Cupcake Empire Rulebook

Table of Contents

Components
- 4 Personal Boards
- 1 City Board divided into 6 neighbourhoods
Setup
Rules for Placing Dice and Improvements in the 5 Action Columns
Game Play
The Rest Area and Special Actions
- Rest Area
- Special Actions
End of the Game
Objectives
- Deck A
- Deck B
- Deck C
- Deck D
Credits

Components

40 dice (12 grey, 4 pink, 6 purple, 6 orange, 6 green, 6 yellow). These represent the employees who will perform the different tasks of your business.
28 Frostings (16 simple and 12 mixed).
28 Cake Bases (16 simple and 12 mixed).

These Frostings and Cake Bases will be used to form the different cupcake recipes.

24 Customers (3 in each of the 8 combinations). Serving these customers, players will increase their Sales Level and their Income.
24 Improvements (4 in each of the 6 types). They allow for additional actions during the game.
12 Bright Ideas. They are used to carry out Special Actions.
20 Discs (5 in each of the 4 colours). These serve to record the accumulated Income and indicate the Objectives achieved during the game.
12 Bakeries (3 in each of the 4 colours). In addition to increasing the Production Level, they also serve as Retail Outlets.
24 Retail Outlets (6 in each of the 4 colours). From these Retail Outlets you can access the different neighbourhoods where the customers are located.
12 Cubes (3 in each of the 4 colours). These serve to record the advances made on the Bright Ideas, Sales Level and Production Level Tracks.
20 Objectives. Each one of them allows players who fulfill its requirements to advance 6 steps on the Income Track.
4 Player Aids. These summarize the Special Actions that the players can carry out on their turn as well as the production values of the different Frostings and Cake Bases.
1 Start Player Token
1 Rulebook

4 Personal Boards

These represent each player's business. They contain the different Action Columns (A); Tracks for: Bright Ideas (B), Production Level (C) and Sales Level (D); the Rest Area (E) and the Customer Board (F).

1 City Board divided into 6 neighbourhoods

(1 starting grey, 2 yellow and 3 beige)

Each of the neighbourhoods will start with 4 customers and have spaces for Bakeries (A) and Retail Outlets (B). Around this board is the Income Track (C) where players will record their Income, which in this game are the victory points.

Setup

Place the City Board in the center of the table and randomly distribute the customers so that there is one lying down in each of the buildings.
Form a Reserve with the Cake Bases, Frostings, dice, Improvements and Bright Ideas based on the number of players as follows:

	2 PLAYERS	3 PLAYERS	4 PLAYERS
Simple Cake Bases	All	All	All
Mixed Cake Bases	All	All	All
Simple Frostings	2 of each kind	3 of each kind	All
Mixed Frostings	1 of each kind	1 of each kind	All
Dice*	1 of each colour	1 of each colour	2 of each colour
Improvements	2 of each kind	3 of each kind	All
Bright Ideas	6	9	All

*Grey dice are not part of the Reserve. If they are left over, they are returned to the game box (see below). In 4-player games there are no pink dice in the Reserve.

Separate the Objectives according to the letter of their back (A, B, C and D), shuffle each deck separately and place one Objective, chosen randomly from each deck, face up above the City Board. All the other Objectives are returned to the game box.
Each player takes a Personal Board, a Player Aid, 8 dice (3 grey, 1 purple, 1 yellow, 1 green, 1 orange and 1 pink) and takes 3 Cubes, 5 Discs, 3 Bakeries and 6 Retail Outlets of the same colour.
Each player places on the City Board:
- 1 Disc on space 5 of the Income Track.
- 1 Bakery in one of the dedicated spaces in the grey neighbourhood.
Each player places on their Personal Board:
- One cube in the green box of the Bright Ideas Track, another in box 2 of the Production Level Track and another in box 1 of the Sales Level Track.
- The purple, yellow, orange, green and pink dice in the topmost free space on the Action Column corresponding to their colour, showing the number of said column.
- The 3 grey dice that you must roll and place in the Action Columns that correspond to the number they show, always in the topmost free space on the column. The dice that show a 6 are rolled again until a different result is obtained so that they can be placed on a column.
The rest of the Discs, Bakeries and all the Retail Outlets remain next to their respective Personal Boards.

Note: In 2-player games, spaces marked on the City Board with 3/4 and 4 must be blocked by placing the Retail Outlets of an unused colour. In 3-player games only the spaces marked with 4 are blocked.
Mix 6 Improvements face down from the Reserve, one of each type. Next, each player takes one randomly and places it in the topmost free space on the Action Column of their choice. Unselected Improvements are returned to the Reserve.
Finally, the Start Player is chosen at random. The person chosen takes the Start Player Token and then, beginning with the player sitting to their right and continuing anti-clockwise, each one chooses from the Reserve a combination of one simple Cake Base and one simple Frosting that they assemble. Each player must choose a combination that has not been chosen before them, so that each player starts the game with a different recipe.

Note: The Reserve of Cake Bases, Frostings, dice, Improvements and Bright Ideas is limited to the available elements. All leftover components are returned to the game box.

Rules for Placing Dice and Improvements in the 5 Action Columns

The Action Columns (1 to 5) are each divided into 2 columns, one with square spaces for the dice (your workers), and the other with circular spaces for the Improvements of your business.

As already noted in the setup, both the dice and the Improvements must always be placed in the topmost free space of the column. This rule applies regardless of the reason why you should place dice or Improvements on your Personal Board, as will be seen later in the rules. Topmost free space means the free space closest to the character on the column.

Game Play

Cupcake Empire is mainly a dice game. Your Personal Board represents your business and the dice your workers. In each of the columns of that board you can carry out one specific action; create new recipes for cupcakes, open new stores, serve customers, hire new workers, etc. On each turn you will have to decide which column you are going to activate, taking into account that the more dice there are and the more specialised they are, the more effective the action will be. Through these actions you will increase your level of sales and production, trying to get them to grow in equal measure since at the end of each of your turns your Income will increase by the amount indicated by the track that is the furthest behind.

Game Turn

The game is played in rounds, beginning with the Start Player and continuing clockwise, until a player reaches or exceeds 70 on the Income Track.

Each player plays their turn in full before moving on to the next player's turn. On your turn you must:

Activate one of the 5 columns of your Personal Board and perform an action of that column. Optionally, you can also activate the Improvements that are placed in the chosen column.
Advance your Income marker as many steps as your Sales or Production Level indicates, always the one that is the furthest behind. Additionally, you will also score the Objectives that you have fulfilled.
Roll all the dice of the Action Column that you have activated, placing each of them in the columns that correspond to the number that they show, except any 6 that will go to your Rest Area.

Optionally, at any time on your turn you can use the dice that are in your Rest Area and/or perform a Special Action.

1. Activate an Action Column and its Improvements

Each column has an associated type of action and several activation levels. The activation level will depend on the quantity and the colour of the dice placed on it. Dice which are the same colour as the column in which they are found are considered "Specialists", and the joker pink dice act as "Specialists" in all the columns, including the one of their colour.

First, check the activation level (coloured rectangles) reached by the dice in the column you have chosen. You can carry out the action that your dice reach or any of the previous ones. But if among those dice there is one or more "Specialist", each of them will allow you to jump to the next activation level, thus expanding the range of available actions.

In addition to the action of the column, if there is one or more associated Improvements, you can activate each of them before or after the action, as long as the activation level reaches or surpasses the space where they are located.

In this situation you can not perform any action in columns 1 and 5 or use the Improvements associated with them since in both cases the activation level does not reach the first action (A). If you decide to activate column 2 you can only perform the first action since with 3 dice, and none of them "Specialists", you do not get to the second one (B). However, in column 3, even though there are also 3 dice, you can perform the first or second action since you have a "Specialist" (the orange die) that allows you to jump to the next activation level (C). If you decide on column 4, you can perform the first action even if you do not reach it as the pink die (joker) acts as a "Specialist". You can also activate the first 2 Improvements of that column (not the third) because the activation level allows you to reach those spaces (D).

Main Actions in Each Column

Column 1: Bake Bases for Cupcakes

Level 1: Choose a simple Cake Base from the Reserve.
Level 2: Take a mixed Cake Base from the Reserve.
Level 3: Choose one simple Cake Base and take one mixed Cake Base from the Reserve.

Column 2: Prepare Frostings for Cupcakes

Level 1: Choose a simple Frosting from the Reserve.
Level 2: Choose a mixed Frosting from the Reserve.
Level 3: Choose one simple Frosting and one mixed Frosting from the Reserve.

Create New Cupcake Recipes

The Cake Bases and Frostings that you obtain through the actions described are placed next to your Personal Board. At any time during your turn, and not necessarily in the turn in which you get these elements, you can assemble Cake Bases with Frostings to create new recipes.

Immediately after creating a recipe you must increase your Production Level: 2 steps if both parts are simple, 3 steps if one of the parts is simple and the other mixed, or 4 steps if both parts are mixed. Once a recipe has been created it can not be changed and will allow you to serve customers who ask for those flavours.

With these recipes, your Production Level would increase as follows: simple base + simple frosting +2; simple + mixed +3; mixed + simple +3; mixed + mixed +4.

Column 3: Open Retail Outlets in the City

Level 1: Open a Retail Outlet in a yellow neighbourhood.
Level 2: Open a Retail Outlet in a beige neighbourhood.
Level 3: Open one Retail Outlet in a yellow neighbourhood and one Retail Outlet in a beige neighbourhood.

The action consists of placing one of your Retail Outlets in a free space in a neighbourhood of the permitted colour. Each Retail Outlet you open will immediately increase your Sales Level one step.

If you choose a neighbourhood without free spaces, you can remove the Retail Outlet of another player to place your own. The expelled player returns said Retail Outlet to their reserve and immediately decreases their Sales Level 1 step. In games of 2 and 3 players, you can not remove the outlets of the colour used to block spaces in different neighbourhoods.

If there are no Retail Outlets in your reserve, you can reposition one of the ones you already have in the city. In this case, your Sales Level will not alter.

By choosing the yellow neighbourhood where all the spaces were already occupied, you can substitute another player's Retail Outlet for one of yours. You increase your Sales Level 1 step and the white player, whose Retail Outlet you have removed, decreases their Sales Level 1 step.

Column 4: Sell Cupcakes

Level 1: Sell cupcakes to a customer that is up to 2 houses away in one of the neighbourhoods where you have a Bakery or Retail Outlet.
Level 2: Sell cupcakes to a customer that is up to 3 houses away in one of the neighbourhoods where you have a Bakery or Retail Outlet.
Level 3: Sell cupcakes to a customer that is up to 4 houses away in one of the neighbourhoods where you have a Bakery or Retail Outlet.

Note: The distance where the customers are located is indicated in the mailboxes located on the margins of the city.

A municipal law requires citizens to wear the colours that correspond to their preferences in terms of cupcake flavours. The trousers should be light brown or dark brown, depending on whether they prefer a normal or chocolate Cake Base, and the yellow, dark brown, green or red T-shirt, depending on whether they prefer lemon, chocolate, mint or strawberry Frosting.

In order to serve a customer you must have at least one cupcake recipe assembled with the combination of flavours that the customer demands, bearing in mind that the colour of their trousers refers to the flavour of the Cake Base and the T-shirt to the Frosting. The mixed Cake Bases and mixed Frostings allow you to serve any customer that has a preference for either of the two flavours.

The action consists of taking the customer that has been served, placing them on the space of your Customer Board that corresponds to the sales value it provides, and immediately increase your Sales Level and your Income according to the values indicated in their house.

Note: The number of customers that you can accumulate for each sales value is not limited to the spaces depicted on the Customer Board.

Column 4 allows you to sell up to 3 houses away. In a beige neighbourhood you have a Retail Outlet and there is a customer at that distance who wants chocolate based cupcakes with mint Frosting, a recipe that you have. Therefore, take the customer, place them in the sales value space 3 of your Customer Board and increase 3 steps both your Sales Level and your Income (as indicated by the customer's house).

Column 5: Contract New Staff and Expand Business

Level 1: Choose a die from the Reserve and place it in the Action Column of its colour on your Personal Board.
Level 2: Choose a die from the Reserve and place it in the Action Column of its colour on your Personal Board. Also, choose an Improvement from the Reserve and place it in any column on your Personal Board.
Level 3: Place a Bakery in a free space in a yellow neighbourhood and immediately increase both your Sales Level and your Production Level by one step. Also, choose an Improvement from the Reserve and place it in any column on your Personal Board.
Level 4: Place a Bakery in a free space in a beige neighbourhood and immediately increase both your Sales Level and your Production Level by two steps OR activate any column of your Personal Board and perform the action you want regardless of the number and the colour of the dice there. If you choose this second option, the Improvements that are activated are still those of column 5, not those of the column that you have chosen the action of.

The dice in column 5 allow you to activate any of its levels as you have a "Specialist" (the pink die). You choose level 4 that allows you to place a Bakery in a beige neighbourhood, and thereby increase 2 steps your Production Level and Sales Level, or perform any action of another column. You choose to perform the action of another column (4) and sell up to 4 houses away, even though the dice that are there do not allow it. The Improvements in column 5 are not activated.

Unlike the Retail Outlets, the Bakeries can not be replaced by those of another player, so that once placed they remain in place for the rest of the game.

A pink die obtained in levels 1 or 2 is placed in this same column but does not modify the action taken.

The Improvements obtained in levels 2 or 3 can be placed in this same column and can therefore be activated immediately.

The Improvements

You start the game with one of them and during the game you can get more using a Bright Idea or through the actions of level 2 and 3 of column 5. There are 6 different types of Improvements and each of them provides you with the following actions:

Choose a simple Cake Base from the Reserve.
Choose a simple Frosting from the Reserve.
Open a Retail Outlet in a yellow neighbourhood.
Sell cupcakes to a customer that is up to 2 houses away in one of the neighbourhoods where you have a Bakery or Retail Outlet.
Advance your Income marker 3 steps.
Move your Bright Ideas marker 2 steps.

Note: You can not place 2 identical Improvements in the same column.

2. Advance the Income Marker

After solving the activated column, check your Production and Sales levels and advance your Income marker on the City Board as many steps as indicated by the Track that is furthest behind.

Additionally, if you have completed one or more of the 4 Objectives in play, place your discs on the corresponding objectives to show this and immediately advance your Income marker 6 steps for each completed Objective.

Your Sales Level is the one that is furthest behind at 6 and on your current turn you have met the requirements of the Objective A, so you advance your Income marker 12 steps (6+6).

3. Roll All Used Dice

Finally, roll all the dice in the Action Column that you have activated, placing each of them in the columns that correspond to the number they show (regardless of the colour of each one). In the case that there is not enough space in a column for all the dice, place those leftover in your Rest Area.

Place all the 6 obtained directly in your Rest Area. The first 6 of your roll always gives you a Bright Idea, which you must place in the dedicated space of your Personal Board. From then on each 6 allows you to move your Bright Ideas marker one step, always in a clockwise direction. The other players move their respective Bright Ideas markers as many steps as 6 you have rolled.

Each time the Bright Ideas marker of a player reaches or surpasses the green box, whether it is on their turn or not, that player will get a Bright Idea, taking into account that no more than 3 can be held at any given time.

Bright Ideas are used to unlock the dice in the Rest Area as well as to perform part of the Special Actions (see the next section).

After rolling the 5 used dice from column 5, you place each one in the column corresponding to the number they show and the two 6 in the Rest Area. The first 6 gives you a Bright Idea and the second one allows you to move your Bright Ideas marker one step, which means that it reaches the green box, so you get another Bright Idea. All other players move their Bright Ideas markers 2 steps for the two 6 of your roll. Those who by doing this reach the green box with their markers, will also get a Bright Idea.

The Rest Area and Special Actions

The Rest Area and the Special Actions are resources that you can use at any time during your turn, even after having rolled all the dice. Once per turn, you can use the dice that are in your Rest Area and/or perform one of four possible Special Actions.

Rest Area

The Rest Area is where your staff have gone to take a break. This is where you must place all the 6 obtained on your dice rolls. These dice are momentarily blocked, but you can recover them in two different ways:

Using a Bright Idea to move all the dice, or part of them, from the Rest Area to one of the Action Columns (they all must go to the same one).

OR
Moving your Income marker 1 step backwards for each die you want to move from the Rest Area to one of the Action Columns (they all must go to the same one).

The logical use of this action is to place the dice in the column that you are going to activate in order to boost it. In any case, you can not place more dice than there are free spaces in the chosen column.

Special Actions

You have 4 special actions, of which you can only perform one in your turn:

Return a Bright Idea to the Reserve to choose an Improvement from the Reserve, and place it in any column on your Personal Board. If you place the Improvement in the column that you are going to activate, you can benefit from it immediately.
Return a Bright Idea to the Reserve to move a die from one Action Column to another. If you move it to the column that you are going to activate, you can boost it immediately. In the case that a gap is created in the origin column, you must cover it by moving all the dice there upwards.
Move your Income marker 2 steps backwards to get a Bright Idea from the Reserve.
Move your Income marker 3 steps backwards for each die you want to move from one Action Column to another.

End of the Game

When a player, at the end of their turn, reaches or exceeds 70 on the Income Track, this triggers the end of the game. The round is completed so that all players play the same number of turns, after which the game ends.

The player who has gone further on the Income Track will be the winner. In the event of a tie, the player, out of those tied, who has more customers on their Customer Board will win. If the tie persists, the one with the most Retail Outlets in the city will win. If the draw still continues, the tied players share the victory.

Objectives

All the Objectives are available to all players throughout the game but each player can only fulfill each Objective once during the game. Each one of them allows players to advance 6 steps on the Income Track if they fulfill its requirements.

Deck A

This deck is related to the production of cupcakes.

A1. Create recipes with at least 4 simple Frostings.
A2. Create recipes with at least 4 simple Cake Bases.
A3. Create recipes with at least 2 simple Frostings and 2 mixed Frostings.
A4. Create recipes with at least 2 simple Cake Bases and 2 mixed Cake Bases.
A5. Create recipes with at least 2 mixed Frostings and 2 mixed Cake Bases.

Reminder: Creating recipes means assembling a Frosting and a Cake Base. Loose Frostings and Cake Bases do not count towards fulfilling the Objectives of this deck.

Deck B

This deck is related to the sale of cupcakes.

B1. Get at least 5 customers.
B2. Get at least 2 customers with light brown trousers and another 2 with dark brown trousers.
B3. Get at least 4 customers with the 4 colours of T-shirts of the game.
B4. Get at least 2 customers with sales value 1 and another 2 with sales value 2. Customers with sales value 3 do not count towards the fulfillment of this Objective.
B5. Get at least 2 customers with sales value 1 and another 2 with sales value 3. Customers with sales value 2 do not count towards the fulfillment of this Objective.

Deck C

This deck is related to the opening of Retail Outlets and Bakeries.

C1. Open at least 5 Retail Outlets.
C2. Open at least 4 Retail Outlets in 4 different neighbourhoods.
C3. Open at least 2 Retail Outlets in yellow neighbourhoods and another 2 in beige neighbourhoods.
C4. Open at least 2 Retail Outlets in yellow neighbourhoods and 2 Bakeries (the initial Bakery counts towards this Objective).
C5. Open at least 2 Retail Outlets in beige neighbourhoods and 2 Bakeries (the initial Bakery counts towards this Objective).

Note: It may happen that after having fulfilled one of these Objectives, a Retail Outlet is removed and thus the requirements are no longer met. In these cases, the Objective is still considered as being fulfilled.

Deck D

This deck is related to the Improvements of the business.

D1. Place at least 3 Improvements in the same column.
D2. Place at least 5 Improvements.
D3. Place at least 5 different Improvements.
D4. Place at least 2 Improvements in one column and another 2 in another.
D5. Place at least 2 pairs of 2 identical Improvements.

Reminder: Players are not allowed to place 2 identical Improvements in the same Action Column.

Credits

Authors: Al Leduc & Yves Tourigny. Illustrations: Amanda Duarte. Graphic design and layout: David Prieto. Development and rules: Juan Luque & Rafael Sáiz. Translation: Jayne Broomhead.