How to Play Innovation: Figures in the Sand

Objective of the Game

In Innovation: Figures in the Sand, players are tasked with leading their civilizations through the ages, enlisting the aid of historical "Figures" to enhance their progress. These Figures provide Inspire effects to boost card-drawing, Karma effects for continuous benefits, and powerful Decrees that can shift the game's momentum. The ultimate goal is to guide your people to victory by effectively utilizing these new tools and achieving the required number of Achievements.

Preparation (Setup)

1. Separately shuffle the age decks of each expansion you are using.
2. Do not mix Figures in with the Base cards. Stack the Figures underneath the Base cards, in a cross pattern. If playing with Innovation: Echoes of the Past, stack Figures underneath both Base and Echoes cards in a double cross.
3. For Achievements, take one Base card from each age 1-9 (not 10!) to form the standard achievements.
4. Place the special achievement cards from each included set with the achievements.
5. Place the five Decree cards with the achievements.
6. The game start rules are not changed when playing with Figures in the Sand.

Flow of the Game

The game progresses through players taking actions on their turns. The structure of turns and rounds remains consistent with the base game of Innovation. New action types like Inspire and Decree are introduced, which players can choose to take during their turn.

Drawing Expansion Cards

• Any time you draw a card of any type for any reason, skip empty ages and draw from the next-highest non-empty age. An age is considered empty if there are no Base cards available, regardless of how many expansion cards are available.
• If you ever need to draw an expansion card but none of the appropriate age are available, draw a Base card of that age instead.
• Figures are not drawn with draw actions or effects that instruct you to draw cards unless they specifically tell you to draw a Figure.
• There are two ways Figures are drawn:
  1. Any time you would draw a card as a share bonus after a dogma action, draw a Figure instead.
  2. Any time a player claims a standard achievement with the Achieve action, each other player draws a Figure.
• In both cases, draw a Figure of value equal to your highest top card, remembering to skip empty ages.
• When drawing a Base card for any reason, if you have cards in your hand but none are Echoes cards, draw an Echoes card instead.

Fade

At the end of any action (on any player's turn), if you have more than one top Figure, you must fade the excess. To fade a Figure, score it. You must continue fading Figures one by one until you have only one top Figure. You choose which Figures to fade.

Actions and How to Play

Karma Effects

Karma effects are found on Figures and provide continuous benefits as long as the Figure is a top card. There are three types:

• When: These effects trigger immediately when the Figure is melded.
• Each: These effects continuously modify something on your cards (icons, cards in a location, or your score) as long as the Figure remains a top card.
• Would: These effects interrupt an action when a specific triggering condition occurs. If the reaction starts with "instead," cancel the original effect and follow the karma effect. If it starts with "first," follow the karma effect, then continue with the original effect.

Karma effects never chain or trigger off of other karma effects. If multiple Would karmas would be triggered by the same action, the current player decides which karma occurs and ignores the others.

Using the Dogma action on a Figure

Although Figures do not have dogma effects, you can still choose to activate them with a dogma action to use the visible echo effects in that color stack on your board, if any. The featured icon is the icon type present on the Figure card.

The Inspire Action and Inspire Effects

Inspire is a new action type that serves as an enhanced Draw action. You may take an Inspire action only once per turn, and only if there are any inspire effects visible on your board. To take an Inspire action:

1. Choose one color containing visible Inspire effects.
2. Execute each of the Inspire effects in order from the bottom card up to the top in that chosen color.
3. Then, draw a card of value equal to your top card in that color.

These effects are not shared. Inspire effects are text in spotlights on the cards.

Decrees and the Decree Action

Decrees are special achievement cards that can be stolen. All five Decrees begin in the center of the table with the other Special Achievements. You can claim a Decree by taking a Decree action, a new action type you can take on your turn.

You may only take a Decree action if you have three Figures of different values in your hand. To do so:

1. Remove all the cards in your hand from the game (including both Figures and non-Figures).
2. Choose a Decree matching the color of one of the Figures you discarded.
3. If it is in another player’s Achievement pile, return it to the area with the Special Achievements.
4. Otherwise, claim it as an Achievement and activate its effect.

It is possible to activate a Decree you already possess, skipping the claim portion of the Decree action and simply executing its effect. Many Figures allow you to activate a specific Decree with 'any two Figures'; in this case, the color and age of the Figures in your hand are irrelevant, but you still remove your entire hand from the game.

Bonus

Bonuses provide points in addition to your score pile. Count the highest visible bonus on your board as points, and add one point for each other visible bonus. For example, if you had bonuses 9, 9, 4 on your board, you would have 11 extra points.

Forecast

Cards in your Forecast are things you’ll unlock in the future. If you take a Meld action (but not when an effect instructs you to meld a card!) you may afterward meld a card from your Forecast that is of equal or lower value than the melded card. You may then take a free Dogma action (not counting as one of your two per turn) choosing the card you melded from your Forecast. Cards enter your Forecast via the Foreshadow keyword. If instructed to ‘Draw and Foreshadow a 4’, you would draw a 4, and then place it in your Forecast.

Echo Effects

When you perform the Dogma action, you execute not only the dogma effects on the card you choose but also all visible echo effects on your cards of that color. Echo effects are executed before dogma effects. Start from the bottom card and proceed up to the top card, and then to the dogma effects. Echo effects are shared by any players that would be eligible to share the dogma effects of the top card.

End of Game and Scoring

The game ends when a player achieves the required number of Achievements.

Victory Conditions with Expansions

The base number of Achievements needed to win a game of Innovation is 6. For each player in the game beyond 2, decrease that number by 1. For each expansion you are playing with, increase that number by 1. The minimum number of Achievements to win is 5, regardless of the number of players and expansions. For team play, count each team as one player for this calculation.

Remember that claimed Decrees count as Achievements.

Claiming Multiple Achievements of the Same Age

Normally, to claim an achievement, you need a top card of value equal to or higher than the achieved card’s age, and five times or more points than the achieved card’s age. If you are claiming a duplicate achievement (an age 2 achievement when you already have one, for example), you must also have twice as many points as usual (20, in this case). To claim a third duplicate, you would need three times as many, and so forth.

Tips for Winning

• Using Decrees effectively is key to victory, as they are very powerful.
• Be mindful of the Fade rule: you can usually only keep one active Figure at a time, so choose which Figures to fade strategically by scoring them.
• Pay attention to Echo effects when performing a Dogma action, as they can provide additional benefits before the dogma effect itself.