Lost Cities
34 questions players ask about Lost Cities. Pick one for the answer. See also the full rulebook.
Updated 2026-11-05.
Components and Setup
Placing and Discarding Cards
- Can you play a wager card after a number card is already in that color column?
- Can you play wager cards one at a time over several turns?
- Can a wager (handshake) card be discarded?
- Must cards in a column always increase in value?
- Can both players start an expedition of the same color?
- Can you play a card onto your opponent side of the board?
- Is there one discard pile per color or a single shared pile?
- Are discards placed face up or face down?
Drawing and Turn Order
- What is the hand size, and must you draw after every play or discard?
- What if a player forgot to draw and played with fewer than eight cards?
- Can you look through the cards in a discard pile?
- Can you draw a discard you cannot play (for example a wager after number cards started)?
- Can you draw the card you just discarded?
- Can you pick up a card you discarded on an earlier turn?
- Can you draw a card from your own expeditions on the board?
- What do you draw if every discard pile is empty?
End of the Game and Scoring
- Does the game end immediately when the last card is drawn, or is there a final turn?
- May players count the remaining draw pile, and do both need to agree?
- In what order are the expedition cost, wager multiplier and 8-card bonus applied?
- What do one, two and three wager cards multiply by?
- Does each wager card add +1 point on top of the multiplier?
- Is the 20-point 8-card bonus multiplied by wagers?
- Is the bonus for exactly eight cards or eight or more?
- Do wager cards count toward the 8-card bonus?
- If two expeditions each have eight or more cards, do both earn the bonus?
- Does a color with no cards played score 0 or -20?