Tigris and Euphrates

From Thousand Parsec Wiki

Overview

Tigris and Euphrates is a ruleset currently in development in conjunction with Google Summer of Code 2008. This ruleset is an adaptation based on the board game Tigris and Euphrates by Mayfair Games.

For a quick guide to getting started with TaE, click here.

Rules

This is an preliminary draft of the rules and may change as development progresses.

Setting

Humans have exploded in growth and expansion with the discovery of ancient alien artifacts in several solar systems scattered around an unexplored region of space. Colonists, scientists, and entrepreneurs alike are eager to explore the galaxy. You and the other players act out the parts of powerful corporations vying for control of the galaxy using strategy, leadership, conflict, and a little bit of luck. But only through the balance of resources and control of long forgotten artifacts can you achieve domination in this new frontier.

Initial setup

The play area is set up as a rectangular grid of solar systems. There are 2 types of solar systems: inhabitable and uninhabitable. Inhabitable solar systems can be colonized by any ship except mining vessels. The uninhabitable solar systems can only be colonized by mining vessels. At the start there are 10 solar systems which start out colonized and contain a single ancient alien artifact each.

Each player starts out with three fleets of ships: a fleet of 6 civilian vessels which are used to inhabit uninhabited solar systems (the civilian vessels are drawn at random from a pool of available civilian ships), a fleet of 4 leaders which are used to control regions of space, And a fleet of two prototype weapon ships which can be used one time each to destroy a solar system. The ships in each fleet are hidden from the other players.

Resources, Colonists, Leaders, and Allied Regions

As discussed above, each player has a fleet of civilians and leaders. There are 4 types of resources, which correspond to 4 leaders per player and 4 types of civilian ships:

Mining robots with a Mining foreman produce Raw Materials
Merchants with a Merchant leader produce Money
Scientists with a Scientific leader produce Technology
Settlers with a Government head produce People

Colonists settle solar systems, and when controlled by the corresponding type of leader that you own, generate resources for you. The amount of resources each player has is hidden from the other players until the end of the game.

Each leader may inhabit a single unoccupied solar system as long as it is adjacent to a Scientific settlement (more on this later).

When two or more settled solar systems (including solar systems with leaders) are adjacent to one another, they are said to be linked together in an allied region. Any solar system which is adjacent to the allied region is added to the allied region when it is settled. An allied region may contain leaders from one or more players, but may only contain one of each of the four types of leaders.

Winning the Game

At the end of the game, a player's score is the number of resources collected in their weakest resource type. For example:

Player 1 has the resources: 4 Raw Materials, 10 Money, 2 Technology, and 12 People.
Player 2 has the resources: 3 Raw Materials, 3 Money, 3 Technology, and 3 People.
Player 1's score is 2. Player 2's score is 3.
Player 2 wins.

Turns and Orders

The players take turns giving orders and collecting resources. On a player's turn he may make up to two orders (two different orders or the same order twice). The possible orders he can give are:

Place, move, or remove a leader
Colonize a solar system with an available colonist and distribute the resource generated by the settlement.
Destroy a solar system with one of your prototype weapons.
Swap up to 6 ships in your civilian fleet for new ships.

Place, move, or remove a leader

All of your leaders are initially not attached to any solar system. You may place a leader onto any unoccupied solar system as long as it is adjacent to a Scientific settlement, and as long as it does not create a connection between two allied regions. If you place a leader in a region which already has a leader of that type, it creates an internal conflict (see the combat section below). Leaders can never be destroyed; they are simply removed from their current solar system only to be placed again later.

Colonize a solar system

You may order a ship from your civilian fleet to colonize an unoccupied solar system. Mining robots may only colonize uninhabitable solar systems. All other ships may colonize any inhabitable solar system. When a ship colonizes a solar system it generates a single corresponding resource for the player who owns the corresponding leader which inhabits the allied region of the solar system. If no leader of the corresponding type exists in the allied region, then the resource goes to the player who owns the Government head of that allied region. If no Government head exists in the region, then the resource is lost.

If the colonization of a solar system connects two regions, and both of those regions have a leader of the same type, then an external conflict occurs (see the combat section below).

Destroy a Solar System

You may order one of your prototype weapon ships to destroy a solar system of your choice. All inhabitants are killed, and the solar system may never be colonized again and no leader may occupy the system. If a leader is occupying the solar system at the time of destruction, it is returned to the player who owns the leader. Each weapon ship may be used only once during the game (so you may destroy 2 total stars per game).

Swap out Civilian Fleet

You may swap out up to 6 ships from your civilian fleet when you use this order. They are removed from the game and new ships are randomly drawn from the civilian ship pool.

End of the Turn

At the end of the turn, all players refill their fleet of civilian ships to 6 ships drawn at random from the civilian ship pool.

Combat

Internal Combat

Internal combat occurs when one leader is placed into an allied region where another leader of the same type already resides. The leader already residing in the region is said to be the “defender” the newly placed leader is the “attacker.”

First, the initial strength of the attacker and defender are evaluated. The initial strength of each leader is the number of Scientific settlements directly adjacent to each leader. Then the attacker has a chance to bolster the strength of the leader by sending in Scientists from his civilian fleet. Then the defender has a chance to do send Scientists in from his fleet. The total strength of each leader is the initial strength plus the number of scientists sent by the player that owns the leader. If the attacker is stronger than the defender, than the attacker wins, otherwise the defender wins. In the case of a tie, the defender wins. The winner receives 1 Technology resource and the looser must remove his leader from the board. All extra ships sent in for the battle are removed from the game.

External Combat

External combat occurs when two regions are joined together forming a region with more than one leader of the same type. The attacker is the player who settled the solar system which connected the two regions. External combat is resolved one leader type at a time. The attacker gets to choose the order of resolution.

For each conflict:

The starting strength of each leader is determined by the number of solar systems of its type in its allied region.
Each player then add ships of the same type as the leader to bolster the strength of their leader (attacker first, then defender).
The leader with the higher total strength wins the battle. In the case of a tie, the defender wins.
The loosing leader is removed and all solar systems of the same type as the leader, in the leader’s former region become uninhabited! Note: This may cause the regions to be split up and may render other unresolved conflicts null since they are no longer in the same region.
The winner receives 1 resource of the type associated with the conflict for each solar system which was vacated and 1 resource for the leader which was removed.

Continue this process until all conflicts are resolved.

Ancient Alien Artifact

An ancient alien artifact is a resource that counts as 1 of any other type of resource. There are ten solar systems designated at the beginning of the game which are home to 1 ancient alien artifact each. To harvest this artifact, you must have a Merchant leader in a region where at least two alien artifacts are located. If you satisfy these conditions, then you can choose one alien artifact to harvest.

Game Ending Conditions

The game ends when one of two conditions is met:

Two or fewer alien artifacts are left in the galaxy.
The pool of civilian ships has been exhausted.

At the end of the game, the points are tallied as described above in the “Winning the Game” section, and the winner is announced.

Examples

Image legend:

White square: Unoccupied solar system
Square with U: Uninhabitable solar system (can only be colonized by mining robots)
Square with X: Destroyed solar system
Square with A: Contains an alien artifact
Red square: Solar system inhabited by scientists
Blue square: Solar system inhabited by mining robots
Green square: Solar system inhabited by merchants
Black square: Solar system inhabited by settlers
Circles: Leaders corresponding to the same color scheme as above. The number in the circle is the player who owns that leader.

2 Players, Basic Round

Initial Board: img

Player 1 places a government leader
Player 1 places a mining robot. Since no mining leader exists in that region, the resource goes to the government leader. Thus, Player 1 gains one raw material resource.

img

Player 1's turn ends and he refills his civilian fleet to 6 ships

Player 2 places a mining leader
Player 2 places a mining robot. Player 2 gets one raw material resource since he owns the mining leader for that region.

img

Player 2's turn ends and he refills his civilian fleet to 6 ships

2 Players, Internal Conflict

Initial Board:img

Player 1's Civilian ships: 2 merchants, 1 settler, 3 scientists
Player 2's Civilian ships: 1 scientist, 3 mining robots, 1 settler, 1 merchant

Player 1 places a merchant leader. This leader creates an internal conflict with Player 2's merchant leader.

img

Internal Conflict:

Initial strength is determined by the number of technological solar systems (red squares) adjacent to each leader
- Player 1 strength: 2
- Player 2 strength: 1
Players may send in scientists as reinforcements
- Player 1 (the attacker) sends in his 3 scientists bolstering his strength to 5
- Player 2 (the defender) has only 1 extra scientist so he opts not to send the scientist in. His final strength is 1.
Player 1 wins the conflict
Player 2's leader is removed from the board
Player 1 receives 1 technology resource for winning

Player 1's turn continues:

Player 1 places a merchant settlement and receives 1 money resource.

img

Player 1 and 2 refill their civilian fleet to 6 ships

Player 2 uses one of his weapon ships to destroy a solar system. This splits the region into two regions.
Player 2 places his merchant leader. Since the region has been split, there is no conflict.

img

2 Players, External Conflict