Dominations: Road to Civilization
Dominations: Road to Civilization Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Game Contents
- Dominos x90
- Cradle of Humanity x1
- Mastery Cards x216
- Objectives Cards x8
- Campfires x16
- Wonder Levels Cards x35
- Wonder Cards x6
- Player Counters x68
- Wonder Standees x6
- Wonder Tiles x6
- Domination Cards x6
- Player Boards x4
- Scoring Board x1
- Gaming Aids
Setup
- Place the Cradle of Humanity tile in the middle of the table.
- Place the Mastery cards on the table so that they are accessible to all.
- Place the Character cards on the table so that they are accessible to all.
- Draw as many Monument cards as the number of players. Place these cards on the table, visible to all. Take the respective tiles and cards for each Monument and place them on the cards.
- Each player takes one Knowledge track board as well as the resource and limit tokens for the board.
- Each player draws a hand of 7 dominos. If they wish, a player may discard part or all of their hand and redraw so as to have 7 Dominos in hand. They may only do this once.
- Each player draws two Objective cards and chooses one, placing the other card back in the game box (See Final Scoring for more details on Objective cards).
- Each player chooses a Campfire card.
- Randomly determine the order of play, placing the player tokens in order of turn on the Initiative Track.
You're ready to go!
The Game
Players take turns starting with the first player on the Initiative Track and ending with the last.
Tie Breaking: in case of a tie in any situation, the winner is always the highest placed (closest to first) player on the Initiative track.
Each player turn is divided into 3 phases: The Grow Phase, the Construction phase and the Development phase.
Each turn is part of an Age. Each Age is composed of 5 Turns for each player. Once players have played 5 Turns each, there is an end of Age Phase.
A Game of Dominations lasts 3 Ages.
At the end of the Third age, the player with the most Victory points wins.
You score points during each age by:
Acquiring Mastery Cards: Each Civilization is characterised by its achievements, technological, cultural or otherwise. Mastery cards offer you a variety of ways of acquiring victory points whether by simply possessing them or activating their unique abilities.
Possessing the most Influence: There is no direct conflict or warfare in Dominations however multiple ways to exercise your influence on the world around you. Players score victory points based on their Influence score and can also assimilate Mastery Cards from other players if they possess the most at the end of an Age.
Controlling Domains: At the end of each age, you lose any remaining resources you have in stock. Before doing so however, the player with the most remaining in each domain will be awarded a special character card that gives them points and a special power for the next age.
You Score additional points at the end of the final age by:
Achieving objectives: The game's Objective cards give you the opportunity to walk in the steps of one of the great civilisations of the past. They offer you a sense of direction at the beginning of the game, constraining you to achieve certain results but also rewarding you with points if you meet their rather hefty requirements.
Evaluating your Civilization tree: Mastery cards you acquire are assembled into what is known as your Civilization tree. This represents your civilisation's mastery over each of the 6 Knowledge Domains, traits of culture and ingenuity for which your empire will be remembered in the ages to come! Therefore you'll be evaluating your tree based on the different coloured cards and Nodes found within at the end of the game.
The Turn
Each player turn is divided into 3 phases: The Grow Phase, the Construction phase and the Development phase.
Once players have played 5 Turns each, proceed to the end of Age Phase.
The Grow Phase
The Grow phase represents the growth of your population and its spread into new and undiscovered territories! During this phase of the game, players place their triangular dominoes around the Cradle of Humanity. Over time, your Nations will come into contact and learn from one another. With each domino you place, your Nation grows larger, and as your Civilisation grows, it will also learn - placing dominos earns you Knowledge, the main resource of the game.
There are 6 types of Knowledge in Dominations:
- Commerce : Yellow — Represents the principles of trade, negotiation, and travel
- Craftsmanship : Orange — Represents the disciplines of construction, farming, mining, woodwork, stonemasonry, and metallurgy.
- Art : Blue — Represents painting, sculpture, theatre, poetry, but also oratory arts such as public speaking, and diplomacy.
- Science : Green — Represents the disciplines of mathematics, medecine, astronomy, and alchemy.
- Society : Red — Represents the ideas of administration and government, schooling, and military.
- Religion : Purple — Represents the concept of theology, and worship.
During their turn, the player must start by placing a domino from those available in their hand. This domino must be placed so that at least one side connects entirely to either the Cradle of Humanity or another domino.
The player accumulates resources based on the colors that are connected during this placement. The four resources present on the two tiles along the connected edge are activated by this, and each brings 1 Knowledge point of the corresponding colour to the player who placed the domino. In addition, the Camp of the placed domino also brings 1 Knowledge point of the corresponding colour.
The "Camp" is the larger coloured space in the center of the domino. The "Resources" are the three smaller points around the outside of the domino
Each time you gain Knowledge points, advance your counter of the corresponding colour along your Knowledge track.
Concentration of Knowledge
When two resources of the same colour are connected face to face, they generate an additional resource of their colour.
The Locus
During the game, a player may complete a wheel of 6 dominos, thus creating a Locus. In this case you do not score the resources present on the connected edges but rather all the resources in the center of the Locus, as well as the point from the Camp on the domino you added. However, when a Locus is created, the "Concentration of Knowledge" rule does not apply.
On top of these resources, you'll also be able to activate all Cities (see "trade" below) on dominos that are part of the locus as well as certain Mastery cards.
Storage Limits
At the beginning of the game, players are limited to 5 Knowledge points of each Domain. If the player acquires Knowledge that should take them beyond that limit, the additional Knowledge is lost. You can increase your limit by building Cities and purchasing certain Mastery cards.
When your reserve of points reaches 20 you cannot increase it further. If the player acquires Knowledge that should take them beyond that limit, the additional resources are lost. However the player gains 1 Victory Point (regardless of how much knowledge is lost) every time they would go over 20.
For example if the player had 20 points on their first Turn of an Age and would gain 3 more from placing a domino, they instead gain 1 Victory Point. If they did the same thing on their following Turn, they would again gain 1 Victory Point.
The Build Phase
During this second phase of their turn the player can, if they wish, build a City OR contribute to a Monument.
Building a City
Cities are the hubs of your Civilisation and proof of its growing influence and wealth. They provide big advantages during the game by affecting Mastery cards, your Influence score and how much knowledge you can stock at any given time.
A City must be built on a domino's central Camp space. In order to build a City, the camp must be unoccupied and the player must pay Knowledge points of the same Domain colour as the Camp on which it is placed.
A player can also develop an existing City, taking it up to level 2 or 3, by paying Knowledge points based on the colour of the Camp.
Cities must be built one level at a time: you cannot immediately build a Level 2 or Level 3 City on a Camp.
Once purchased the city also gains you bonuses depending on its level:
City Level 1:
- Cost: 3 Knowledge of the appropriate colour.
- Influence: +1
- Increases Reserve of that colour to 10
City Level 2:
- Cost: 6
- Influence: +2
- Increases Reserve of that colour to 15
City Level 3:
- Cost: 9
- Influence: +3
- Increases Reserve of that colour to 20
TRADE - As well as earning you Influence points (see The Score Track below) and expanding your Reserve - thus allowing you to stock more resources - Cities are a great way to obtain additional Knowledge easily. Any time you or another player connect a domino to another domino upon which you have built a City, you gain an additional point of that City's colour per level of the city. Additionally, if you or another player forms a Locus (by completing a full circle of 6 dominos), any Cities situated on the dominoes forming the Locus are immediately activated (whether they belong to you or not), gaining you even more resources. So choose where you place your Cities carefully! Cities also gain you additional points at the end of each Age (see End of Age) and at the end of the game (see Final Scoring).
Building a Monument
Throughout history, humanity has erected some truly awe-inspiring structures. Testaments to science, culture, faith and more. In Dominations, your civilisation can also leave its mark on the world…
Monuments are a common objective that all players can potentially take part in. Each time a player contributes to a Monument, they gain specific Victory Points and bonuses.
If a player wishes to buy the first Level of a Monument, they must first place the Monument's Tile on the Board according to the restrictions shown on its card (if any). Monument tiles come in two shapes: Diamonds and Circles. Diamonds must placed next to an existing Domino following the normal restrictions for Domino placement. Circular monuments are placed over the centre of a Locus.
Note that even though certain monuments have have resources indicated on their tiles, you do not generate any resources by placing down a Monument. However, any Dominos subsequently connected to the tile activate those resources as per the normal rules.
Any player can then participate in the construction of a Monument by paying the resources shown on the top Monument Level card. Once purchased, the player takes the Level card in question and integrates it into their Civilisation tree, just like a Mastery card (see "Development Phase" section below).
City rewards: Some Monuments award Victory Points for building Cities next to them. These may be awarded to cities present on certain sides of the tile or a type of city, as specified on the tile or card. Any cities meeting these conditions when the tile if placed cause their owner to score those points immediately. Any cities placed after the tile also score points. Cities and City levels also contribute to "controlling" a monument in the case of objective cards (see final scoring).
Monument effects: Some Level cards have effects written on them. These effects take effect as soon as the card is integrated into the Civilisation tree.
The Develop Phase
In this final phase of your turn, you can choose to develop skills which will become the pillars of your Civilisation. All Domains start out with similar abilities but as you work your way through them you will find that each has their own speciality. Combining these cards into powerful combos will give you a big advantage as the game moves forward.
During your turn, you may only acquire 1 new Mastery card OR improve 1 previously acquired Mastery card.
Develop a Mastery: During their turn, a player can acquire a new Mastery card by paying the value required to unlock that card and adding it to their Civilisation tree.
These Mastery cards represent various useful skills like Painting, Road Building, MIlitary Genius, and so on. The effects noted on the card take effect as soon as it is acquired. There are 3 different values of Mastery card available: value 3, value 6, and value 9. Mastery cards of a value of 9 are quite an investment, but their effects are the most powerful!
A player can also improve the Mastery cards they already possess. To do so, pay the required cost for each card (indicated in the lower left hand corner) before turning it over. It is then considered Advanced (black background).
Whether you're acquiring a new Mastery upgrading an existing one, the effects noted on the card, including victory and influence points, take effect or are scored as soon as it is acquired/improved.
Civilisation Tree: Your Civilisation Tree represents the disciplines upon which your Nation has been built. Each Mastery card that you obtain becomes one of the fundamental elements of your Civilisation, an integral part of your Legacy for which you will be remembered through the ages. During the game, you will be building your Civilisation Tree around your Campfire card.
Campfire card: Your Campfire card is the starting point for your Civilisation Tree. As well as allowing you to acquire new Mastery cards, this card grants you a free exchange action. At any time during your turn, you may use it to transform 2 resources of the same colour, into 1 resource of a different colour. You may perform this action as many times as you like.
To integrate a card into your Civilisation tree, you must first be able to place it. A card must be placed:
- Orthogonally adjacent to a card you already own,
- So that it is connected to any adjacent cards via a Nodus of identical colour (Nodus are the colored half-circles on the sides of the cards, which connect with other cards to create a full Nodus),
- With the text the right way up.
If you cannot fulfill these three conditions when acquiring a new card, you may not take that card. Each Mastery card is available in four copies, which each copy having a different configuration of Nodus'. Once a card has been placed, it cannot be moved.
Vestigium: White nodes on Mastery cards are called Vestigium. These can connect to any other colour and count as a Nodus of that colour. They also often appear on Monument Level cards. However, two Vestigium create a blank Nodus that will not score you any points at the end of the game.
Once the Development phase is over, the turn passes to the next player on the Initiative track.
The Score Track
There are two different types of scoring in Dominations: Influence Points and Victory Points.
Influence Points: There are no wars or empires in Dominations, but over time, your Nation will become more powerful and influential, and Influence points represent this growing prestige. As soon as you acquire an element with the "Influence" symbol you advance your Influence counter on the Influence track to represent this. The Influence track is the yellow track that goes around the edge of the scoreboard. Influence is mostly taken into account at the end of each Age but can have other effects as well (see End of Age and Final Scoring).
Victory Points: In Dominations you will regularly score Victory Points and it is these points that will win you the game! Your contributions to Monuments, your Mastery cards and many other effects will provide points and allow you to move along the score track. As soon as you acquire an element with the Victory point symbol you immediately score that many points, advance your token on the score track to represent this. The Victory track is the white track that snakes around the centre of the board.
End of Age
When all the players have played 5 turns each, proceed to the End of Age phase. At the end of each Age, players must perform the following actions before beginning a new Age:
End of Age effects: If a player possesses any cards in their Civilisation tree with a "At the end of each Age" effects, they may activate these powers now.
Resolve influence: First, the player with the highest number of Influence points can assimilate a Mastery from another player. They may choose a Mastery card currently possessed by another player and take the same card from among the those still available in the box. This card is not taken directly from a player.
The only restriction to this action concerns the level of Mastery card you're trying to assimilate and your level of Influence:
- If your Influence level is 12 or less, you can only assimilate cards of value 3.
- If your Influence level is between 13 and 22 you can assimilate cards with a value of 3 or 6.
- If your Influence level is 23 or more, you can assimilate cards with a value of 3, 6 or 9.
The player may also choose to assimilate an Advanced version of a Skill that has been developed by another player, on the condition that they already possess the base version of that Mastery themselves.
Once the leading player has assimilated a card, each player scores their current number of Influence points in Victory Points.
Determine Roles: Whoever has retained the most resources in each knowledge Domain at the end of an Age gets the help of a high-ranking citizen adept in that type of skill: A great Inventor, Diplomat, etc. The player takes the corresponding Character tile for the next Age and gains a special benefit from their assistance.
- Civics - Governor (+6VP): You determine the Turn order of the next Age.
- Religion - High Priest (+5VP): You draw 2 additional dominoes at the start of the next Age.
- Art - Diplomat (+4VP): You immediately gain 2 Influence points.
- Trade - Trader (+3VP): Each time you place a domino, that domino's Camp generates 2 Knowledge instead of 1 for the rest of the Age.
- Science - Inventor (+2VP): Once per Age, you can activate a domino already in place instead of placing a new one (scoring resources as per the usual rules).
- Crafts - Farmer (+1VP): Once per Age, during one of your turns, you may place a second domino immediately after placing and scoring the first.
Each player immediately scores the number of Victory Points stated on each card.
Once Role cards have been used, they may be returned to the common area of the table.
A player may take several, or all of the Character cards. If no player has any remaining Knowledge points in a Domain, then the Character card cannot be claimed.
After roles have been attributed, each player resets all the resources on their player board to 0 (unless they have a card indicating otherwise).
Before starting their next phase players may choose to keep one or more of the dominos from their remaining hand, discarding the others to the back of the domino holders.
They may then draw back up to 7 dominos (or more if they have a card indicating otherwise) to complete their hand. Just like with setup, a player may choose to discard part or all of their hand once and draw back up to 7 (or more) Dominos.
The next age can then begin.
End of Game
The first and second ages are played the same way. The third (and last) Age is played slightly differently however.
End of Age: Once this third age is over, players proceed to the Influence phase and trigger other End of Age effects as normal. For Role Determination, this follows the same rules except that each role is worth 3 points rather than its usual value.
Additional steps for final scoring:
Objective cards: In Dominations, the aim of the game isn't to copy History. However, Objective cards give you the chance to walk in the footsteps of some of History's greatest Nations. Each Objective card has 5 Objectives that gain you Victory points at the end of the game if you manage to complete them. These can be having a number of Cities of a certain level, a certain number of Nodus of a given colour in your Civilisation tree, the construction of Monuments, and more. The first 3 Objectives are based on the Nation's real History, whereas the final 2 represent what they could have become, had they had more time, more resources, etc.
The icons on the cards represent:
- Cities of certain levels (e.g. "5x City Level 1" and "1x City Level 2"): You must finish the game in possession of a certain number of cities of certain levels. In this case: 5 level 1 cities and 1 level 2 cities.
- Adjacent cities (e.g. "10x" cities linked together): You must finish the game in possession of a certain number of cities adjacent to one another. In this case: 10 cities.
- Monument control (e.g. "1x" monument column icon): You must finish the game in control of a monument. Both the number of level cards each player possesses for this monument and the number of City Levels they have built adjacent to the monument's tile count when determining control. In case of a tie, the player having purchased the first level wins.
- Nodus of a given colour (e.g. "8x" yellow, "5x" red, "3x" green): You must finish the game with a certain number of Nodus in your Civilization tree. In this case, 8 Commerce Nodus, 5 Government nodus and 3 Science Nodus.
- Influence Points (e.g. "30" with the influence icon): You must finish the game with a certain number of Influence Points. In this case, 30.
- Mastery cards of a given level and domain (e.g. "4x" level 6 Commerce/Science, "3x" level 9 Commerce/Government): You must finish the game with a certain number and domain of mastery cards in your Civilization tree. In this case: four level 6 Commerce and/or Science mastery cards AND three level 9 Commerce and/or Government cards.
Each objective is worth 10 victory points.
Civilization Tree: Finally you will score your Civilisation tree. Your tree represents your civilisation's mastery over each of the 6 Knowledge Domains, traits of culture and ingenuity for which your empire will be remembered in the ages to come! Therefore, before determining the victor you'll be evaluating your tree. For each Domain, multiply the number of Mastery cards from that Domain (advanced cards count for 3!) by the number of Nodus of that colour in your tree. You score that many Victory Points!
Example: Nodes = 5, Cards = 8. Total = 5 x 8 = 40 points.
The player with the most Victory Points at the end of the final scoring wins the game! In the case of a tie, the player highest on the initiative track wins!
Game Glossary
- Turn: Action phase of each player.
- Age: Composed of five Turns for each Player.
- Game: Composed of three Ages (representing around 3000 years in the life of your Civilisation).
- Domino: Three-sided tiles that are placed by all players during the game.
- Resources: Small coloured dots on dominoes.
- Camp: Larger colour dots on each domino.
- Reserve: The maximum number of any one type of resource that you can possess at once. Determined by the highest level of City you have on any Camp of that colour.
- Knowledge: Main Game Resource. Each Domain counts as a separate resource
- Domain: There are six different domains of Knowledge: Society, Art, Craftsmanship, Science, Religion and Commerce.
- Mastery cards: Purchasable skill cards.
- Civilisation Tree: Arrangement of Mastery cards specific to each player.
- Cradle of Civilization: Starting tile for the board.
- Board: Space on the table where dominoes are placed.
- Campfire: Starting card for a player's Civilisation Tree.
- Locus: The centre of a complete circle of six dominoes.
- Nodus: (The assembled) coloured circle allowing players to connect Mastery cards on their Civilisation tree. Two half-circles connect to make a Nodus.
- Vestigium: A colourless circle which can be connected to any Mastery card.
- City: There are three levels of City which can be built on dominoes.
- Monument: A common objective to which all players can contribute.
- Monument Tile: The tile belonging to each Monument, which is placed on the board by the player who purchases the first level.
- Monument card: The main card of a Monument which indicates the conditions of purchase and the number of levels available
- Monument Level card: Card representing each level of a Monument as it is built, integrated into a player's Civilisation tree when purchased.