Welcome to the Villagers Solo Rules

Are you ready to embark on an exhilarating adventure on your own? Look no further! In this guide, I’ll walk you through the rules and strategies for playing Villagers solo. Let’s dive in!

Getting Started

First things first, let’s set up the game. Place the score track, coins, and the three solo player cards close by. Shuffle the deck of character cards and draw five of them, placing them face up in a row. These cards will be available for recruitment.

Playing Your Turn

On your turn, you have three opportunities to take actions. Here are your options:

• Recruit a Character: Select one of the available character cards and pay its cost in coins. Add the character to your tableau, ensuring you follow any production or scoring instructions.
• Score a Building: Select one of the building cards from your tableau that has a scoring value. Gain the indicated score.
• Generate Coins: Select one of the building cards from your tableau that has a production value. Gain the indicated number of coins.

After taking your three actions, draw one new character card from the deck and replace any vacant spots in the recruitment row. Then, it’s time for the AI player to take their turn.

The AI Player

The AI player operates using a simple algorithm. The AI player will prioritize recruiting characters, scoring buildings, and generating coins, just like you. However, the AI player has one additional rule – they will always recruit the leftmost available character card in the recruitment row.

Game End

The game ends when either the character deck is empty or all the building cards have been scored. At this point, it’s time to calculate the final score. Add up all the scores from your buildings and characters, and subtract any penalties as indicated on the building cards. Compare your score to the AI player’s score to determine the winner.

Conclusion

Now that you understand the solo rules for Villagers, it’s time to put your skills to the test. Enjoy your solo adventure and may you emerge as the ultimate builder and strategist!

I am the last living relative of the oppressive Royal Family that used to rule the land. With my vast fortune and army of soldiers, I am determined to bring back the glory days of the nobility, with me as the Queen.

I will do whatever it takes to crush the local villagers’ attempts to unite. Even though I lack the support of the people and economic prowess, I rely on bribery, dirty tricks, and violence to get my way.

The Solo Mode offers a unique way to play Villagers by yourself. By using two event decks and making a few rule adjustments, you can experience what it’s like to go up against the wicked Countess.

While you have the advantage of choosing which villagers go to which Village, you still have to face unexpected disastrous Events every round. This means you need to adjust your strategy on the fly.

Let’s Get Started

Okay, here’s what we need to do to start playing the game:

1. Gather all the game pieces.
2. Find a clear, flat surface to play on.
3. Set up the game just like you would for a 2 player game, but with a few changes:

Instructions

Now that we’re all set up, let me explain how to play the game:

1. Decide who will go first. You can flip a coin or play rock-paper-scissors to decide.
2. On your turn, take one of your game pieces and place it on an empty spot on the board. The goal is to get three of your game pieces in a row – either horizontally, vertically, or diagonally.
3. After you place your game piece, it’s the other player’s turn.
4. Keep taking turns until one player gets three in a row or all the spots on the board are filled.

Winning the Game

To win the game, you need to get three of your game pieces in a row. Here’s how:

1. Horizontally: All three game pieces are in a row going from left to right or right to left.
2. Vertically: All three game pieces are in a row going from top to bottom or bottom to top.
3. Diagonally: All three game pieces are in a row going from one corner of the board to the opposite corner.

Remember, the game can end in a tie if all the spots on the board are filled and no one has three in a row.

Game Over

Now that you know how to play, I hope you enjoy the game! Have fun and may the best player win!

1. First, I’ll remove all the cards from the Special suit.
2. Next, instead of having just 4 cards in each stack on the road, I’ll have 5 cards in each stack.
3. Now, I’ll take the Jester card and place it right next to my Village Square.
4. After that, I’ll shuffle the Winter Events and the Summer Events separately. Then, I’ll place them face-down on the table. I’ll deal the top Summer Event card and place it face-up next to the Road. This Event card will be in play for the first round of the game.
5. Lastly, I’ll replace one of the players with The Countess. Here’s what I’ll do:
   • I’ll use The Countess Card to form her Village instead of a Founders card. I’ll place it with the side showing 4 Gold facing up.
   • The Countess will have 1 gold in her Supply.
   • The Countess won’t have a hand of cards.

When playing in Solo Mode, it’s just me against the game. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t some extra rules to keep things interesting at every step:

Draft Phase

In the Draft Phase, I still get to choose cards from the Road. But here’s the twist: whenever I pick a card, I also get to add a face-up villager from the Road to the Countess Village. Yes, the Countess is on the move, too! And don’t worry, I’ll deal new face-up cards to the Road afterwards.

Now, when I place villagers in the Countess Village, I don’t have to worry about Production Chains. Each villager gets their own special spot, no sharing allowed!

The Countess is a real rebel. She doesn’t care about Padlocks when villagers show up in her Village. You’ll still have to pay her villagers to unlock any villagers playing with Padlocks, though. So, she’s like another player in that sense.

When playing with two players, I resolve the End of Draft Phase in the same way as usual, but without The Countess placing Gold on any villager on the Road. If The Countess somehow receives a villager that I placed Gold on during the end of a Draft Phase, she takes the coins and adds them to her Supply.

Next, it’s time for the Event Phase.

After finishing the Build Phase, we move on to the Event Phase. If there is a Market Phase in the current round, we resolve it after the Event Phase. Let’s go through the following steps in order:

1. I resolve all the face-up Events. I carry out the effects mentioned on the cards. I can resolve them in any order I want. As I resolve each Event, I discard it. Some Events have rules that apply during a specific phase of the game instead of being resolved in the Event Phase. These cards are also discarded in this phase.

When all the Events are resolved, I take the top card of the Reserve and place it in my village. It’s just like the Draft Phase, but I ignore the normal rules for Production Chains and Padlocks. Depending on the value of this villager, a certain number of new Event cards will be dealt:

• If the villager is worth 10 Gold or more, I deal 1 Event card.
• If the villager is worth between 1 and 9 Gold, I deal 2 Event cards.
• If the villager is worth 0 Gold, I deal 3 Event cards.

If the villager has a Silver Symbol, I calculate its current Gold value and deal Event cards following the same rules.

Solo Draft Phase Example:

So, here’s the deal. I pick a villager and put them in the Countess Village. Easy enough, right? But wait, there’s more. I also have to grab a face-up villager from the Road and stick them in the Countess Village too. Gotta keep things interesting, you know? Oh, and don’t forget. I need to make sure there are always two cards on the Road. So, I grab two new cards from the leftmost stack and add them in. And I repeat this whole process three times this round because I’ve got 1 Food. So, yeah, it’s pretty straightforward, but there are a few hoops to jump through.

Let’s take a look at an example from the end of the event phase:

I get a Truffler at the end of the event phase. It’s worth 8 Gold, so 2 new event cards are dealt.

Switching from summer to winter events

During the summer events, we deal the events face-up until we finish the first market phase. After that, we switch to dealing the events from the winter events deck.

The Jester

The Jester is a card that belongs to you and can be played at any time. As stated on the card, the Jester allows you to immediately get rid of an event.

You can’t use the Jester to discard an event that has already been resolved or is currently being resolved. For instance, if the Countess already drew a face-down card from the Conscription event, you can’t discard the event after seeing the drawn card.

I’m briefly going to outline the main points you need to understand about the Jester card in the game. Keep in mind that it can only be used once as it gets discarded after use. It’s important to note that the Jester is not part of the player’s hand and cannot be traded for a Basic Villager.

Market Phases

The Countess scores just like a player during the Market Phases, which means that the Gold on the Countess Card will be included in the scoring. This includes any Silver Symbols in the Second Market Phase as well.

The Final Round

When the Second Market Phase triggers and it’s the final round, the Countess will not place the top card of the Reserve into her Village.

End of the Game

To win, you need to have more Gold in your Supply than The Countess by the end of the game.

Beginner Mode

1. In Beginner Mode, only 1 Event card will be dealt each round, regardless of which villager The Countess ends up with after the Event Phase.

Flip the Countess Card over to the side that has no Gold on it.

To start the game, flip the Countess Card so that the side without any Gold is facing up.

Remove the “It was you” Event card from the Winter Events.

During the Winter Events phase, make sure to take out the “It was you” Event card and set it aside.

Hard Mode

If you’re up for a challenge, here are some modifications you can make to play in Hard Mode:

1. At the beginning of the game, deal 2 Event cards instead of just 1.
2. Take the Jester card out of the game completely.
3. Exclude the “It was you” Event card from the Winter Events.
4. Give The Countess 10 Gold to start with, instead of just 1.

More Rules for Playing Alone

If you want to jump right into a solo game without spending time reading all the instructions, you can skip ahead and start playing. You can always come back here to check the rules as you play.