Empire of the Stars Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Game Components
  • Constructing the Thrones
• Setup
• Gameplay
  • Scoring Tokens
• Player Powers
• The Emperor and Ending the Game
• Explorer
• Steward
• Merchant
• Engineer
• Scientist
• Warlord
  • 1. Move Ships
  • 2. Resolve Battles
  • 3. Colonize Planets
• Regent
• Variants
  • Playing with 2 Players
  • Set Up for First Time Players

Game Components

• 1 game board
• 36 exploration tiles
• 40 galaxy tokens
• 64 Credit tokens
• 75 technology cards
• 30 player power cards
• 7 edict tiles
• 4 market tiles
• 1 Monolith
• 1 scepter

Player components, in 4 colors: 1 player board, 1 home world, 16 colony tokens (starbase on the black side, colony on the other), 1 combat dial, 1 throne (see assembly instructions), 2 dreadnoughts, 4 cruisers, 8 fighters, 3 resource markers.

Constructing the Thrones

Carefully fold in the armrests and fold down the seat along the score lines. Then slot the seat into the armrests, slotting the back of the seat into the top slot in the back of the throne.

Setup

1. Game Board. Place the board on the table. The board is made up of 10 sectors each with 4 regions. Each region is a circle where an exploration tile can be placed.

2. Technology Display. Separate the technologies by cost: 1, 2 and 3. Shuffle them by this cost and deal 3 cost 1 cards to each player as their starting hand. Then create three face down draw decks—one for each cost—and flip over the top card of each deck to create three face up discard piles.

3. Far Space Locations. Place a galaxy token on each of the 8 far space locations on the board. Place the remaining galaxy tokens in a supply next to the board.

4. Market Tiles. Place the 4 market tiles resource side up, pushed to the right edge of the market table. The order of the tiles does not matter. Place the credit tokens in a supply next to the board.

5. Exploration Tiles. Set aside the 3 wormhole tiles and one 2-polymer tile per player. Shuffle the remaining tiles into three roughly equal stacks. Place 1 wormhole tile in the middle of each stack and combine all three stacks together into a single face down stack. Flip over a number of tiles equal to the number of players plus one to form a face up display. If there are no planets in the display, remove an empty space tile and place it on the bottom of the stack and flip over a replacement tile. Repeat as necessary until at least one planet is in the display.

   Each player gets one 2-polymer tile. The 3 wormhole tiles are placed in the starting stack of tiles.

6. Player Components. Each player chooses a color, takes the corresponding player board, 3 resource markers, home world tile, 2-polymer tile, ship models (8 fighters, 4 cruisers, 2 dreadnoughts), colony tokens, combat dial and a slotted throne. Make 8 stacks of 2 colony tokens on your player board.

Gameplay

In the center of the game board are 7 roles: EXPLORER, STEWARD, MERCHANT, ENGINEER, SCIENTIST, WARLORD, and REGENT. When chosen, a role grants you a special privilege, and everyone takes a turn with the role.

In a round, each player takes a turn going clockwise around the table. When all players have taken a turn with the role, the scepter is given to the next player on their left and a new round begins with that player choosing a new role.

• EXPLORER: Add planets, asteroid fields, and wormholes to regions in the galaxy.
• STEWARD: Produce resources from colonized planets.
• MERCHANT: Trade resources for credits and invest in far space.
• ENGINEER: Build ships and deploy them to a starbase.
• SCIENTIST: Gain technologies that give a unique ability.
• WARLORD: Move ships and engage in battle.
• REGENT: Influence planets, create starbases and become Emperor.

To begin the first round, the starting player places the Monolith on any role to select it. Each round after, the player with the scepter must move the Monolith to select a role. You can move it any number of spaces, but must drop one credit on each role passed over. If you have no credits, you can only move to a role adjacent to the Monolith. After moving the Monolith, if your chosen role has one or more credits on it, take all the credits.

Example: Moving the Monolith past Warlord means you drop 1 credit. Landing on Merchant means you take the 2 credits on that role.

Example: Bob chooses Merchant and as a privilege collects credits. Then Bob, Pat, Xiang and Elenor all take turns buying and selling resources. Bob says "I'll sell 2 energy for 3 credits each". Pat says, "I'll sell all my polymers for 1 credit each so that's 5 credits". Xiang says, "I'm not buying or selling". Elenor says, "I'll buy 1 energy for 3 credits and sell 1 metal for 2 credits".

Scoring Tokens

Your player board begins the game with stacks of your colony tokens. When placed on a planet or far space location, a colony token represents your expanding empire. However, you may also score tokens with technologies, player powers or by destroying opponent's colonies. If ever a rule, technology or player power says 'score a token', the token goes into the slot of your throne—hidden from all players. If you ever run out of colony tokens on your player board, you may score a galaxy token instead. Your total score at the end of the game is the total of all tokens on the game board and in your throne. No one may examine tokens in a throne during play!

Player Powers

Each player has a unique power. There are two sides to this power: core and surge. All players begin the game with their power on the core side. This side can be used each time anyone selects the role as specified on the card. However, you are never compelled to use your power—it is always optional.

Whenever a power says 'before' a role, it may be used before anyone takes a turn with that role. Whenever it says, 'after' a role, it may be used after everyone has taken a turn with that role. And when it says 'during' a role, it can be used any time during the role. If powers ever conflict, the power with the lower number is resolved first. If a power seems to contradict the rules, follow what the card says. Much of the fun and strategy of the game is using your power to your best advantage!

The surge side is much more powerful than the core side. All players flip their power to the surge side after EXPLORER when a new wormhole is placed in a region. When you use your surge power, you must then flip the power back to the core side. Usually this happens at the end of the role in which the power is used. If you cannot or do not want to use the surge side, you may instead at any time flip it back to the core side. Since there are only 3 wormholes in the game, you can use your surge power at most 3 times—so be sure to use it wisely!

Example: As a core power, Despot can destroy a ship of each opponent. But the surge side lets them destroy colonies and starbases!

The Emperor and Ending the Game

During the game, one player will be the Emperor and bring order to the galaxy represented by an edict placed in front of them to remind them how the game is scored each round of the game. When the Emperor receives the scepter, they must do the following before choosing a role:

1. Score the Edict. The Emperor calls all players (including the Emperor) to score a colony token from their player board. The token must be scored if possible. Then the player who meets the condition on the edict also scores 1 galaxy token. If two or more players tie in this condition, no one scores the token. The game begins with the Chaos edict which does not score any galaxy tokens. Also, do not score the Chaos edict before the first turn of the game!

2. Check for Game End. The Emperor asks if any player (including the Emperor) has no colony tokens left on their player board or if there are no galaxy tokens left in the supply. If so, the game immediately ends!

If the game ends, all players reveal and count their tokens in their throne—each colony and galaxy token scores 1 point. Then each adds their tokens on planets and far space locations to this total—each colony token scores 1 point and each starbase scores 2 points. Tokens left on your player board are not counted toward your final score!

The player with the highest total wins! If there is a tie, the tied player with the most planets wins. If there is still a tie, the Emperor determines the winner among the tied players!

Explorer

During an EXPLORER round, players choose and place exploration tiles—expanding the known galaxy for all.

1. Select a Tile. Starting with the player who chose EXPLORER, each player must choose a tile and place it in any region. As a privilege, the player who chose EXPLORER may immediately place a colony token on the tile (assuming it has a planet) and claim ownership. The last player places the 2 remaining tiles.

   • When placed, the region cannot already have a tile.
   • If there are ships in the region, place them on top of the tile.
   • Empty space tiles, wormholes and asteroid fields are placed like other exploration tiles, but cannot be colonized.
   • If there are not enough tiles for all players, place as many as are available. In this case, some players may not get to place a tile.
   • If the last tile is placed or the galaxy is full, for the remainder of the game EXPLORER has no effect.

   Example: Bob places an empty space tile next to an opponent's home planet, placing the space ships there on top of the empty space tile.

2. Refill the Display. After all players have placed tiles, refill the display—one exploration tile per player plus one. If there are not enough tiles, fill the display as much as possible. If there are no planets in the display, remove an empty space tile and place it on the bottom of the stack and flip over a replacement tile. Repeat as necessary until at least one planet is in the display. (With 3 players, put out 4 explorer tiles.)

3. Check for New Wormholes. If one or more new wormholes were added to the galaxy, all players flip their player power over to the surge side. It is immediately available for use. If a power was already surged, it is left surged.

   Example: A new wormhole was placed in a region. Xiang's power flips over to the surge side.

Steward

During a STEWARD round, players produce resources from their planets. A planet is owned (colonized) by a player if it has their colony token on it (it does not matter which side of the colony token is showing). Produced resources are marked up on their resource track and can later be spent to buy ships and technologies, or sold for credits. If there are no market tiles showing resources, the STEWARD role has no effect!

1. Choose a Market Tile. As a privilege, the player who chose STEWARD selects one of the resource tiles and immediately collects one of each resource on that tile, marking them on their resource track. The market tile determines which type of resources are produced from all colonized planets.

   Example: Xiang chooses the market tile with polymer and energy. He marks up 1 polymer and 1 energy. Then everyone including Xiang produce only polymer and energy resources from their planets.

2. Produce Resources. All players may simultaneously produce resources and mark them on their player board. All colonized planets produce the resources indicated on the planet—but only the resources that match the chosen market tile. Any excess resources that cannot be marked up are lost.

   Example: Since Xiang chose energy and polymer, Elenor produces 1 energy and 1 polymer from her home planet, and 2 polymer from her other planet. She cannot produce the metal from her home planet.

3. Set the Market. As a final step, flip the chosen market tile over to show one or more credits. Next, all credit tiles are pushed to the left edge of the market table and all resource tiles are pushed to the right edge of the market table. The revealed column of numbers sets the value of resources during MERCHANT.

   Example: The chosen tile is flipped, revealing 1 credit. Then all credit tiles are pushed to the left and all resource tiles to the right. Polymer is now valued at 1, metal is 2 and energy is 3.

Merchant

During a MERCHANT round, players can buy and sell resources at the current market price. The price is determined by the market table. Prices are high with few market tiles chosen by STEWARD, but lower with many tiles chosen—simulating the supply and demand of resources in the galaxy.

1. Collect Credits. As a privilege, the player who chose MERCHANT gains credits from the supply equal to those shown on all tiles on the credit market tiles.

   Example: Pat chose Merchant and there are 3 credits on the market. Pat collects 3 credits from the supply.

2. Buy and Sell Resources. Players may buy and sell simultaneously. The value of resources is indicated by the column not covered by a market tile. Sold resources are deducted from your track and credits are taken from the supply. Credits spent to buy are returned to the supply and bought resources are added to your track.

3. Invest in Far Space. Far space represents distant galaxies that can further expand your empire. The player who chose MERCHANT invests first, then others may invest in turn order.

   • You may invest in one or more of the 8 far space locations. The cost ranges from 5 credits to as much as 10 credits.
   • You may invest a maximum of two times on your turn.
   • If a galaxy token is on the location, pay the credits indicated and score the galaxy token.
   • If there is no galaxy or colony token on the location, pay the credits indicated and place 1 of your colony tokens on it. This makes it worth 1 point.
   • If your colony token is on the location, pay the credits indicated and flip your colony over to a starbase. This makes it worth 2 points.
   • Only one token may be placed on a far space location—once you own a far space location, no one can take it from you.

   Example: Elenor invests twice: first spending 7 credits to score a galaxy token from far space and then spending 7 more credits to place her colony token.

4. Reset the Market Tiles. After all players have finished investing, all market tiles are flipped to their resource side and pushed to the right edge of the market table. The order of the tiles does not matter.

Engineer

During an ENGINEER round, players build and deploy space ships to their starbases. Keep in mind you can only have 3 ships per region! You may change a colony into a starbase during REGENT.

1. Build Ships. All players can build ships simultaneously. As a privilege, the player who chose ENGINEER may build 1 fighter for free if one is available in their supply. If you have no ships in your supply, you cannot build any ships.

   • Fighters cost 1 polymer and 1 metal.
   • Cruisers cost 2 polymers, 2 metal and 1 energy.
   • Dreadnoughts cost 3 polymers, 3 metal and 2 energy.

   Deduct resources from your track. All built ships are placed in your staging area on your player board.

   Example: Bob builds a cruiser for 2 metal, 1 energy and 2 polymers. He then deploys it to his starbase.

2. Deploy Ships. Starting with the player who chose ENGINEER, all ships in your staging area must be deployed to one or more of your regions with a starbase (you cannot deploy ships to a colony or to far space). Your home world is always a starbase. Each region can only hold 3 ships. After deployment, any ships still in your staging area must be put back into your supply.

Scientist

During a SCIENTIST round, players acquire technologies that grant unique abilities. There are 3 types of technology—Science & Culture which costs polymers, Industry which costs metal, and Military which costs energy. Once you buy a technology, you keep it for the entire game. Like player powers, they are usually used before, during or after a role. If a technology ever contradicts the rules, the technology is correct. If technologies ever conflict, the player with the lower player power resolves first.

Starting with the player who chose SCIENTIST, each player does the following:

1. Draw 1 Technology. You may draw the top card from any face down deck or face up discard pile into your hand of technology cards. You do not have to draw a card. You may keep your drawn cards hidden. If a discard pile is empty, draw and display a new card.

2. Buy 1 Technology. You may buy one technology from your hand of cards, paying the cost from your resources. Place it face up in front of you—it is immediately available for use.

   As a privilege, the player who chose SCIENTIST pays 1 less resource for their technology. In addition, all players pay 1 less resource for each owned technology matching the type they are purchasing (to a minimum cost of zero).

   Example: Since Bob chose Scientist, he would pay 1 polymer for Spy Network or 2 energy for Invade. But since he previously bought a Science & Culture technology, he can buy Spy Network for free.

3. Discard Down to 3 Cards. You may only hold 3 cards in your hand. Discard extra cards face up in the discard pile matching their cost.

Warlord

During a WARLORD round, players move their fleets around the galaxy and fight opponents in an effort to take over planets. As a privilege, the player who chose WARLORD goes last. So turns begin with the player to the left of that player. On your turn, you can move, battle, and colonize as follows:

1. Move Ships

Move any or all of your ships, in any order, but each ship may only move once.

• Ships move from one region to an adjacent region—each counts as 1 movement. Fighters may move 4 regions, cruisers move 3, and dreadnoughts move 2. Colonies and starbases cannot move. You do not have to move the full distance.
• Ships can move into regions with no exploration tile.
• The maximum number of ships in a region is 3. You can never stop on a region with 3 ships, but you may move through it. Opponent's ships do not block movement.
• You can never stop on an opponent's home world.
• If your ship moves into an asteroid field, it is too dangerous to move further. You must stop moving the ship. However, you may continue movement when WARLORD is chosen again.
• You may move from a wormhole to any other region in the galaxy as if it were adjacent to the wormhole.

Example: Bob moves his 2 fighters into a sector, and then his cruiser into another sector.

Example: Elenor moves her fighter into an asteroid field and must stop. Then she moves her dreadnought out of the wormhole to another region far away.

2. Resolve Battles

After you move your ships, you may optionally start a battle in any sectors with your ships, colonies or starbases—these are your "units"—and an opponent's units. On your turn, you may declare battles in any order, but only once per sector—the battle includes all 4 regions! You are the attacker and the battle is resolved as follows:

A. Declare Opponent and Call for Allies. You must declare one opponent in the sector as the defender. You may then call for allies.

i. Announce which players you wish to have as allies. Then the defender announces which players they wish to have as allies.

ii. Starting with the player to the left of you and continuing around the table, each accepts or declines the invitation of either attacker or defender. If they accept, they may move one or more ships into the sector following normal movement rules.

Before the battle begins, an ally must have at least one unit in the sector (ship, colony, or starbase).

An ally's technologies apply only to their units unless otherwise stated on the technology.

Example: Xiang declares a battle in the sector. He picks Bob as his opponent and asks Elenor to ally with him. She accepts and moves 2 fighters into the sector.

B. Determine Combat Strength. Both attacker and defender add up the strength of all their units and their allied units in the sector. Your home planet always has 1 starbase.

• Each fighter = 1
• Each colony = 1
• Each starbase = 2
• Each cruiser = 3
• Each dreadnought = 6

Example: Bob has 3 fighters and a colony in the sector, so his combat strength is 4. Xiang has 1 cruiser and Elenor's 2 fighters, so his combat strength is 5.

C. Set Battle Plan. Using your combat dials, the attacker and defender secretly distribute their respective total combat strength among tactics, weapons, and shields. Players reveal battle plans simultaneously.

Example: Bob divides his 4 combat strength, putting 1 in tactics, 2 in weapons, and 1 in shields. Xiang places his 5 combat strength into 3 tactics and 2 weapons.

D. Tactics Winner Moves Ships. The player with the higher tactics may move ships equal to the difference in tactics values. Any ships in the battle from either side can be moved according to normal movement rules. The tactics winner and their allies score 1 galaxy token each.

It can be advantageous to move ships from either side. If you move your own ships out of the sector, they cannot be hit in this battle (see Determine Hits below) and might be used in a next battle! If you move enemy ships out of a region, it may be easier to destroy a colony because there is less protection!

Example: Since Xiang put 3 in tactics and Bob only put 1, Xiang may move 2 ships in the sector. He moves his cruiser onto Bob's region and moves Bob's fighter off the region. This makes Bob's colony vulnerable. Then Xiang and his ally Elenor both score 1 galaxy token.

E. Determine Hits. Both players compare their weapons against their opponent's shields. For each weapon not deflected by a shield, the player of the firing ships makes a hit, and decides which opposing unit in the sector is destroyed. You may only hit units in the sector! A fighter or colony is destroyed by 1 hit, cruisers by 2 hits, and dreadnoughts by 3 hits. A starbase is flipped to a colony by 1 hit or destroyed by 2 hits. Home world starbases can never be destroyed. And you cannot destroy an enemy colony if there are any enemy ships in its region!

Example: Xiang has 2 weapons against Bob's 1 shield. Xiang applies the hit to Bob's colony and destroys it. Bob has 2 weapons and Xiang has 0 shields. Bob hits and destroys both of Elenor's fighters.

F. Return Destroyed Ships and Score Colonies. All destroyed ships are returned to their owner's staging area—not their supply! These ships can be deployed again during ENGINEER. However, if you destroy an opponent's colony, it is not returned to them. It is instead scored in your throne.

Each of your allies score 1 galaxy token for each colony you score!

Example: Since Xiang destroyed Bob's colony, he scores it. Elenor as Xiang's ally scores 1 galaxy token.

3. Colonize Planets

After all your movements and battles (if any), if you are the only player with ships on an empty planet, you may place 1 of your colony tokens on the planet. If there is more than one player on the planet, nothing happens.

Example: Xiang is over the planet alone and places 1 of his colony tokens on the planet. Xiang now controls the planet and can produce resources from it during Steward.

Regent

During a REGENT round, players use political influence to expand or protect their colonies or upgrade their colonies into starbases. Influence can enable you to take control of planets or create a new starbase. All players may also influence the Galactic Throne to become Emperor!

1. Gain Influence. All players take 2 colony tokens from their player board to use as political influence. If a player has less than 2 colony tokens, they use what they have. In turn order starting with the player who chose REGENT, each player decides whether to buy 1 additional token to use as political influence. Players may only buy 1 additional token! The cost for this extra influence starts at 2 credits, but the cost rises 1 credit each time influence is purchased (i.e. if a player does not buy an extra influence, the cost does not go up).

   Example: Xiang chose Regent and decides to pay 2 credits to buy 1 more influence. Bob is next and declines to buy an extra influence. Then Pat pays 3 for 1 additional influence.

2. Place Influence. In turn order starting with the player to the left of the player who chose REGENT (the player who chose REGENT will go last), each player decides where to place all of their influence.

   • Each token you place counts as 1 influence, just as colonies already on the board do. A starbase already on the board counts as 2 influence.
   • You may spread your influence around or put it all on one planet. You may expand your empire by putting influence on uncolonized planets.
   • You may not place influence on far space locations.
   • You may put influence on your own planets to upgrade them to starbases. You may influence enemy planets to downgrade an enemy starbase to a colony, or eliminate an enemy colony.
   • You may place influence on the Galactic Throne at the bottom of the game board to become Emperor.

   Example: Pat places 1 influence on his colony hoping to turn it into a starbase. Then he places 1 influence on an empty planet and 1 on Xiang's starbase - hoping to knock it down to a colony.

3. Resolve Conflicts. If 2 or more players have influence on a planet or the Galactic Throne, the conflict must be resolved. Remove influence from each player evenly until only one player has influence left. If both players have the same amount of influence, the planet or Galactic Throne will be left empty. The removed tokens are returned to the player's board.

Variants

Playing with 2 Players

There are a few changes for 2 players. Roles are selected differently. Also, substitute the following setup steps.

Exploration Tiles. Set aside the 3 wormhole tiles and one 2-polymer tile per player. Shuffle the remaining tiles and remove 16 tiles. Choose 4 sectors adjacent to each other and fill all the regions with the 16 face down tiles. These sectors are now blocked from play. Divide the remaining tiles into three roughly equal stacks. Place 1 wormhole tile in the middle of each stack and combine all three stacks together into a single face down stack. Flip over 3 tiles to form a face up display. Replace a tile if all tiles have no planets.

Playing the Game. When the game begins, the starting player may place the Monolith on any role. Each player takes a turn as indicated by the role. The scepter is then handed to the other player. However, from this point forward, each player chooses two roles, one after the other, resolving and moving the Monolith between each selection before handing the scepter to their opponent.

Example: Barry moves to Warlord. He and Sharon complete their turn. Then Barry moves to Regent for his second role, dropping a credit on Merchant.

Set Up for First Time Players

You can play Empire of the Stars without player powers. This will make the game easier for first time players. For starting resources, each player begins with 3 polymers, 2 metal, 1 energy and 5 credits. Do not deal powers out and ignore the rule for flipping powers to surge after a wormhole appears.