Splendor

DeathMatch 4: Splendor

In this game, players will collect Resource Gems to be the first to reach 15 prestige points by purchasing development cards.

There are 5 types of Gem Tokens, you should be familiar with these now. They are Ruby, Emerald, Sapphire, Onyx and Diamond. There is an addition special Token of Gold. There are 4 of each type of Gem Token, and 5 Gold Tokens. These will be used to purchase development cards, which in turn can be used to purchase further development cards and prestige points. There are also development cards of 3 different levels, and 3 nobles.

The board is as follows:

Development Cards

4 development cards will be revealed for each level. Each development card has 3 properties:

Gem Purchase Cost, Bonus Gem Type, Prestige Points.

• The Gem Purchase Cost is how many of each type of Gem you need to purchase the development card. The number of each gem type required is listed in the respective coloured columns.

• The Bonus Gem Type is the type of Gem you add to your bonus pool when purchasing future development cards.

• Prestige points are how many prestige points you earn by Purchasing the card.

Turn Actions

Players alternate taking turns, the DMO may decide whether they would like to go first or second. There are four possible actions that can be taken:

• Collect 3 Gem Tokens of different colours.

• Collect 2 Gem Tokens of the same colour. Can only be used if there are 4 Gems of the colour.

• Purchase a development card from the grid or your hand.

• Reserve a development card and take 1 Gold Token.

If a player has more than 10 Tokens (Gems or Gold) at the end of their turn, they must discard Tokens until they have 10. These return back to the board.

Purchasing a development card, adds 1 of its Bonus gem type to your pool. When purchasing a development card, you may spend tokens or bonus pool gems. Spent tokens are returned to the board, but bonus pool gems are not expended. By default, you will use bonus pool gems, then gem tokens, then gold tokens if you don’t specify what you use to purchase.

Reserving a development card removes it from the grid and adds it to your hand. You may also choose to reserve a random development card. This means only you will be able to purchase that development card. You may reserve cards while there are no gold tokens left, but you will not receive a gold token. Gold tokens can be used as any colour Gem when purchasing a Development Card. You may only have up to 3 development cards in your hand at a time. If you have 3 development cards in your hand, you must purchase one before you can reserve again.

Nobles

There is one final way to obtain prestige points, by fulfilling a noble’s requirements. There will be 3 nobles. Each nobles’ requirements will either contain three gems of three different colours, or four gems of two different colours. If you obtain enough bonus pool gems to meet the requirements before the opponent meets those requirements, you will earn 3 prestige points. This only uses the bonus poll gems, not the tokens. This doesn’t taken an action, but you can only collect 1 noble per turn (choosing if there are multiple you could collect).

Winning the Game

When a player reaches 15 prestige points, and both players have taken the same number of turns, the game will end. The player with more prestige points wins. If this is a tie, the player with less total Gems in their bonus pool wins. If this is also a tie, the DMO wins.

Here is a video summary to assist your understanding: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2A0CQ0xsrv0

There is a time limit of 1 min per turn, with 5 mins of reserve time. If you run out of reserve time, you lose the DM.