Herdeiros do Khan Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Goal and Principles of the Game
• Game Components
• Game Setup
• Understanding the Main Board
• Before the First Round
• Round Sequence
• Your Turn
• Actions You Can Take on Your Turn
  • 1. Move
  • 2. Take Tribute Tiles
  • 3. Use the Khan
  • 4. Recover Your Activation Tiles
• Extra Actions
  • 1. Attack Cities with Swords
  • 2. Build Yurts
  • 3. Buy Upgrades with Coins
  • 4. Deliver Treasures to Advisors
  • 5. Fulfill the Demands of Open Advisor Cards
  • 6. Gain Votes
• End of the Game
  • Influence Over the 3 Regions
  • Secret Advisor Cards
  • Determining the Winner
• Upgrades
• Bonus Tiles
• Open Advisor Cards
• Secret Advisor Cards
• Special Abilities

Goal and Principles of the Game

The goal of the game is to gain votes in the Kurultai council. To do this, you ride across Asia collecting tributes, attack cities, gift advisors with the looted treasures and build yurts along your way. When the Kurultai council is full, whoever has the most votes is named the next Khan.

Game Components

• 1 main board
• 6 player pawns
• 1 Genghis Khan pawn
• 5 plastic player tokens
• 1 neutral plastic token
• 60 player yurt pieces (12 per player)
• 9 city tiles
• 5 player boards
• 20 activation tiles (4 for each player)
• 35 tribute tiles (10 swords, 10 yurts, 15 coins)
• 40 treasure tiles (8 of each type)
• 44 upgrade tiles
• 7 bonus tiles
• 10 secret advisor cards
• 14 open advisor cards
• 1 Karakorum tile
• 1 instruction manual

Game Setup

Shuffle each of these sets of components separately:

• city tiles
• treasure tiles
• open advisor cards
• secret advisor cards
• upgrade tiles
• bonus tiles

Each player chooses a color. Give each player:

• the player board associated with that color
• the 4 activation tiles of their color
• the 12 yurt pieces of their color
• 2 secret advisor cards
• 1 coin tile for the 1st and 2nd players to play, and 2 coins for the others

Open the main board in the center of the table:

1. Reveal 3 city tiles and leave the others in a pile nearby.
2. For each revealed city, open 4 treasure tiles and place them in the designated city. Leave the remaining treasure tiles face down, near the board.
3. Place the players' colored pawns in Karakorum, the Mongol capital.
4. Optional: if you wish, place the Karakorum tile on top of the one printed on the board, to vary the treasures to be delivered in the capital.
5. Randomly place a bonus tile on top of each of the 7 advisor symbols, including Karakorum.
6. Reveal 4 open advisor cards and place them beside the board. The others will not be used in this game.
7. Place 1 tribute tile in each province, according to the symbols printed on the board. Leave the rest near the board, face up.
8. Place the Khan pawn beside the board.
9. Place the player tokens and the neutral token on the seat icon beside the Kurultai track.
10. Reveal 5 upgrade tiles and place them in the upgrades area at the bottom of the board. Leave the others near the board, face down.

Understanding the Main Board

The main board shows a map of the Mongol Empire divided into 3 regions: Russia, China and Persia, with the capital Karakorum in the center.

• Routes and stops: Your pawn moves on the board along these routes.
• Cities: They are the sources of the treasures you need to loot. There are always 3 cities available for attack at the same time. When a city is conquered, a new one is revealed.
• Provinces: They are the areas between the routes. You need to collect tribute tiles (yurts, swords and coins) from them to progress in your game.
• Khan provinces: Every time you activate Genghis Khan, you must place him in a Khan province, indicated with his head icon. Add a tribute tile to the 3 adjacent provinces (the small arrows leaving the Khan indicate which). You can also use him to renew the upgrade tiles.
• Advisors: Each double stop marks a place where you can deliver treasures to an advisor. You gain one vote for each delivery you make.
• Upgrades: You can buy upgrade tiles from this area to improve the actions on your board.
• Bonus tiles: The first player to deliver treasures to an advisor also receives a bonus tile, which can be used only once.
• Karakorum: If you deliver the 3 specific treasures indicated in Karakorum, you receive 2 votes.
• Kurultai: Whenever you gain votes, you must advance your token on the Kurultai track.

Before the First Round

Look at your 2 secret advisor cards. Choose one to keep and discard the other. The chosen card can give you votes at the end of the game.

Round Sequence

The player with the greatest number of descendants starts, and play continues clockwise until the end.

Your Turn

On your turn, place one of your activation tiles on a column to perform its actions. The tile stays on the column, and must be recovered before the column can be used again.

Each icon in the column is an action. You can do them in any order you like. During the game you can buy upgrade tiles and increase the number of actions in a column.

• Heir: The player boards represent the heirs of the Khan. Each has a special ability.
• White column: When you choose this column, you can recover all used activation tiles.

Example: The red and yellow columns have already been used, so at this moment you can activate only the green or white column.

Actions You Can Take on Your Turn

1. Move

The number of horses determines how many times you can move. Moving means shifting your pawn to an adjacent stop.

You can jump over your own yurts when moving (even if another player is on them).

You can pass through a stop occupied by another player, but you cannot end your movement there, unless it is a double stop (which holds 2 pawns) or Karakorum (which holds all pawns).

Important: You only need one move to move through a double stop.

Example: You chose the yellow column. You have 3 moves (including the horses on your upgrade tile).

• You can stop at or pass through another player's yurt.
• You can jump over your own yurts when moving.
• You cannot end your movement in the same place as another player, but you can pass through a stop where they are.

2. Take Tribute Tiles

The number of fists you have determines how many tribute tiles you can take.

You can take tribute tiles from the provinces adjacent to the stops where you were during your turn, whether before, during or after your movement.

But if you use a yurt to jump over a stop, then you were never actually in it, so you cannot use it as a base to take tributes.

You can take more than one tribute tile from a province.

Example: You chose the red column. It gives 2 take-tribute actions (as well as 2 moves).

• You can choose to take this sword, since the province is adjacent to at least 1 stop you made.
• You can choose to take these two coins, since you have 2 fists.
• You cannot take yurts from this province, since it is empty.
• You cannot take this yurt, because the province is not adjacent to any stop you made.

There are 3 types of tribute tile you can take. Each allows a different extra action. You can use them immediately after taking them or keep them for later turns.

After using a tribute tile, put it back in the supply beside the main board.

• Sword: allows you to attack cities.
• Yurt: allows you to place your yurts on the board.
• Coin: with two coins you can buy an upgrade tile.

3. Use the Khan

Using the Khan is a mandatory action. When the column you activated has the Khan icon, move him to one of the places that have the Khan icon: one of the 4 provinces on the map or the upgrades area.

You cannot leave the Khan where he is. At the start of the game he begins off the board and can go to any of the 5 places, but afterwards you must alternate.

If you place him in a province, the Khan makes it and 2 adjacent provinces (indicated on the board by the arrows leaving the Khan himself) deliver tributes. Place one tribute tile in each, according to the province's icon, even if it already has tiles (maximum of 3 per province).

If you place him in the upgrades area, reveal new upgrades and place them in the empty spaces. If the spaces with the coin and sword icons are not occupied, take those from the supply for yourself.

Example, Khan in a province: After placing the Khan, you put 1 tribute tile in the 3 indicated regions. Two of them already had tiles, but still receive one more.

Example, Khan in the upgrades area: There are 4 vacant spaces in the upgrades area. If you choose to place the Khan here, take a coin tile and a sword tile before restocking, since the 2 icons are visible.

4. Recover Your Activation Tiles

When you activate the white column on your board, recover all your activation tiles, including the one you just used. All columns will be available again on the next turn.

Extra Actions

Extra actions can be done at any time during your turn. You just need to have the necessary resources and/or be in the right place.

1. Attack Cities with Swords

Swords allow you to attack cities. You can attack a city if it has treasures and if, during your turn, you make a stop adjacent to it.

To take a treasure from a city, you must pay 1 sword. But if you want to take other treasures from the same city in the same turn, each following treasure costs 2 swords.

Example: You have 3 swords and are at a stop adjacent to Samarkand. There are 2 good possibilities:

1. Use 1 sword to take a treasure from Samarkand, move, and use 1 more to take a treasure from Baghdad.
2. Use all 3 swords to take 2 treasures from Samarkand (the 1st costing one sword, and the 2nd, two).

If you take the last treasure of a city, you have conquered it! Two things happen:

1. Reveal the next city tile in the pile beside the board. Place 4 random treasure tiles in the newly revealed city. (If there are no more face-down city tiles, skip this step.)
2. To symbolize the conquest, place one of your yurts in the middle of the city. This yurt will not help your movement, but will count for the contest for the majority of yurts in a region, which gives votes at the end of the game.

Example: You decided to use your 3 swords to take 2 treasures from Samarkand, conquering the city. Place a yurt in the center of the city and reveal one more city: in the example, the new city available to attack is Sarai.

2. Build Yurts

Yurt tribute tiles allow you to build your yurts on the board. You can build them on any stop without yurts that you make during your movement, even if there is another pawn on it.

Example: You spent 2 yurt tiles to build your yurts along your path. You cannot build a yurt where one already exists.

Each stop can only have one yurt, except double stops, which can hold two (they can be 2 yurts of the same player), and Karakorum, which cannot have yurts.

Your yurts allow you to jump over a stop when you move. But you cannot take tributes or do actions at stops you jumped over.

If you run out of yurt pieces, you can no longer build.

You will also compete for the majority of yurts. The player with the most yurts and the player with the 2nd most yurts in each region will receive additional votes at the end of the game. This is explained in more detail under End of the Game.

3. Buy Upgrades with Coins

At any time on your turn, you can spend 2 coins to buy one of the available upgrade tiles, or a random one from the top of the pile. When buying an upgrade, place it in one of the 3 columns on the left of your board, matching the upgrade's background color. The columns are filled from bottom to top.

Important: You cannot use the benefits of upgrades bought in the same turn.

After buying, move the remaining upgrades to the right. Do not reveal new upgrade tiles; that only happens if someone places the Khan in the upgrades area.

Whenever you complete a row of 3 upgrades on your board, you gain one for free to place in the white column. Choose it from those available or take a random one from the top of the pile. There is no color restriction for upgrades in the white column.

Each of the 3 colored columns is related to one of the 3 regions on the board, according to its color. At the end of the game, the number of upgrades in each column determines how many votes you receive if you are the player with the most yurts or the 2nd with the most yurts in the corresponding region.

For details on each upgrade, see "Upgrades" below.

Example: If you manage to place an upgrade here, you will gain a free upgrade to place in the 2nd space of the white column. When you completed the first row, you gained this upgrade.

4. Deliver Treasures to Advisors

If, during your turn, you make a stop at an advisor, you can deliver treasures to receive votes. There are 7 advisor stops: 6 double stops around the map and one in Karakorum.

You can keep delivering to an advisor even if the bonus tile has already been collected.

Each advisor asks for a specific set of treasures to grant votes:

• 5 of the advisors ask for 2 identical treasures of a specific type. Each delivery at these places gives 1 vote.
• One advisor asks for 3 treasures of any type. Each delivery here gives 1 vote.
• Karakorum asks for 3 specific types of treasure, according to the tile placed here at the start of the game. Each delivery here gives 2 votes.

Example: You are the first to deliver 2 furs. You receive not only 1 vote but also the bonus tile with 2 coins, and can spend them whenever you wish.

5. Fulfill the Demands of Open Advisor Cards

If at any time during your turn you meet the conditions of an open advisor card, you gain one vote in the Kurultai. Remove the card from play and do not reveal a new one in its place. Only the first person to meet the card's demand receives the vote.

For more details on these cards, see "Open Advisor Cards" below.

6. Gain Votes

Whenever you gain a vote, whether from deliveries or from open advisor cards, advance your token on the Kurultai track.

Also advance the white (neutral) token, which represents the council's occupancy. It advances whenever any player gains votes.

When the white token reaches a certain number of votes (depending on the number of players), the Kurultai is ready to meet and the end of the game is triggered.

Example, end-game trigger: In a 3-player game, when the white token reaches the space numbered 3, the end of the game is triggered.

End of the Game

The end of the game is triggered when the white token reaches the mark of 10 / 14 / 16 / 17 votes (for 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 players). At that moment, follow these steps:

1. Finish the current round (the remaining players take their turns until it is the turn of the player who started the game).
2. Then play one more full round (each player plays one last time).
3. After this last round, the game ends.

More rarely, the end of the game can also be triggered when all cities have been conquered. Follow the same steps above.

After the last round, it is time to count the end-of-game votes. There are 2 types: influence over the 3 regions and secret advisor cards.

Influence Over the 3 Regions

Count how many yurts each player has in each region. The player with the most yurts and the player with the second most in a region receive votes depending on how many upgrades each placed in the corresponding columns on their boards. The table located above the upgrades area of the board details this scoring.

Attention: the initial actions of each column are not part of the count of upgrades for influence scoring.

The table shows the number of upgrades in a column, the number of votes if you have the most yurts in the region according to the number of upgrades in the corresponding column, and the number of votes if you are the 2nd player with the most yurts in the region.

If there is a tie for the most yurts in a region, the tied players are all in 1st place, and no one is in 2nd place.

If there is a tie for 2nd place in a region, the tied players are all considered 2nd place.

Example of influence scoring:

• In China, you are in third place in number of yurts. Even though you advanced in the red column, you receive no votes.
• In Persia, you are in second place in number of yurts. Since you have 3 upgrades in the green column, you receive 2 votes.
• In Russia, you had the most yurts, tied with the blue player. Since you have 2 upgrades in the yellow column, you receive 2 votes.
• Upgrades in the white column are not part of the end-game vote count, regardless of colors.

Secret Advisor Cards

Reveal the secret advisor card you chose at the start of the game. It can give 0 to 3 extra votes, depending on how well you fulfilled its conditions.

For more details, see "Secret Advisor Cards" below.

Determining the Winner

The player with the most votes is the winner. If there is a tie in the number of votes, the tied player with the most undelivered treasures wins.

If there is still a tie, the tied player closest to Karakorum wins the game. If the tie persists, the tied players share the victory and will rule the Mongol Empire together.

Upgrades

Spend 2 coins to buy an upgrade. You cannot use it in the same turn in which you bought it.

(Quantities as printed in the manual: 8x, 8x, 8x, 6x, 9x, and 1x per treasure.)

• Virtual coin (8x): Counts as a virtual coin you can use only on the turn it is activated (you do not gain a coin tile).
• Virtual treasure (1x per treasure): Counts as a specific virtual treasure (in the manual's example, iron) that you can use only on the turn it is activated (you do not gain a treasure tile). Allows you to make a single delivery with one fewer treasure (and/or complete open advisor cards).
• Virtual sword (8x): Counts as a virtual sword you can use only on the turn it is activated (you do not gain a sword tile).
• Virtual yurt (8x): Counts as a virtual yurt you can use only on the turn it is activated (you do not gain a yurt tile).
• (6x): Extra action of taking 1 tribute tile from the map.
• (9x): Two extra moves.

There is no restriction on accumulating upgrades of the same type in the same column. For example, you can have two virtual coin upgrades in the same column, which allows you to make a purchase at zero cost.

Bonus Tiles

You gain bonus tiles when you are the first to make a delivery to an advisor on the board. After it is used, flip it over and keep it beside you. It cannot be used again.

• Immediately gain 1 extra vote on the Kurultai track.
• Receive 2 sword tribute tiles.
• Receive 2 coin tribute tiles.
• Receive 2 yurt tribute tiles.
• Make 3 extra moves and 1 extra take-tribute action.
• Make 2 extra take-tribute actions.
• Take 3 random treasures from the treasure pile and choose 1 to keep. Discard the others.

Open Advisor Cards

In each game there will be 4 open advisor cards. When you meet the demand of a card, remove it from play and gain one vote on the Kurultai track. Do not reveal a new card.

The cards in the game are:

• First to have 4 swords (you do not need to spend them).
• First to have 6 yurts on the map.
• First to have 10 yurts on the map.
• First to have 4 treasures (you do not need to spend them).
• First to have 5 different treasures (you do not need to spend them).
• First to have 1 yurt in each region.
• First to have 2 yurts in each region.
• First to obtain 2 bonus tiles.
• First to obtain 3 bonus tiles.
• First to conquer 2 cities.
• First to conquer 3 cities.
• First to complete a row of upgrades.
• First to have 2 columns with 2 upgrades each.
• First to have 4 upgrades in a single column.

Secret Advisor Cards

Each player receives 2 at the start of the game and chooses 1 to keep. At the end it will give 0 to 3 votes, depending on how well you fulfilled its conditions. (Values given as a-b-c correspond to 1, 2 and 3 votes respectively.)

• Have a group of 3-6-8 connected yurts. The network may have branches.
• Have 4-7-10 upgrade tiles.
• Have 4-6-7 upgrade tiles with different symbols (treasure symbols count as different).
• Have 1-2-4 pairs of upgrades with the same symbol. Pairs may be equal to each other (different treasure symbols do not count as the same).
• Have 1-2-3 regions with at least 2 yurts and 2 upgrades in the associated column.
• Place at least 2 yurts adjacent to 2-3-4 Khan provinces (provinces on the map with the Khan icon).
• Place at least 2 yurts adjacent to 2-3-4 cities. Yurts inside cities do not count as adjacent.
• Place at least 1 yurt adjacent to 3-6-8 cities. Yurts inside cities do not count as adjacent.
• Have 2-4-5 upgrade tiles with horse or fist symbols.
• Place at least 1 yurt on 2-4-6 double stops on the map (any advisor stop except Karakorum).

Special Abilities

Each player has on their board an heir with a unique ability. Each ability lets the player break the rules of the game in a different way. Here are frequently asked questions about each heir's abilities:

Altani

• Only one pawn can do the actions. The other cannot attack cities, place yurts or deliver treasures, even if it stays still.
• A treasure or tribute obtained with one pawn in a round can be used by the other in the following round.

Chagatai

• You can keep the sword you gain for future turns.

Jochi

• If you complete the 1st row of upgrades, you do not gain a new upgrade, since the space in the white column is already occupied.

Ogedei

• You can also use coin upgrades to take a treasure from a city.
• If a city has 2 or more treasures, you can use a coin to take the 1st, and if you are next to it, a sword to take the next.

Tolui

• The yurt in Karakorum does not count for influence in any region, it only helps your movement (it also helps complete the demands of 2 open advisors: 6 yurts on the map and 10 yurts on the map).
• If an opponent's pawn is at an adjacent stop, you can still place a yurt on it.