Welcome to the Neue Heimat Game!

Are you ready to embark on a thrilling adventure full of strategy and decision-making? Then you’ve come to the right place! In this game, you’ll be challenged to build your own city from scratch, making important choices along the way.

But before we dive in, let’s take a moment to understand the rules and how to play.

Goal of the Game

The goal of Neue Heimat is to create the most prosperous and vibrant city possible. You’ll be competing against other players, each aiming for the same goal. By constructing buildings, strategically placing them, and making smart decisions, you’ll work towards becoming the most successful city planner.

Setup

At the beginning of the game, each player starts with a plot of land. This plot is where you’ll build your city. Additionally, you’ll receive a starting budget to kickstart your city’s development.

Gameplay

The game is played over several rounds. In each round, players take turns making decisions and taking actions to grow their city. Here are some key actions you can take:

1. Construct Buildings: You’ll have the opportunity to construct different types of buildings, such as residential areas, commercial spaces, and recreational facilities. Each building type has unique benefits and costs, so choose wisely.
2. Expand Your City: As your city grows, you’ll have the option to expand your plot of land. By doing so, you can accommodate more buildings and increase the potential of your city.
3. Manage Resources: Resources play a crucial role in the growth of your city. You’ll need to manage them efficiently to ensure the smooth functioning of your buildings and the overall prosperity of your city.
4. Make Strategic Decisions: Throughout the game, you’ll be faced with important decisions that can significantly impact your city’s development. Consider the long-term consequences of your choices and think strategically.

Scoring

At the end of the game, your city will be evaluated based on several factors, including the number and variety of buildings, the overall income generated by your city, and the overall happiness of your citizens. The player with the highest score will be declared the winner.

Now that you have a grasp of the basics, it’s time to dive into the exciting world of Neue Heimat! Get ready to strategize, make tough decisions, and become the ultimate city planner. Good luck!

• 1 board
• 36 floor cubes with pips in 6 different colors
• 4 special cubes
• 1 wooden pawn (the mayor)
• 6 small colored cubes without pips
• 17 rooftops
• 2 pouches
• 60 cheques
• Instructions

Story

Let me tell you a story about a town called Neustadt, where the real estate business is booming! The City Council just approved a new zoning map, and the Filthyrich banks are handing out millions of Euros in loans. It’s a frenzy of construction as developers scramble to build houses along the rivulet Haul and the Main Road. Each row of houses can have up to four buildings, and there are strict rules to follow.

On the opposite side of the Haul, there are beautiful meadows that serve as a recreational space for the new residents. However, despite the clear public demand, the profit-seeking speculators and greedy builders have chosen to ignore it completely. Instead of adhering to the allowed two rows of houses, they are constructing three rows.

It’s astonishing that even the mayor himself is joining in on the act by planning to build a lavish mansion at the Haul. To maximize his gains, he manipulates the value of one of the rows through underhanded means.

Furthermore, by obtaining dubious “special building permits,” the builders have violated the designated construction area and put up houses on the other side of the Haul, a practice commonly referred to as “taking a haul.”

Nevertheless, the City Council is taking decisive action. Once the first two rows are finished, they uncover the corruption and declare that the houses in the unfinished third row must be demolished. This proves to be a significant financial loss for all the individuals who had invested in that particular row.

Background Information

So there’s this game board, right? It’s right there in the middle of the table. And next to the shorter edge of the board, you’ll find these 6 small colorful cubes.

Now, all the other cubes that go on the floor, those are put into a pouch. Out of those, 24 random cubes get taken out and put on display. They make 3 rows of 8 cubes each, right beside the game board. The remaining 12 cubes are not used in this game, so we set those aside for now.

Oh, and we can’t forget about the rooftops! They get laid out on the table, all nice and neat, with the dome side facing down. We mix them up a bit, just to add some spice. And don’t forget about the 4 special cubes and the wooden pawn, also known as the mayor. Those go beside the board too. Oh, one more thing – each player gets 12 checks that are worth a cool million each.

How to Play

Alright, now here’s how the game goes down. It’s all about taking turns. When it’s your turn, you get to choose one of those pieces on display – you know, like a floor cube or a special cube or even the mayor himself. But here’s the twist, you gotta hold an auction for it! That’s right, you ask the other players (you know, the ones sitting beside you) if they wanna make some bids.

When we’re playing a game, we can either decide to continue or try to outbid the other players. We can only bid once, and each bid must be at least one million higher than the previous bid. Once the highest bid is determined, the person running the auction has two options:

1. They can give the item to the highest bidder, who then pays their bid to the auctioneer.

2. They can keep the item for themselves and pay the highest bid to the person who made that bid.

In the game, there are cubes on the ground that we can take from the ends of the rows. There are six cubes available at the start of the game. We can also choose to auction other items like rooftops, the mayor, or special cubes.

We can only auction rooftops if there are houses without a roof on the game board. Before the auction begins, we flip the rooftop to see if it has a number on it. If it doesn’t, we remove it from the game and end our turn.

When I buy a rooftop or floor cube, I have to put it on the board right away. But special cubes and the mayor, well, I can either put them on the board or just throw them away. If I toss them, though, I won’t be able to use them later in the game.

Once my turn is done, the next player goes clockwise and becomes the auctioneer.

If I’m the first one to put down a cube of a new color that hasn’t been used yet, I’ll put a small cube of that color right in front of me. Everyone can see it. And at the end, when we’re scoring, any building with a floor cube of that color right under the rooftop is scored for me – could be good or bad, though.

Now, here’s the cool part. I can choose, offer, buy, and place floor cubes of any color, even if somebody else already has that color. It’s open for everyone to use.

In this game, you can have more than one color or no color at all. It’s up to you!

How to Put a Floor Cube in Place

To put a floor cube in place, start by putting it on the square lots, pip side up. You can also place a floor cube on top of another if it has a higher number of pips.

The color doesn’t matter. You can stack up to six cubes on top of each other!

On the building lots with the white fence, you can only build one cube. But you can also add a rooftop on top of it. If there’s already a rooftop, you can’t add another cube.

At the beginning, you can only have up to four houses in a row. But with special building permits I, II, and III, you can change the number of houses.

When you’re building houses in this game, it’s important to keep a few things in mind. The first building in each row needs to be right next to the main road, and there can’t be any gaps between the houses.

How to Place the Rooftops

Once you buy a rooftop with a number, you have to put it on top of one of your houses. It doesn’t matter what color the house is or how many points it’s worth. You can even put your rooftop on a house that another player owns!

A row of houses is complete when all of the spaces of the same length are filled and each house has a rooftop!

How to use the mayor and the special cubes

Let’s talk about how you can use the mayor and special cubes to your advantage.

Mayor:

The mayor is an important figure in the game. They have the power to choose which row you can build in. They can shorten or lengthen the currently allowed length of a row for one house, two houses, or even three houses. This means you have more flexibility in where you can build your houses.

Special Building Permits:

• I cube: This cube allows you to change the length of a row for one house.
• II cube: This cube allows you to change the length of a row for two houses.
• III cube: This cube allows you to change the length of a row for three houses.

When you have a special building permit, you can place it on the board to mark the new building limit for that row. You can make the row longer or shorter, depending on what you need. You can even place multiple special cubes in one row if you want to make a big change.

Keep in mind that if a row is already built up to a certain point, you can’t make it shorter with a special cube. The row can only be lengthened, which means it will become incomplete again even if it was previously complete.

Cancel Cube:

The cancel cube is another special cube you can use. It allows you to undo the effect of a special building permit. If you decide you don’t want to change the length of a row anymore, you can use the cancel cube to go back to the original building limit.

So, here’s the deal. If you get yourself a fancy cube or you splurge on the mayor, you gotta make a decision right then and there – either play ’em or kick ’em out of the game.

Making Money Illegally

When it’s my turn, I have the option to stash one million dollars in my secret “illegal earnings cash box.” To do this, I grab one of my cheques and slide it halfway under the edge of the game board.

However, once I stash my cash, I can’t use it for the rest of the game. But here’s a sweet deal—I’ll get one point for each cheque in my “cash box” when we add up the final scores.

The Game Ends

The game comes to a close when two rows are completed or if it becomes impossible to finish any more houses. This happens when either we use up all 12 roofs or all 24 floor cubes have roofs on them.

When I first looked at the houses in this town, I couldn’t help but notice something interesting. The upper and middle rows seemed to be complete, with all the houses lined up neatly. But there was something different about the upper row. It had a mayor standing in front of it, and that seemed to make a big difference.

As I continued to observe, I realized that the score of the houses in the upper row was doubled because of the mayor’s presence. It was as if the mayor had the power to elevate the status of the houses behind him.

But it wasn’t just the mayor that caught my attention. All the rows in this town had been changed in terms of their length. The upper row had been made two lots shorter, creating a sense of compactness. On the other hand, the middle and bottom rows were made longer, spreading out to make room for more houses.

It’s fascinating to see how these changes in length affect the overall look of the town. The shorter upper row gives it a sense of uniqueness and exclusivity, while the longer middle and bottom rows create a sense of expansion and growth.

As I pondered over this observation, I couldn’t help but wonder about the intention behind these changes. What does it mean to have a shorter upper row and longer middle and bottom rows? What message does it convey?

Perhaps it’s a way of creating a hierarchy within the town, with the upper row symbolizing prestige and the middle and bottom rows representing the common folk. Or maybe it’s a way of maximizing space, accommodating more people in the growing town.

Whatever the reason may be, it’s clear that the arrangement of houses in this town is deliberate and thought-out. Each row has its own unique characteristics, contributing to the overall meaning and identity of the town.

In the end, it’s fascinating how something as simple as the length of rows and the presence of a mayor can shape the perception of a town. It makes you realize that even the smallest details can have a significant impact on how we perceive our surroundings.

I’m going to explain how scoring works in this game. It’s important to understand because it affects your total points. Let me break it down for you.

Scoring

In this game, each house has two parts: the floor cubes and the rooftops. Completed rows, which have all the houses filled, are scored positively. Incompleted rows, which have some empty houses, are scored negatively. Sometimes there might be only one completed row, and in some cases, there won’t be any.

Now, let’s talk about how each house scores points. A house scores points for the player who owns the topmost level, which is the floor cube. Each pip, or dot, on every cube of the house is worth one point. And don’t forget to add the value of the rooftop as well.

There’s something else you need to know. When the mayor is in front of a row, the scores of the houses in that row are doubled, whether they are positive or negative. Finally, you can also earn points by collecting cheques from your “illegal earnings cash box.” Each cheque is worth one point.

The Game in Several Rounds

If you have enough time, I suggest playing the game in multiple rounds. Each round usually takes about half an hour.

Before starting the game, we should agree on how many rounds to play. After each round, we should write down the scores, so make sure to have a pencil and paper handy!

The game ends early if someone wins two rounds. That person will be the final winner, regardless of their actual score.

If no one wins two rounds, the player with the highest total score wins the game. If all players have negative scores, the player with the least negative score wins instead.

After each round, all the floor cubes and rooftops go back into their bags and get mixed up. They are then set up again for the next round, along with all the special cubes, the mayor, and the small color cubes (indicators).