Cities — How to Play

Game Objective

In Cities, you have been tasked by the city council to transform an entire city district. This is an opportunity to build new housing, offices, parks, and recreational areas near the waterfront. The game is played over 8 rounds (or 4 rounds in a 2-player game). Each round, players use workers to collect 1 scoring card, 1 city tile, 1-2 feature tiles, and 2-4 building pieces. City tiles are made up of park, water, and building spaces. Building pieces are placed on corresponding colored building spaces to form buildings, which can be 1 to 4 stories tall. Scoring cards and city achievement boards provide objectives for players to complete and score at the end of the game. Whoever scores the most Victory Points will have built the most fantastic district and wins the game!

For a longer 2-player game, play 7 rounds and build a 3x5 tile district.

Setup

1. Place the game board in the center of the table.
2. Each player chooses a player color and takes the 4 corresponding worker pawns (or 8 in a 2-player game), 3 achievement rings, 1 scoring token, and 1 player aid card.
3. Choose any city achievement board and place it above the game board. Return unused achievement boards to the box. For your first game, play with New York or Rio de Janeiro. In 2-player games, the middle space for each achievement is not used, so you should cover it with 1 achievement ring of a color not in use.
4. Shuffle all scoring cards and place them in a face-down draw pile to the left of the game board.
5. Shuffle all city tiles and place them in face-down draw piles below the scoring cards and near the board.
6. Place the feature tiles face down, mix them, arrange them into stacks, and place them below the city tiles.
7. Place all building pieces into the bag.
8. Randomly choose a starting player, who takes the star token and places it in front of them.
9. Lay out the 4 starting tiles in view of all players. Starting with the player to the right of the starting player and proceeding counter-clockwise, each player chooses a starting city tile and places it in front of them. This is the beginning of their "district." Return any remaining starting tiles to the box.
10. Draw 4 scoring cards and place 3 face up and the last 1 face down in the top row of the game board.
11. Draw 4 city tiles and place 3 face up and the last 1 face down in the second row of the game board.
12. Draw 6 feature tiles and place 5 of them face up and the last 1 face down in the third row of the game board.
13. Create sets of building pieces by drawing pieces from the bag and placing 1 in each of the first ten squares in the last row of the game board. Do not place building pieces in the spaces with a question mark.

Game Flow

The game begins with the player who has the star token and proceeds clockwise around the table.

Each turn, the active player takes an item (or group of items) from the board and then places 1 of their workers in the designated worker space next to or below the taken item(s). After the starting player's first turn in the round, they place the star token in the indicated bottom right space on the board.

In a 3-4 player game, each player may only place 1 worker per row each round. In a 2-player game, they must place 2 workers per row throughout the round.

Workers, however, can be placed in any order (e.g., you can place your first worker in the 3rd row).

Each row provides a different resource to be used in the game.

When a player chooses a face-down item, it is flipped face up and taken. Players may not look at a face-down item until it is chosen.

The remainder of the turn depends on which row the worker was placed:

• Scoring Card Row: The player takes the scoring card, places their worker in the designated worker space, and places the card face up on the table next to their district.
• City Tile Row: The player takes the city tile and places their worker in the designated space. Then, the player places the city tile face up in their district. It must be placed fully adjacent to an existing tile, though it can be rotated to any orientation. Tiles have 3 types of spaces: city, park, and water. Any type of space can be placed next to any other type. A player's district can never exceed 3 tiles in length and 3 tiles in width.
• Feature Tile Row: The player takes the feature tile(s), places their worker in the worker space, and then places each feature tile face up on a space of the same type in their district. Feature tiles with a blue background are placed on water spaces; tiles with a green background are placed on park spaces; and tiles with a gray background are placed on building spaces without building pieces on them. Only 1 feature tile can be placed per space. If the player cannot legally place a tile, or chooses not to, it is removed from the game.
• Building Pieces Row: The player takes the building pieces from 1 space (or, in the case of the last space, they draw 2 random pieces from the bag) and then places their worker in the designated worker space. Each building piece can be placed on a building space of the corresponding color or can be stacked on top of a piece of the same color (up to 4 pieces high). If the player cannot legally place a piece, or chooses not to, it is removed from the game.

At the end of the player's turn, they check if they have met any achievements listed on the city achievement board. If so, they place 1 of their rings on the highest vacant number under that achievement. A player can claim multiple achievements in the same turn, but can only claim each achievement once per game. After checking for achievements, the player's turn ends and the player to their left plays.

The following rules apply to all achievements: "Adjacent" means orthogonal, not diagonal. An "area" means a group of orthogonally connected spaces. All numerical requirements are a minimum, not exact (unless indicated). A special feature tile counts as an empty city space of any color for achievement purposes. If you claim an achievement, but later in the game no longer meet its requirements, you do not remove your achievement ring from the board.

Once all workers have been used, the round ends. The player with the worker closest to the star token space (the rightmost worker in the fourth row) takes the star token and becomes the first player for the next round. In a 3-player game, the remaining scoring card, city tile, feature tiles, and building pieces are removed from the game.

Actions and How to Play

Refer to the manual for details on this section.

End of Game and Scoring

After the 8th round (or the 4th round in a 2-player game), the game ends.

Each player places their scoring token near the scoring track. Players calculate their scores as follows and move their disc on the track accordingly:

• City Achievement Boards: The points listed under any achievement rings they placed on the city achievement board.
• Scoring Cards: The Victory Points listed on each of their scoring cards whose requirements have been met. Each scoring card scores for each occurrence of the shown requirement in their district. The same configuration of spaces or building pieces can be scored by multiple scoring cards.
• Water and Park Spaces: For each area of orthogonally connected water spaces in their district, score 1/3/6/10 points for 1/2/3/4 different feature tiles in that area. Each area can only score 1 set. Do the same with park spaces.
• Monument Feature Tiles: Each monument feature tile (which shows a "2") grants 2 Victory Points.

The player with the most Victory Points wins! In case of a tie, the player with the most Victory Points from achievements wins.

Tips for Winning

Refer to the manual for details on this section.