How to Play

Endeavor

3-5 players 90-90 min 7.4 Board Game Geek Rating

Players lead expanding maritime empires during the age of exploration, competing for global dominance through strategic building construction and resource management. Each turn, construct buildings, gather population tokens, and execute actions like shipping, occupying cities, attacking rivals, or drawing cards to gain influence across world regions. Victory goes to whoever accumulates the most glory points through territorial control, connections, and advancement tracks after seven rounds.

Published 2009

Get Ready

Setup the game with these step-by-step instructions before diving into your turn.

Prepare the main board

Set up the main board, trade tokens, asset cards, and buildings normally as in the standard game

Distribute player boards

Each player receives one player board and chooses a single color for their tokens

Create neutral supply

Take one of the remaining colors (not including cubes) and place them in a common supply as neutral tokens

On Your Turn

What you can do during your turn.

Follow standard phases

The build, growth, and payment phases remain the same as the base game

Trigger neutral actions

During the action phase, certain actions provoke neutral responses that bring tokens onto the board or discard cards

Place your token first

Use the occupy action and place your token as normal

Add neutral token

Immediately after, add a neutral token to any available city in an open region where the neutral color has presence

Discard trade token

The trade token present at the neutral placement location is discarded

Check availability

If no available city exists, no neutral token is placed

Note connection rule

Neutral tokens cannot complete connections

Blue token exception

Using a blue token to occupy does not provoke a neutral occupy action

Attack normally

The attack action remains unchanged from the base game

Target neutrals

Neutral tokens can be attacked

Place your token first

Use the ship action and place your token as normal

Add neutral token

Immediately after, add a neutral token to the next available space on any one shipping lane

Discard trade token

The trade token present is discarded

Handle governors

Neutral tokens can collect governors, which are then discarded from play

Blue token exception

Using a blue token to ship does not provoke a neutral ship action

Draw your card first

Use the draw action and draw your card as normal

Discard from region

Immediately after, discard the top card from any one open region where neutral tokens present equal or exceed the card value

Check eligibility

If no such card exists, then no discard occurs

Governor protection

Governors cannot be discarded and therefore protect their stacks

Abolition trigger

If Abolition of Slavery is discarded, it comes into effect immediately as if drawn by another player

Blue token exception

Using a blue token to draw does not provoke a neutral draw action

Docks resolution

If the docks is used to both occupy and ship, a neutral token is placed for each action, after each individual action

Cartographer resolution

After both ship actions have been executed, only one neutral token is placed on a shipping lane

Trade Office resolution

After both cards have been drawn, discard only one card

Limited Neutral Occupy

Neutral tokens only occupy in the region that was just occupied (recommended for first-time players)

Blue Tokens Provoke

Allow neutral actions after the use of blue tokens for simpler but more aggressive neutral presence

Building Limitations

Before either player builds, the non-crown player discards one building equal to or lower than their Industry level; only one level 5 building may be discarded this way per game