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How to Play

Res Arcana

2-4 players 30-60 min 7.6 Board Game Geek Rating

Players become mages collecting five magical essences to craft artifacts and claim places of power. Each round involves gathering essences, taking turns performing actions like placing artifacts or using powers, then checking victory conditions. The game uses a turn-based system where players continue until all pass, then components reset for the next round. First to reach ten victory points wins.

Published 2019

Res Arcana

Get Ready

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

1
Place magic items and essences
Put the 8 magic items, essence supply, and 5x essence tokens in the center of the table as the common supply
2
Set up Places of Power
Place all five Places of Power cards next to the supply
3
Prepare Monuments
Shuffle the Monument cards, place 2 face-up, and form a draw pile with the rest
4
Distribute starting essences
Give each player 1 essence of each type (including gold) as their starting essence pool
5
Choose starting player
Select who goes first and give them the First Player marker
6
Distribute mages and artifacts
Give each player 2 mage cards and 8 artifact cards; players review all 10 cards
7
Select magic items
In reverse turn order (starting with last player), each player selects one magic item from the supply

On Your Turn

What you can do during your turn.

1
Activate collection abilities
Resolve all collection abilities on your game elements and take the indicated essences from the supply
2
Remove essences from game elements
Optionally remove any essences stored on your artifacts, Monuments, or Places of Power to your personal supply
3
Play an artifact
Pay the cost shown in the upper left corner and place the artifact in front of you
4
Acquire a Monument or Place of Power
Pay the essence cost and take it from the center
5
Discard a card
Discard one artifact from hand to gain either 1 gold or 2 other essences of any type
6
Use an ability
Pay the cost of an ability on an untapped game element to gain its effect
7
Pass
Once you pass, you take no more actions this round
8
Pay life loss
When an opponent's effect causes life loss, pay the indicated amount in life essences
9
Use defense reactions
Many effects provide optional defense reactions to avoid life loss entirely
10
Draw cards
If your deck is empty, shuffle your discard pile to form a new deck
11
Untap game elements
Some abilities let you untap previously tapped elements to use again
12
Transform essences
Some abilities convert matching essences into different types
13
Destroy artifacts
Destroyed artifacts go to your discard pile; any essences on them return to supply

Winning

How to claim victory.

1
Check for victory
After all players have passed, check if any player has 10 or more victory points
2
Resolve ties
If multiple players have 10+ points, the one with more essences in their supply wins
3
Continue if no winner
If no player reached 10 points, untap all game elements, flip the First Player marker and magic items back, and begin a new round
4
Immediate victory check
The Coral Castle and Menagerie abilities allow checking for victory immediately, even mid-round

watch & Learn

Let the pros teach you with these top videos.

Hra v kocke - Res Arcana (videonávod)

Hra v kocke - Res Arcana (videonávod)

Instructional

【桌游教学+试玩】Res Arcana 奥法之战+双扩 | 怪鹿终极对决系列 Ep04

【桌游教学+试玩】Res Arcana 奥法之战+双扩 | 怪鹿终极对决系列 Ep04

Session

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FULL rules

Looking for the full details? Grab the complete rulebook as a downloadable PDF.

PDF RULEBOOK

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