reason he does not want to). The player who takes on the doctor's duties (the player keeping Lind's route) follows the progress of the chase closely.
- If a detective's token ends up in a location Lind has already visited, the card of that location on the route must be revealed together with any card left there.
- If a trap was set in the location, the detective has a chance to defuse or avoid it with the instrument indicated in the text of the trap card. If the necessary instrument is absent, the detective has suffered from the trap: he must act as the text of the card says (for example, stay in this location for one turn). One good thing: now the detectives know that Lind left this place on foot, so the pursuit will follow the red lines.
- If a ticket or a note was left in the location, this find causes the detectives no trouble. On the contrary, it allows them to understand how the villain hid from here.
Detective movement options: the figure on the sheet shows a detective on location 31 who may move on to location 16 or to location 37.
Special Locations
There are several places in Moscow where detectives can obtain information about Lind's movements. A detective who enters a location marked with one of the instrument symbols (respirator, revolver, money, lock pick or first-aid kit) may refuse to move on the next turn. Instead of moving, the detective discards the instrument card indicated on that location and gains the right to open the location on Lind's route where Lind was 4 turns earlier. The trap or ticket card remains lying face down. Afterwards, detectives may visit this location to find out how Lind left it.
Explanation: between the location where Lind is now and the location the detective will open, three closed locations must remain.