Your task is to develop your province with the help of your workers and the clever use of your accumulated dice. In the end, you must win the race with a combination of wealth and fame. The fame track and the money track run parallel to each other in opposite directions around the gameboard. The fame markers are moved clockwise, the money markers, counter-clockwise.

As you build and expand, you attempt to increase both your fame and wealth so that your fame marker and your money marker intersect. The first player to have his fame marker and his money marker converge or even pass each other on their tracks, has a good chance to win.

The game proceeds over several rounds, each of which consists of several stages. In each stage, players, in turn – in clockwise order, beginning with the starting player – place one worker, pay the costs if required, and immediately carry out the associated action. This continues until nobody can place a worker any more. After that, each player takes his workers back, and a new round begins.

Workers can be placed in the following areas on the gameboard:

1. At the quarry, in order to carry out building actions on your province board.
2. At the market place, in order to receive money through market scorings later in the game.
3. In the Great Mogul’s palace, in order to get various benefits there.
4. At the harbor, in order to advance on the river and thus reach lucrative river spaces.

At the quarry and at the harbor, workers are always placed row by row from left to right. At the market place and in the palace, you can choose any (unoccupied) action space.
While advancing on the fame and money tracks and developing your province board, you will have chances to obtain valuable bonuses.

The placement of workers always proceeds in this order:

1. Place a worker
2. Pay costs, if required: give up money and/or dice
3. Carry out the action

Costs: Depending on what action space you place a worker on, you might have to pay costs for being allowed to carry out the applicable action. Some spaces are for free; for others, you have to give up dice or money. How much it costs to place a worker on an action space is shown on the action space itself.

Pay money for an action: Every time you have to pay money for an action (e.g., at the harbor or the quarry), you move your money marker back on the money track accordingly – 1 space for each money you have to pay. If your marker is sitting on 0, you have no money left and temporarily cannot carry out any actions that cost money.

The same applies to actions for which you have to pay dice – if you don’t have any (suitable) dice, you can’t carry out the applicable action.

On each action space there may be only one worker. Dice are never placed onto the board, but always into the (general or personal) supply!

Dice are the most important resource in this game.
Whenever you get a die from the general supply, you roll it immediately and, with the rolled number facing up, add it to your own supply, i.e. on your Kali statue. The value of the die conforms to the number rolled (from 1 to 6).
Attention! You may store only as many dice as Kali has free hands – that means, in the basic game you may own a maximum of 10 dice. If you get into a situation that would get you more dice, you either take fewer dice or put dice from your Kali statue back into the general supply before taking new ones.
If a die color is temporarily unavailable in the supply, you can’t take this color at that moment.

In order to develop your province, you need to send workers into the quarry. Depending on the space where you place the worker, you pay 1 to 4 money on the money track. In return, you acquire one of the 12 province tiles on open display. On the top left of the tiles you can see what dice with which total minimum value you have to give up in order to take the tile. Put dice of the respective color back into the supply. Their total value has to be at least as high as the one shown on the tile. When building, you are allowed to overpay. That means: In order to acquire a tile with the value “blue 7,“ you can pay with a blue 3 and a blue 5, for example.

Besides the costs, the tiles also depict roads, buildings and/or markets. Once you acquire a province tile, you immediately have to place it onto your province board.

The province board shows the territory that you, being a raja, control and strive to expand. Your residence is in the middle on the top; from there, 3 roads lead into the country. Every time you add a new province tile, the end of one of its roads has to connect to an already-existing road, so that there is a connection to the residence. You can turn the new tile in any direction. You may also orient a tile in such a way that it cuts off a road of an adjacent tile; not all road ends need to be connected – it is sufficient that each tile is connected to the residence through at least one road. Once placed, the tiles cannot be relocated later on. Be careful not to cut off all roads, so that you always have good possibilities for placing a tile.

When you have added a new tile to your province, you immediately score money and/or fame for it. Some tiles show one or two market tents with certain goods (silk, tea, or spices) of a certain value; other tiles show one or two buildings (temple, palace, fort, or mill); and a few tiles show a combination of both.

When you add a tile with one or two markets to your province, you immediately receive the amount of money indicated on that tile. When you add a tile with one or two buildings, you immediately receive 2, 3, or 4 fame points for each building, depending on where your upgrade cube is on the scroll for the corresponding building on the gameboard (see also Upgrades of the buildings).

Special yields:

There are yields printed on the edge of the province boards (symbolically, for special gains due to trade relations you have established). You get these immediately when you have connected them to your residence via a road, after scoring for the province tile itself.

Of course, it is also possible to place a tile without creating a connection to the special yield. In this case, you don’t get anything extra.

Every time you send a worker to one of the market spaces, you generate income for the markets laid out in your province. There are markets with 3 kinds of goods:

Silk

Tea

Spices

There are 2 types of market spaces:

• Assorted goods –when you place a worker here, you may score for exactly one market per kind of good.
• Goods of one kind – when you place a worker here, you have to give up any one die. Then you may score for up to a maximum of as many markets of one kind of good as corresponds to the value of the die.

Attention! In the 3- or 4-player game, you may place only one of your workers on the assorted goods market in a round; that means, if you have placed a worker on the first space, the second space is no longer available to you in this round. It can then only be used by another player. However, you still have the possibility to place workers on the other market type.

The river action can be used only if you give up a “1,” “2,” or “3”.

Every time you place a worker at the harbor, you may advance your boat up to three unoccupied spaces on the river, depending on the number on the die you have given up. The harbor provides space for several workers. The first worker placed here doesn’t cost anything; workers placed later cost 1 or 2 money.

If you give up a die showing a “1,” you advance exactly one unoccupied space; if you give up a “2,” you advance one or two unoccupied spaces; if you give up a “3,” you may advance up to three unoccupied spaces. Spaces occupied by other players’ boats are not included in the count but are skipped. So there can never be more than one boat on any particular river space. The only exceptions to this are the starting space and the final river space where multiple boats may rest.

You immediately get the earnings of the space where you stop your boat.

When you have arrived at the final river space, you can no longer use the river action.

The possible earnings on the river are listed in the appendix.

The 4 types of buildings that you can erect in your province are shown on the gameboard. At the beginning of the game, your upgrade cubes lie on the first level of each building – i.e., you earn 2 fame points when you add a province tile with 1 building (or, likewise, 4 fame points for 2 buildings).

Upgrades enable you to improve your constructional skills and to earn 3 (or 4) points for a certain building type in later building actions.

You can influence the result of a die roll through karma. One karma allows you to turn any die on your Kali statue to the opposite side when you use it; that means a “1” can turn into a “6” and vice versa, a “2” into a “5,” etc.

You start the game with karma at level 1. Over the course of the game, you can improve your karma – for instance, by sending a worker to the Yogi in the palace (see p. 18, “The Chambers” “Yogi”) or by stopping your boat on the applicable river space.

Besides this, there is a bonus space on the fame track (space 24) that increases your karma 2 levels if your fame marker stops on that space or crosses it. The highest karma level is 3; that means you may have a maximum of 3 karma.

In order to use karma, you don’t have to place any worker – you may use your karma anytime during your turn when giving up a die. For each karma you use, you move your karma cube 1 level down. So the karma can even go down to zero.

At the beginning of the game, each player has 3 active workers at his disposal.

During the course of the game, you can get up to 2 additional workers. If you have advanced far enough on the respective scoring tracks (money: space 20; fame: space 15) or on the river (bridge), you receive extra workers.

Important: As soon as you have received your second inactive worker (no matter whether on one of the tracks or the river), you immediately take your extra one off the board and remove him from the game.

The fame and the money tracks as well as the river each have one space with an inactive worker per player color. The spaces on the scoring tracks with the inactive workers are regular spaces; at the moment when your money marker or fame marker stops on the respective space or crosses it, you take the worker of your color. With this, he becomes active. The inactive worker on the river doesn’t have his own river space (the bridge doesn’t count as a river space); that means, when your boat has passed the bridge, you take the worker of your color.

You never lose a worker once you have activated him this way, even if your marker falls back (which can happen only on the money track). You can place a new worker even in the same round in which you have obtained him.

Besides the inactive workers, the two scoring tracks also have special spaces; when you reach or cross them, you immediately get the corresponding bonus.

The fame track has 3 bonus spaces:

• Space 5: You receive an upgrade of a building type of your choice. (This upgrade counts from your next turn on.)
• Space 24: You may increase your karma 2 levels
• Space 31: You may move your boat to the next unoccupied river space and get the applicable earnings.

The money track has 4 bonus spaces:

• Spaces 12 and 44: You may move your boat to the next unoccupied river space and get the applicable earnings.
• Spaces 33 and 55: You may take any 2 dice from the supply, roll them, and put them on your Kali statue.

Since you pay money and can thus fall back on the money track, there is a special bonus marker of your color that indicates which bonus you’ll get next on the money track. When you reach or cross space 12 for the first time and get the applicable bonus, you take the marker of your color, turn it over and put it on space 33 (die side facing up). When your money marker reaches or crosses this space as well, you turn the marker back and put it on space 44 (river space side facing up), etc. After you have crossed the last bonus space on the money track, you remove your marker from the game.

Attention! A bonus applies only to the track where it is printed. If, for example, your money marker passes a bonus space printed on the adjoining fame track, you don’t get the bonus from there, of course.

After you have placed all of your active workers and carried out the applicable actions, the round ends.

If one of the players has placed a worker at the Great Mogul, he now gets the starting player elephant and becomes the starting player of the following round. If nobody has sent a worker to the Great Mogul, the elephant goes from the previous starting player clockwise to the next player.

All players take all their active workers off the gameboard and put them back below their Kali statue. After that, the starting player begins the new round.

As soon as one player manages to have his fame marker and his money marker converge or pass each other, the end of the game is triggered. The current stage will still be completed – i.e., all players who are sitting between the player who has triggered the end of the game and the current starting player still have a chance to win and may place one more worker (provided they have any left) and carry out the applicable action.

After that, players check who has won. If there are two or more players whose markers passed each other on their final turn, each of the players involved counts the difference of fame points between his money marker and his fame marker; the player with the most points wins the game. In case of a tie, the first player whose two markers passed each other wins.

To find out who is second and third, etc., count the number of fame points that are still separating your fame marker from your money marker.

There are 2 spaces on the money track belonging to each space of the fame track. Both spaces are equivalent in regard of the end scoring.

After having played the basic version for one or more games, you can opt for the “Navaratnas“ version for advanced players (English “The Nine Gems“). Here, the following modifications apply:

You can activate all 3 inactive workers. So you may play with up to 6 workers.

You play with the back of your Kali statue and you may store only up to 8 dice.

You play on the back of your province board. Here also, special yields are printed on the edge of the province board, which you can connect to your road network. However, these are only minor yields, but you can improve them during the course of the game.

At the beginning of the game, mix the brown yield tiles. Each player randomly picks one, reveals it and puts it on one of the two possible spaces on his province board. You decide which of the special yields on the board you wish to cover.

Now place the remaining brown yield tiles as well as all other yield tiles face up on the buildings of the same color on the gameboard. You may get them during the game to enhance the special yield you can get from your province board.

Attention: Always score for the province tile first before you take the special yield. You may not move or cover yield tiles already placed on the board.
You may not move or cover yield tiles already placed on the board.
You may only take yield tiles in a color for which you still have space available on your board.
You may also refrain from taking a yield tile.

There are 2 ways to obtain additional yield tiles during the game:

• When you are at the dancer

  Every time you place a worker at the dancer and give up one value-2 die of any color, you may take 2 dice of your choice from the supply and choose any yield tile. You immediately put this tile face up on an (as yet) unoccupied space of the corresponding color on your province board. Different from the basic game, here you earn the yield not immediately but only when you have connected the yield tile to a road on your province board.

• When you have fewer active workers than other players

  If, for example, you have a total of 4 active workers, but at least one of the other players already has 5 workers at his disposal, you get 1 yield tile in the fifth stage of the current round if it were your turn to place a worker but you don’t have any left. You immediately decide on which unoccupied space of your board you want to place the new yield tile (face up and color-matching).

  If at least one other player even has 2 more active workers than you, you take another yield tile and place it as if it were your turn to place a worker but you can’t place any for the second time.

For advanced players who play with a group that includes beginners, it is also possible to play with handicaps.

In this case, the advanced players use the Navaratnas side of their board and the back of their Kali statue, whereas the beginners use the basic side of their board and the front of their Kali statue.

You can have up to 5 workers.

The yellow, red, and brown yield tiles stay in the box. You play according to the basic rules and use only the white yield tiles for which you get a yield only at the dancer (as in the basic game) to use immediately.

For this version, you add the 8 river tiles to the game. They modify the river earnings. At the beginning of the game, shuffle the river tiles face down. Roll a die, count the spaces, beginning with the first space after the starting space, draw the first tile blindly and place it face up on the corresponding river space. For example, if you roll a “2,“ you place the first river tile on the second space and, in doing so, replace the 2 karma shown there.

Roll again, count the next spaces and place a tile until either you run out of tiles or the river ends. The final space may never be covered by a river tile. Return remaining river tiles to the game box.

Mix the 8 Mango Village province tiles and put them as a face-up stack next to the other province tiles. The Mango Village tiles can be acquired through the building action (just as the other province tiles). They differ in their cost and yield, though.

Cost: In order to acquire a Village tile, you have to give up a double, i.e., two dice showing the same values (e.g., two times a “3”); the dice color does not matter in this case.

Yield: Each Mango Village tile, once placed, gives you a special bonus depicted in the bottom right corner of the tile.

Put the Mango Tree tile on the corresponding space of the gameboard.

Now there is also one action space (2 players) or two action spaces (3 or 4 players) in the village on the Mango Tree tile. If you place a worker there, you may score up to 2 of the villages in your province again.

If you have more than 2 villages in your province, you choose which two you wish to score again.

In the 3- or 4-player game, each player may send only one of his workers to the village per round.