Rio Grande Games 10 Board Games User Manual


 
Figure 4: The player takes
the soldier card. He can
choose between 9 different
points because there are
three soldier spaces at the
same distance away: that
is two edges to the nearest
points.
He decides to move to
the point indicated as
shown in
figure 5. He
now has 3 different ways
to place the boundary walls;
he decides, as shown in
the figure, to cut
the biggest possible
province. The
alternative paths
are shown with the
dotted lines. Note
that both paths
would have passed
over a previous
placed boundary
wall. In this case
only the remaining
two boundary walls
would have been placed.
Players may place boundary walls that cross each other and
also inside closed provinces. As you will see, that’s a very important
point, because you may decide to divide an opponent’s province.
The figure 6 shows another possible movement. Here, the player has
decided to go to another
of the 9 possible points
(fig.4). In this particular
case, the player simply
moves Alexander following
the existing path and,
therefore without placing
new boundary walls. The
dotted line shows the
only other alternative
path (as you can see,
it runs inside the closed
province).
Players only place black boundary walls during normal turns. The red
boundary walls are used for Alexander’s last move in the game (see
game end below).
Alexander’s special move
It can happen that neither face-up card offers a symbol that will give
the player a good Alexander move or that the moves offered gives the
player’s opponents better opportunities than they give the player.
It can often happen that the player sees a good Alexander move, but
the required symbol is not on one of the face-up cards.
In such a case, the player may play a card from his hand and move
Alexander to the next empty space showing that symbol.
By doing this, the player loses 2 cards: the one he plays and the one
face-up card he does not take.
Due to this cost, a player cannot afford to do this often.
2. Further actions
After moving Alexander, a player may take 2 further actions in any
combination or order. These can be any 2 of the following 4 actions.
Also, a player may choose to do the same action twice, except for levy
taxes, which a player may only do once in a turn.
- take a card
- occupy an empty province or take over an opponent’s province
- levy taxes
- take back a guard
- Take a card
This is the simplest and most common action. The player takes the
top-most card from the card supply or one of the two face-up cards.
He adds it to his hand, which he keeps secret from the other players.
If the player chooses to take a card as his first action and wants to
take another card as his second action, he may only choose between
the card supply and the remaining face-up card(s). He does not draw a
second face-up card to replace one he took until the end of his turn.
Then he replaces any face-up cards he took. When the card supply is
exhausted, shuffle the discard stack and place it face down as the new
card supply.
- Occupy province
A province is a connected group of triangular spaces (with or without
symbols) that are enclosed by boundary walls and the coast (or the
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