VIAE: Roads of Rome Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Components
• Set Up
• How to Play
  • Goal of the Game
  • Gameplay Overview
• I. Fortuna
• II. Ordo
• III. Stipendium
  • Roads
  • Cities
  • Basilicas
  • Draw Deceptio cards based on your influence
• IV. Agere
  • Build a Road
  • Move
  • Sail
  • Scout
  • Conquer
    • Conquering a peaceful city
    • Conquering a hostile city
    • Hostile cities
    • Success
    • Failure
    • Hostility
  • Build a Basilica
• V. Epilogus
• Mandatum
  • How to Win the Game
  • How to Complete a Mandatum
  • How to Conquer a Region
• End of the Game
  • Strategic Advice on Ending the Game
• Common Used Terms in VIAE

Components

2-5 players, age 10+, about 120 minutes.

• 1 game board
• 10 player markers (2 for each player)
• 40 Legio pawns (8 for each player)
• 10 Officer pawns (2 for each player)
• 100 Road milestones (20 for each player)
• 60 City forts (12 for each player)
• 5 Influence cubes (1 for each player)
• 8 Basilicas (2 Forum, 3 Temple, 3 Quarry)
• 41 Hostility tokens (7x, 19x, 9x and 6x, by city value)
• 1 Round marker
• 4 Conquest dice
• 50 Stone resource cubes
• 50 Denar coins (10x value X, 25x value I, 15x value V)
• 5 player Cohorte boards
• 1 quick reference Player Turn Guide
• 18 Mandatum cards
• 54 Deceptio cards
• 18 Castra cards
• 27 Fortuna cards

Set Up

I. Set up the board in the middle of the table.

II. Place the round marker on the green space marked "1" of the round tracker.

III. Hand out one Cohorte board to each player. Put any remaining back inside the box.

IV. Each player chooses a color and places all pieces of that color next to their Cohorte (player markers, Legio and Officer pawns, influence cube, city forts and road milestones).

V. Randomly set the first turn order (rolling dice, by age, sword fight...). Then place one of each player's player markers accordingly on the turn tracker. The turn order starts left and ends right.

VI. Place five Legio pawns in their matching red spaces on the Cohorte board. Additional pawns are placed when they are recruited. Place the influence cube on the influence tracker in slot 1. This is your current influence. Influence is a resource but will be counted at the end as victory points.

VII. Shuffle the Fortuna, Castra and Deceptio decks and place them on the board.

VIII. Place the top three Castra cards face up, from left to right, in front of the deck on their marked areas on the board.

IX. Deal 2 Deceptio cards face down to each player. The last player receives 1 extra Deceptio card.

X. Shuffle all Mandatum cards and draw one for each player. Place these face up next to the board. Any player can complete these. Now deal 2 to each player face down. These are tucked under the Cohorte board. Only that player can complete those. Return the rest back to the box. These Mandatum cards are your personal objectives. Keep them secret from the other players.

XI. Place the Denar coins, Stone cubes, Hostility tokens and Basilicas at an easy to reach spot on the table.

XII. Hand out starting resources. Each player starts with 12 Denar and 8 Stone.

XIII. In turn order, each player places one fort and one of their player markers on a city in SPQR (the red region) and a road milestone adjacent to it. Roma can't be controlled by any player.

How to Play

Goal of the Game

The goal of the game is to be the player with the most influence at the end of the game. As soon as a player completes two Mandatum, the game ends. Mandatum give you bonus influence at the end of the game. You can gain influence in different ways, but the best way is by conquering cities. Influence is a resource you can use to play Deceptio cards that manipulate the game state.

Gameplay Overview

The game unfolds over multiple rounds divided into 5 phases:

• I. Fortuna - Start of the round
• II. Ordo - Setting the turn order
• III. Stipendium - Receive resources
• IV. Agere - Action phase
• V. Epilogus - End of the round

I. Fortuna

Move the round tracker and reveal a Fortuna event card.

At the beginning of a round, place the round marker onto the current round number.

After the first 2 rounds (after 3 rounds in a 2 player game), the enemies of Rome will begin to fight back.

• From now on Cities can become hostile.

Whenever you place the round marker on a red spot, reveal a Fortuna card for the round and resolve its effects.

Resolving Fortuna Events: Events are only active until the end of a round. If an Event states that you should reveal another card, resolve its effects, then reveal another Fortuna card. All cards that are revealed during this phase stay active until the end of the round. (When you shuffle the Deceptio deck)

II. Ordo

During this phase, players choose their starting position.

Remove your player markers from the turn tracker and starting with the first player, each player chooses a new spot on the turn tracker. (Skip this phase if it's the first round of the game. The first turn order has been set during the game's set up)

• You can't choose a spot another player has already occupied.
• Players take their turns based on where on the turn tracker they are placed. (Starting with the spot marked VIII)
• First positions in the turn order cost Denar, while later positions are free.
• If you choose a position with a cost, pay Denar (as shown on the tracker) as soon as you place your marker on that spot.
• If you choose a free position, your marker will be placed on the last possible spot in the turn order.

Exception for 5 players: If all free spots have been chosen before you had a chance to place yours, place your marker on the next possible spot. You are by default the first player. This will place you on a spot with a cost, but since you were the last player to choose, you don't have to pay for it.

III. Stipendium

During the third phase, each player receives their resources.

Roads

Each player gains 1 Denar for each road they control.

Cities

Each player chooses to receive either 1 Stone or 2 Denar for each city they control.

Basilicas

Basilicas grant bonus resources if there are no hostile cities in the same region.

• Quarry: Each city in the same region as a quarry produces double Stone.
• Forum: Players with at least one city in the same region as a forum gain 1 influence.
• Temple: Players with at least one city in the same region as a temple gain 5 Denar.

Draw Deceptio cards based on your influence

• Influence I-V: if your influence is at 1-5, you draw 1 Deceptio card.
• Influence VI-IX: if you have 6-9 influence, you draw 2 Deceptio cards.
• Influence X: if you are at the maximum of 10 influence, you draw 3 Deceptio cards.

Whenever you have more than 5 Deceptio cards in your hand, discard down to 5 cards.

IV. Agere

Players take their actions in turn order.

Starting with the first player, each player takes their turn using all their available actions before passing the turn to the next player. Depending on the number of players, you get a certain amount of actions you can take during this phase.

• In a 2 player game you get 5 actions.
• In a 3 to 4 player game you get 4 actions.
• In a 5 player game you get 3 actions.

Select any combination of the following 8 actions. You may do the same action multiple times, each time counting as an individual action.

The actions are: Build a Road, Move, Recruit, Scout, Conquer, Preparation, Build a Basilica, Sail.

Build a Road

Place a milestone on an unbuilt road adjacent to your player marker by spending as much workforce and Stone as the road's value.

Place the pawns of units assigned to build a road on the build space of your Cohorte.

If a road's value is III you must assign 3 workforce and spend 3 Stone.

After building a road, you may move your player marker to the city it is connected to.

Move

You can only move on built roads, but you can move to any city as long as there are built roads connecting it to you. Roads adjacent to Roma count as built.

• When you use a road controlled by another player, you must pay them 1 Denar to be able to use it.
• As soon as you move into a hostile city, you immediately have to take the conquer action.

If you don't have enough actions left, you can't move into a hostile city.

Sail

You can sail (move) from any harbor (a city with 2 blue tridents) to any other harbor on the map.

Pay 3 Denar to depart a harbor and 3 Denar to arrive at the other.

• If a harbor is controlled by a player, you pay them instead.
• You don't pay for harbors you control.

If you want to sail to a hostile city, you must take the Conquer action immediately on arrival.

• If you don't have enough actions left, you can't sail to a hostile city.
• If you have to retreat from conquering, you return to the harbor you departed from.

Scout

You can assign your Legio as Scouts to any adjacent hostile City. Pawns of scouting Legio are placed on the City they are scouting.

• The road connecting it doesn't have to be built.
• A hostile City can be scouted by up to 3 Legio in total, no matter from which player.
• You can scout multiple different cities within the same action.

Your Scouts let you roll additional conquest dice (+1 for each scout you control). Scouts add to the attacker's power, no matter who controls the scouts.

Conquer

Unless another player already controls it, you can conquer any city your player marker is placed on. An uncontrolled city is either peaceful or hostile. Hostile cities are marked by a hostility token. You conquer cities by moving onto it and assigning units with power equal to or higher than the city's value. To assign a unit as an attacker, place its pawn on the conquer space in your Cohorte.

Place the pawns of units assigned to conquer on the conquer field in your Cohorte.

Conquering a peaceful city

Assign units with total power equal to or higher than the city's value.

Conquering a hostile city

If you have scouts in that city, you add that many conquest dice to each roll. Once you've rolled the dice, you choose which result you want to add to the city's power. After the power of the city has been set, assign any number of units with equal or more power to successfully conquer that city. Add the power of all scouts (from any player) in that city to your attacking power.

Hostile cities

A city can be 2 levels of hostile:

• Vigilant: roll once and add the result to the city's power.
• Aggressive: roll twice then add both numbers.

Example: If you attack a hostile city that is aggressive and have 2 Legio scouting it, roll 3 dice (1 city + 2 scouts) for the first roll and choose the result. Then for the second time, roll 3 dice (1 city + 2 scouts) again and choose the result. Add both results to the city's base power - this is the final power of the city.

Success

• Place a fort on that city.
• If the conquered city was peaceful, you gain 1 influence.
• If the conquered city was vigilant, you gain 2 influence.
• If the conquered city was aggressive, you gain 3 influence.
• Place all your scouting pawns on the conquer field in your Cohorte.
• If there were any scouts from other players on that city, return them to their Cohorte's Legio slots. That player gains 1 influence.

Failure

• If you don't have enough power to conquer a city, you don't assign any units and instantly fail to conquer.
• Move your player marker back to the last city it was placed on before the attack.
• Scouts (from any player) in that city are dead and their pawns are placed back outside their Cohorte.
• You lose influence equal to the value of the dice.
• Should the city have been peaceful, you lose 1 influence and the attacked city becomes hostile.

Hostility

Beginning with the third round (4th in a 2 player game), after conquering, all uncontrolled cities connected by a road to the attacked city, become increasingly hostile. Increase their hostility by either placing a hostility token on those cities or turning a hostile city token upside down. (Peaceful to Vigilant; Vigilant to Aggressive.)

The value of the city remains the same.

Cities in SPQR can never become hostile.

Build a Basilica

You can spend 3 Stone and 3 Denar to build any type of Basilica next to a city you control.

• There can't be more than one Basilica in a Region.
• Basilicas can't be built in SPQR.

As long as there are no hostile cities in a Region with a Basilica, they give each player controlling a city in that region a bonus to their resources.

• Quarry = double Stone
• Forum = 1 influence
• Temple = 5 Denar

Prepare

When you prepare, you end your turn and gain 2 Denar for each action you didn't use. Once you've taken this action, you can't take any other actions.

1 action = 2 Denar. No other actions after this one.

You gain Denar from taking this action before you have to pay for your Cohorte at the end of your turn.

Recruit

You can either recruit more Legio - OR - an Officer from the Castra on the Board.

Recruiting Legio

Recruiting a new Legio costs 1 Denar. You can recruit any number of Legio within the same action, but you can't recruit more than you have slots available in your Cohorte.

Recruiting Officers from the Castra

Officers of your Legion are powerful units with special abilities.

To be able to recruit an officer, you will need to have influence equal to or higher than shown on the top left of the card. If you meet the requirements, pay its cost by adding the Castra slot cost and the additional cost of the unit shown in the top right of the card.

• Take the card and place it with a pawn in an officer slot in your Cohorte. You can discard one of your officers to free up a slot for your newly recruited officer.
• Draw a new card from the Castra pile. Move the remaining cards in the Castra slots according to the arrows and place the new card in the free (text ends here in the source)

Castra card parts: required influence (top left), cost (top right), power, workforce, ability, Castra slot cost.

Using abilities: Every officer has an ability. Abilities can be static effects that are always active or activated abilities that require you to assign that unit.

Assigning units: You assign units whenever you use its power to conquer, workforce to build roads or activate its ability. When you assign a unit, place its pawn on the corresponding field. Once a unit is assigned to something, you can't use it again that turn. To use the ability of an officer, place its pawn on the ability. This is not an action.

Available officer slots in your Cohorte:

• Slot 1 is available to you throughout the game.
• Slot 2 is available as soon as you have 6 or more influence.
• Should you fall below 6 influence, you must discard your officer in slot 2 by shuffling it back into the Castra pile.

(Officer slots show a cost of unit at end of turn and a pawn slot.)

Cycle

You may pay 3 Denar to discard the available cards and draw 3 new ones. Place all new units in a slot, starting from left to right. Shuffle the discarded cards back into the pile. If you decide not to recruit a unit at this point, you still spent your action.

Free Actions

Play Deceptio

• You can play Deceptio cards at any time during your turn.
• Playing Deceptio doesn't require actions.

Playing Deceptio costs +1 influence for each one you played this round. You can't spend more influence than you have. You can't fall below 1 influence.

• The first Deceptio is free
• The second costs 1 influence
• The third costs 2 influence
• The fourth costs 3 influence
• and so on...

Buy Influence

Once each turn when you enter Rome, you may buy influence.

• You can only buy 1 influence this way.
• You pay Denar equal to the influence you would have.

Influence track from 1 to 2 - 2 Denar; from 2 to 3 - 3 Denar; from 3 to 4 - 4 Denar; from 4 to 5 - 5 Denar; and so on...

At the End of Your Turn, Pay Your Cohorte

Pay in the following order:

1. Pay 1 Denar for each Legio you control.
2. Pay 2 if you have an officer in your first slot.
3. Pay 3 if you have an officer in your second slot.

Discard any units you can't pay.

After you paid your Cohorte, return all pawns (except scouts) back to their slots.

V. Epilogus

Shuffle the Deceptio discard pile back into the deck.

End of the round - Fortuna effects end - begin the next round.

Mandatum

How to Win the Game

The goal of the game is to gain the most influence. Mandatum add bonus influence points at the end of the Game. You can complete your personal Mandatum (tucked under your Cohorte) or the communal Mandatum (face up next to the Board).

How to Complete a Mandatum

A Mandatum counts as completed as soon as all requirements are met. As soon as you completed a Mandatum, place it face up next to your other Mandatum.

How to Conquer a Region

To complete this Mandatum, conquer the last city in that region. A region counts as conquered as soon as all cities in that region are controlled by players.

If this is a personal Mandatum, you complete it as soon as any player conquers the last city in that region. (only you can complete your personal Mandatum)

The bonus influence is shown on the Mandatum card.

End of the Game

The first player to complete 2 Mandatum ends the game.

When a player completes their second Mandatum, there will be no more rounds after that. Each player who hasn't taken their turn yet still does like in any other round. Once the turn order is complete and you finished the round, count your total points to determine the winner:

Count your influence by adding 1 point for each city you control and 1 for each Basilica you control to the number on your influence track in your Cohorte. Then add bonus points from your completed Mandatum to the total. This is your influence.

The player with the highest influence wins the game.

Strategic Advice on Ending the Game

Before completing your second Mandatum, check if your influence would be high enough to win. Sometimes it is wise to use a round to gather more influence before ending the game. When you end the game, players will try anything to make you lose influence or for them to gain more. Keeping that in mind, you might want to consider being the last player in the round where you complete your final Mandatum.

FAQ: So why does the round track have 12 rounds? The round track is merely a tool to know what round you're in. The game is most likely to end long before you reach round 12. In the rare case that you should reach the 12th round, consider it the last round of the game.

Common Used Terms in VIAE

Disclaimer: used terms might be incorrect and differ from Latin.

• Agere = Action phase
• Basilica = Special building granting you bonus resources
• Castra = Pool of recruitable units on the board
• Cohorte = Player board representing your legion
• Deceptio = Hand cards that change the game state
• Fortuna = Cards that change the rules of the game for one round
• Mandatum = The game's main objectives
• Epilogus = Shuffle Deceptio cards and end of the round
• Ordo = Selecting the turn order
• Stipendium = Gather resources