Einstein: His Amazing Life and Incomparable Science
Einstein: His Amazing Life and Incomparable Science Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Setup
To set up, each player selects an Einstein to play.
Now, each player takes their Einstein Card, Idea Tiles, and Inspiration Cards.
Each of the four Einsteins has six Idea Tiles from each field of science: Physics, Mathematics, Philosophy, and Chemistry (24 total), and 10 Inspiration Cards.
Shuffle your Inspirations and draw three cards as your starting hand. Keep these hidden from other players.
Place your remaining Inspiration Cards face-down to form a draw pile next to your Einstein Card. Your stock of Idea Tiles are stored alongside.
Then, sit around the table in order from youngest to oldest Einstein: Young, Prime, Globetrotting, and Wise. The cards also are numbered in this order for convenience. This is how we balanced the game to make it fair for all of the different Einsteins!
Shuffle the Major Theory Cards to form a face-down draw pile and put them, along with the Prestige Tokens, in a central spot on the table.
There are 10 Major Theory Cards and 30 Prestige Tokens.
Draw three Major Theories and place them face-up next to the draw pile for everyone to see.
That's it! You're all set up and ready to play!
Turn Overview
On your turn play any two of your Idea Tiles from your stock into The Big Idea in the middle of the table.
At the start of the game, the table is empty, but the first player — the youngest Einstein — plays two of their Ideas connected together to get The Big Idea started.
Together, all of the Einstein's will collaborate to make The Big Idea in the middle of the table.
The sides of Idea Tiles have either one line on the edge or two. Matching lines indicate a correct match.
There are only two restrictions on placing Idea Tiles
- At least one of the sides must correctly match the side of an Idea already on the table... as long as at least one side is a correct match, it is perfectly fine if another side of your Idea is touching, but not correctly matching, other Idea edges.
- The Idea must lay flat on the table. That means the sides must be the same length, connect completely from edge-to-edge, and the Idea you place can't overlap another Idea.
You play Idea Tiles to gain prestige in one of three ways
- Completing a shape on an Inspiration Card in your hand.
- Completing the requirements for a Major Theory Card available on the table.
- Earning Prestige Tokens when opponents use one or more of your Ideas to complete an Inspiration Card themselves.
Inspirations
Let's look at how you complete shapes on Inspiration Cards to score prestige.
Example: the "Mathematics Challenge" Inspiration Card (worth 3 stars) carries the flavor text below, describing the historical inspiration behind the card:
Olympia Academy — This book club founded in 1902 by Einstein, Conrad Habicht, and Maurice Solovine in Bern, Switzerland exposed Einstein to important thinkers such as David Hume, Baruch... (the card's flavor text is partly hidden behind other components in the rulebook artwork)
To receive prestige for completing an Inspiration Card, on your turn you must place the final Idea Tile that finishes the shape shown.
To complete one of your Inspiration Cards, you must play the final piece that completes the required shape.
You may complete more than one Inspiration Card when placing an Idea — and your completed shapes may also contain Idea Tiles from other players.
Shapes must be completed exactly as they appear on Inspiration Cards.
However, if the completed shape included any Idea Tiles from other players, they take one Prestige Token for each Idea Tile of theirs that was used.
The card itself indicates how much prestige you receive at the end of the game, so do not take any Prestige Tokens.
Place completed Inspiration Cards face-down in front of you.
In trying to complete your Inspirations be thoughtful about where you play your Idea Tiles: you can earn prestige on others' turns or even spoil a shape that they are trying to make!
Major Theories
Next, let's learn about how to complete the Major Theories.
Example Major Theory Cards include: "Connect 4 Different Types of Ideas" (4 stars), "Complete an Inspiration with Just 1 of Your Own Ideas" (4 stars), and "Complete 2 Inspirations on Your Turn" (4 stars).
Major Theory cards look a little similar to Inspiration Cards but, while Inspirations always just show a shape, Major Theories instead have different unique requirements which must be met to complete each card.
These cards have examples of shapes to help players understand how to complete the requirements, but none of these shapes need to be matched exactly to score a Major Theory.
Example: the "Challenges to Quantum Mechanics" Major Theory Card carries the flavor text: For years, Einstein used clever thought experiments to assail Niels Bohr and his prevailing theories of quantum mechanics, including at the high-profile Solvay Conferences of 1927 and 1930.
Major Theories are completed when you play an Idea that creates a new state in The Big Idea that meets the requirements on the Major Theory Card. You can only immediately satisfy the requirements on the card.
As with Inspirations, each Major Theory Card indicates its own prestige reward, and you put your completed Major Theories in the same pile as your completed Inspirations.
However, unlike Inspiration Cards, opponents do not collect Prestige Tokens when you complete a Major Theory.
Game End
Your turn is over after you place your two Idea Tiles. As applicable:
- Draw your hand back to three Inspiration cards.
- Replenish the available Major Theory cards to three.
Then the next player begins their turn.
The end game trigger occurs when any of the following things occur
- A player draws their last face-down Inspiration Card into their hand.
- A player draws and reveals the last face-down Major Theory Card.
- A player, upon placing an Idea Tile, only has two types of Idea Tiles remaining in their stock.
In games of Einstein, each player always takes the same number of turns. So, unless the end game trigger occured as a result of the oldest Einstein's turn, keep taking turns until the oldest Einstein is complete.
Scoring
When the game is over, to determine the winner, each player adds together:
- The value of the Inspiration Cards and Major Theories they completed...
- ...along with the number of Prestige Tokens they earned.
The winner is the player with the most points. In the case of a tie the oldest Einstein wins!