Tzolk'in: The Mayan Calendar rules refresher

Read the refresher

You are trying to score the most victory points, mostly through the three temples, buildings, monuments and crystal skulls. You do that by placing workers on five rotating gears and picking them up later, after the calendar has carried them to better actions.

For setup, rotate the Tzolk'in gear so the arrowhead points at one of the two blue-green end-of-age teeth. Put a Corn Harvest Tile on every jungle field, then stack a Wood Harvest Tile on top of each field in the groups for Palenque actions 3, 4 and 5. The group for action 2 stays corn only. With three players use only three fields per group, with two players only two. Each player takes three workers, a player board lighter side up, and seven markers: one on the white step of each temple and one on the leftmost space of each of the four technology tracks. Deal six Age 1 buildings to the building row and six monuments face up, five monuments with three players, four with two. Corn goes in the middle of the Tzolk'in gear. Finally, deal four Starting Wealth Tiles to each player, everyone secretly keeps two and discards two, then reveals and takes what they show. With two or three players, block action spaces with dummy workers first, drawn from the leftover wealth tiles, before anyone chooses.

Each round, players take turns clockwise from the starting player. Then, only on a Food Day, everyone feeds and the gods give rewards. Then the calendar advances. On your turn you must do exactly one of two things: place any number of workers and pay corn, or pick up any number of workers and perform their actions. You cannot mix the two, and you cannot skip. Your very first turn is always a placement.

At the start of your turn, if you have two or fewer corn, you may beg: discard all your corn, take three from the bank, and step down one step on a temple of your choice. You cannot beg if you are on the bottom step of every temple.

When you place, each worker goes on the lowest-numbered unoccupied action space of the gear you choose. You pay corn equal to the number of each space chosen, plus the worker-count cost on your player board, where the bold number is the running total. You cannot place more than you can afford, and you cannot place zero. The Starting Player Space between Palenque and Chichen Itza counts as an action space with a cost of zero.

When you pick up, for each worker you may use the action it is standing on, use a lower-numbered action on the same gear by paying one corn per step back even if that space is occupied, or do nothing. You choose the order. The top space on each gear, actions 6 and 7 on the small gears and 10 on Chichen Itza, is a free choice action: perform any action on that gear at no extra cost.

The gears do this. Palenque is food and wood: action 1 is fishing for three corn and never runs out, and actions 2 through 5 take a Harvest Tile from that group. Wood sits on top of corn, so you take the wood first, or burn the forest by discarding the Wood Tile to take the Corn Tile underneath, which angers the gods and costs you a step down a temple. Keep your harvested tiles in front of you. Yaxchilan gives wood, stone, gold, crystal skulls and combinations. There are only thirteen skulls in the whole game, and once the last one is taken no more can be gained. Tikal advances technology and constructs buildings, and action 4 builds one or two buildings or one monument. If you build two, only one of them may benefit from your architecture technologies, and architecture never applies to monuments. Tikal action 5 climbs one step on two different temples for one resource block. Uxmal lets you climb one temple for three corn, trade at the market exchange table, take a new worker from the bank, build a building paying two corn per resource with no resources allowed, or pay one corn to perform any action on Palenque, Yaxchilan, Tikal or Uxmal. Chichen Itza requires placing a crystal skull in the oval for the action you use, which means each of those actions can be used only once all game. You get victory points, a step up a named temple, and sometimes a resource of your choice.

Technology has four tracks. Going from start to level one costs one block, level one to two costs two blocks, level two to three costs three blocks. At level three you may still pay one block to take the printed bonus, as often as you like. Higher levels include the benefits of the lower ones on that track.

On temples, only one player can stand on the top step of each. When you reach a top step, immediately flip your player board to the lighter side. Anytime you anger the gods you move down one step on a temple of your choice, and you may not pick a temple where you are already at the bottom.

After everyone has acted, the calendar turns one day counter-clockwise. Workers on the highest space are pushed off and returned with no action. If nobody occupied the Starting Player Space, add one corn to the current tooth of the gear. If someone did, they take all the accumulated corn as soon as their turn ends, get their worker back at end of round, and the Starting Player Marker changes hands, passing to the left if they already had it. They may also advance the calendar two days instead of one, but only if their board is lighter side up, and not if that would push off a worker that would not otherwise be pushed. Using it flips the board to the darker side.

There are four Food Days, marked on the Tzolk'in teeth. On a Food Day, after all turns, pay two corn for every worker you have in play, including those on gears. Any worker you cannot feed costs you three victory points, and points can go negative. Farms reduce this cost, but never below zero per worker. On the second Food Day, after feeding, clear the building row and deal six Age 2 buildings. Then take temple rewards. On a brown-orange Food Day you take the resources and skulls shown on your current step and on every step below it. If there are not enough skulls for everyone entitled to one, nobody gets a skull. On a blue-green Food Day you score the points on your current step only, which can be negative at the bottom, plus a bonus for being highest on each temple. The lower left number above a temple is the end of Age 1 bonus, the upper right is the end of game bonus. Tied players each take half the bonus.

The game ends after the fourth Food Day, one full revolution of the gear. Convert all your resources to corn at the market exchange rate, then score a quarter of a point per corn, three points per crystal skull you still hold, and whatever your monuments award. Most points wins. Ties go to whoever has the most workers still on the gears, and if still tied, all tied players win.

A turn, played out

This round ends on a Food Day. You hold 4 corn, 2 wood and 1 stone. All 3 of your workers are on the gears: one on Palenque action 5, one on Tikal action 5, one on Uxmal. On the temples you stand 2 steps up on the first, 3 up on the second, and on the bottom step of the third. Feeding 3 workers will cost 6 corn, and you have 4. With more than 2 corn you cannot beg, and with no workers in hand there is nothing to place, so you pick up. You leave the Uxmal worker riding the gear toward better actions, and you choose your order. Palenque first. In the action 5 group one field is left, a Wood Tile stacked on a Corn Tile. Wood will not feed anyone, and stepping back to fishing at action 1 would cost 4 corn to gain 3. So you burn the forest. You discard the Wood Tile and take the Corn Tile, keeping it in front of you. That angers the gods, so you step down a temple. The third is not an option, because you are already at its bottom, so the first drops from 2 to 1. Now Tikal. Stepping back to action 4 for 1 corn would let you build, but you want those temple steps. You pay 1 wood and climb two different temples. The first goes back up to 2, and the third rises off the bottom to step 1. Both workers come back to your supply. You gave up a Wood Tile and 1 wood, and gained a Corn Tile for the Food Day plus a net step on the third temple.