Vested InterestsContracts, secrets and the Tribunal

Watch the Vested Interests tutorial

Components

The districts

Every land tile belongs to exactly one district: the Delta (coastal lowlands, including both offshore bays; home of floods and sea-level surge), the Reach (plains; home of drought), the Verge (forest belt; home of forest fire) and the Rim (highlands; home of hurricanes). "Coastal" means Delta plus offshore. District weather and sea-level effects use these, so a few Contracts reward building in the same district, while spreading out reduces exposure to one weather event.

Setup

1. Board and Dial. Needle to 450 ppm, Ice Loss token already crossed, Projection marker at 450, era marker on round 1.
2. Seed the world. Place 4 neutral Old World Fossil assets (two in the Reach, one Delta, one Rim) and 2 Forests in the Verge, as printed in the setup diagram.
3. Houses. Deal or draft 1 House card each. Take 6 Capital, 3 Operatives and your ownership discs. You start with 0 Influence: the era grant is collected when the world turns in round 1, not now.
4. Secrets. Build the Agenda deck for the player count (below), deal 1 face-down Agenda each and return the undealt cards to the box unseen. Shuffle the Vices and deal 1 face-down Vice each. Look at both. Keep them private unless a rule reveals them or lets another player look. You may voluntarily reveal either on your own turn.
5. Market. Shuffle Contracts and reveal 4 Contract cards face up. Shuffle the Initiative and Planet decks. Place the Schemes face-down as a draw pile.
6. First Player: roll the dice and add the results; the highest total starts. The marker rotates clockwise each round.

Nobody knows which agendas are seated. At three players the deck contains only two Stewards, so an all-Steward table is impossible. An Accelerationist may be left undealt.

How a round works

Ten rounds in three eras: the first era is rounds 1-3, the second era rounds 4-7 and the third era rounds 8-10. Each round runs in this order:

The world turns

Resolved by the First Player, in six steps.

1. Advance the Dial. New ppm = old + era baseline + crossed-tipping penalties + net board Heat − removals.
2. Check tipping points. Crossing 500, 550 or 575 flips that token permanently and adds its penalty from then on.
3. Set the Projection. Move the Projection marker to the ppm the world reaches if nothing changes. Its band forecasts the final climate band; it does not determine who is currently winning.
4. Draw a Planet card: weather or scenario.
5. Reveal the round's Initiative into the vote box.
6. Refresh. Slide the Contract cards down and refill to 4. (Contracts nobody can take are discarded at the end of Income; see The Contract cards.) At the start of each era (rounds 1, 4 and 8) every player takes the Influence grant: 3, then 4, then 4.

Each programme removes 11 ppm, and their combined cooling cannot exceed 11 ppm per round for the whole table, however many Research mini-cards are in play and whoever owns them. One active Research reaches the limit on its own, so no House or Contract adds cooling beyond it.

Disinfo silences one named Research. When you play a Disinfo mini-card, name any Research in play. It removes nothing from that moment until the world has turned once more, so it misses exactly one cooling, then resumes.

Income

Simultaneous. Collect Capital from your assets, take +2 base Capital, and return your Operatives from the board to your supply. Weather-exhausted assets yield nothing this round. An Operative gained by building enters your supply at the next Income phase, not immediately.

Actions in detail

Round-robin, starting with the First Player. On your turn you place 1 Operative to take exactly one action, or pass, and a pass is final for the round. Continue around the table until everyone has passed or run out of Operatives.

Convert a Fossil plant: Helios Combine has this additional action once per era. It uses 1 Operative and no Capital: replace one of your Fossil Fuel Plants with a Solar Array or Wind Farm from supply in the same district.

Stand aside (decline): skip the current optional Scheme or Takeover response. This is different from Pass, which ends your Actions for the round. If no eligible Tribunal suspect remains, standing aside means casting no vote. In online games every player is asked at every Scheme window, even with no Scheme to play, so being asked tells nobody who holds one.

Crew growth: Housing, Transport Hub, Institution and Cultural Centre each grant +1 permanent Operative when built, to a maximum of 6. Institutions: maximum 4 on the board, limit 1 per player until the second era. At five players use 5 Institution sites: the four printed tiles plus the marked reserve site in the Rim.

The Contract cards

Four Contracts sit face-up. Each offers one of the thirteen assets at a discount, with an extra effect or condition written on the card. Dirty Contracts are printed in amber; clean ones in teal. Taking a Contract uses an Operative and the card's price. Other players may take a deal before your next turn.

Dead Contracts. At the end of each Income phase, discard every Contract card on offer that no player could legally take at that moment, then refill to 4.

Refilling the Contract cards: refill immediately when a Contract is taken. Contracts that no player can legally take (the supply is empty, the placement is illegal everywhere, or nobody can afford it) are discarded at the end of Income; see Dead Contracts above. Placement, district and NIMBY legality are checked when the Contract is taken.

Votes and Initiatives

One Initiative is live each round, revealed when the world turns. During Actions you may Campaign to secretly commit any amount of Influence, once per player per round. At a physical table, hold it in a closed fist. When all players have passed, everyone reveals their committed Influence simultaneously. Players who never Campaigned contribute zero.

• Threshold: total revealed Influence of player count + 1 or more.
• If an Initiative passes: the Dial drops 9 ppm, then its rider applies (the table below). The top contributor becomes Sponsor (+1 Legacy point; ties: no Sponsor). Every third passed Initiative is a Breakthrough: a further -12 ppm and +2 Legacy points to the leading Sponsor.
• If a bad Initiative passes: the Dial rises 6 ppm and its effect applies. The top contributor takes +3 Capital instead of a Legacy point (ties: nobody). It is not a sponsorship and does not count towards a Breakthrough.
• Pay what you can: no payment a card asks for takes more Capital than a player holds.
• "Earn nothing next round" means those assets pay nothing at the next Income, defended or not. Community assets belong to nobody, so no rider pays or charges them.
• All revealed Influence is spent whether the vote passes or fails. You may commit zero and do not have to tell other players how much you committed.
• Passing after others have passed grants no extra Campaign. You must Campaign during your own turn before passing.
• The Scheme Blackout, played as votes are revealed, cancels the vote and returns all committed Influence to its owners.

Takeovers

Eligible targets: any dirty asset (fossil, monoculture, logging, motorway), any Institution, and NIMBY tokens. A revealed Accelerationist may target any asset type. You may never target an asset you own or co-own.

1. The attacker places 1 Operative and declares the target.
2. Joining: each other player, in clockwise order from the attacker, may commit once: 1 Operative to one side. The owner may commit up to 2 in total. No side-switching; commitments are final.
3. Strength: attackers = Operatives committed (+1 per supporting Scheme); defenders = 2 base security + Operatives committed.
4. Roll: each side rolls a dice and adds its strength. The defender wins ties.
5. If the attackers win: the asset flips to a Community marker. If the winning side is led by a revealed Accelerationist, they may instead place a Vested marker.

• Community marker: the tile stays on the board, flipped or marked. It yields to nobody, its Heat is removed, and its tile still blocks the space.
• Vested marker: the asset yields to the Vested holder and its Heat stays on the board.
• A successful Takeover against a NIMBY (same procedure, defender strength 2 base) simply removes it: NIMBYs are not assets and cannot be held.
• Institutions carrying CIA or Research mini-cards cannot be taken by Accelerationists.
• All committed Operatives return at the next Income phase as usual.

Schemes

Drawn secretly, held to a hand of two, played openly and instantly at the moment they bite. Anyone can scheme. What you play is remembered at the Tribunal, and only one Scheme may be played per player per window.

District weather

Each weather card has a home district, printed on its face and shown as a badge beside the district's name on the board: Flood the Delta, Drought the Reach, Forest Fire the Verge, Hurricane the Rim. The First Player rolls the dice for the district: 1-3 the card's home district, 4 Verge, 5 Rim, 6 the First Player chooses. Sea-level Surge needs no roll: it always strikes the Delta. The Weather Machine Scheme chooses the district instead of the roll. Impacts last one round, except for hotspot assets in Extreme weather below.

Spread from 500 ppm. If the Dial stands at 500 ppm or more when the weather resolves, the same weather also strikes the next district in order: Delta, then Reach, then Verge, then Rim, then back to the Delta. No extra dice is rolled. The second district suffers the same effect and its own repairs, so a player liable for repairs in both districts pays twice.

Hotspots

At setup, reveal two random hotspot cells in each district. Each hotspot's zone includes its own cell and every cell within three shared-edge steps, staying inside that district. When building, choose a free triangular cell in the chosen district. Old World assets have fixed cells. A NIMBY still closes the whole district, with the existing exceptions.

Use the Dial when weather resolves. The card still determines which asset types it affects:

• Danger, below 510 ppm: card effects apply only to eligible assets inside a hotspot zone. Each owner with any non-Community asset inside a zone of the struck district pays 1 Capital in repairs. Owners with assets only outside the zones pay nothing.
• Severe, 510-549 ppm: card effects apply throughout the district. Each owner with any non-Community asset there pays 1 Capital per struck district, or 2 Capital if any of their non-Community assets there is in a hotspot zone.
• Extreme, 550 ppm or more: Severe repairs apply, and struck assets inside a hotspot zone lose this Income and the next.

Defence tokens and Contract immunities negate card effects on their assets; Community assets are protected. Repairs are geographic: card type, defences and immunities do not prevent them. Each owner pays once per struck district under the hotspot rule above; Community assets do not count for repairs. Terminus Mutual collects 1 Capital per payment made by another player, even when that payment is 2 Capital.

Houses, Agendas and Vices

Houses (public)

• Helios Combine: build Fossil, Solar and Wind for 1 Capital less. Once per era, swap a Fossil Fuel Plant for Solar or Wind, free (1 Operative, no Capital). Earn +1 Capital each round.
• Evergreen Consortium: build clean assets for 1 Capital less. Earn +1 Capital in any round when no tipping point is crossed.
• The Assembly: build Institutions for 1 Capital less. Earn +1 Influence in rounds 2, 4, 6, 8 and 10.
• Terminus Mutual: build defences for 1 Capital less. When weather strikes, collect 1 Capital for each repair payment made by another player, once per struck district. Earn +1 Capital each round.
• Halcyon Labs: earn +2 Capital each round. Whenever any player places a Research, take 1 Capital from the bank. Nobody pays more for a Research.

Agendas (secret)

Your Agenda uses the final climate band to set your bonus or victory condition. Each card prints its role under the title. Steward (The Long Game, The Custodian, Last Light, The Quiet Repair, Warden of the Verge) earns an extra bonus in the Danger band. Opportunist (The Vulture, Warlord of the Margin, The Broker, Salvage King, The Fixer, Gardener of Ruin) earns an extra bonus in the Severe danger or Extreme danger band. Accelerationist (The Arsonist, Drill Baby Drill, Merchant of Embers, Burn It Down) earns an extra bonus in the Extreme danger band, loses points in the Danger or Severe danger band, and can qualify to win Collapse. An Accelerationist can also win a world that survives, on Legacy points like anyone else. Every Steward card scores the same way, as does every Opportunist card and every Accelerationist card: the titles are flavour, so two cards with the same scoring text are not a mistake. The complete scores and tie rules are below.

Vices (secret)

Your Vice is a private card that adds Legacy points at the end for meeting its condition. For example, Coastal Hoarder gives you 2 Legacy points for each asset you own in the Delta, up to 6 Legacy points. Two Delta assets score 4; three or more score 6.

A player's builds may help their Vice as well as their Agenda. Building in the Delta, for example, does not tell you which final climate band that player wants.

The Tribunal

Held at the end of rounds 3 and 7 only.

1. Each player secretly commits 0-2 Influence to a vote for exactly one suspect. Reveal simultaneously. All committed Influence is spent, to the bank.
2. The player with the most votes reveals their Agenda, or their Vice if their Agenda is already revealed. They do not choose.
3. A player with both secrets already revealed cannot be named. A player who was the Tribunal's victim in a previous era cannot be named again unless every other eligible player has fewer votes.
4. Ties: the tied player earliest in clockwise order from the current First Player is the player required to reveal.

Revealing an Accelerationist Agenda changes three rules for that player. Their Schemes cost +1 Capital (3 to draw instead of 2), and Takeovers against their assets gain +1 strength. They also unlock Open Throttle: +1 Capital per dirty asset each Income, and the right to take over any asset type. Voluntary reveal is always allowed on your own turn and applies the same effects.

Scoring and game end

Legacy points are the victory points. If the world survives, add your base points and then apply your Agenda's bonus or penalty for the final climate band.

On Collapse, a qualified Accelerationist, meaning 2 or more dirty assets and 6 or more Capital at the moment of collapse, wins alone. If several qualify: most Capital, then most dirty assets, then earliest in clockwise order from the First Player. If none qualifies, everyone loses.

On survival, the most Legacy points wins. Ties break on most Community assets, then remaining Influence, then clockwise from the First Player. Exactly one winner always resolves.

Flashpoint mode

An optional physical/manual-table variant. The guided digital game uses ten rounds; it does not currently offer a Flashpoint switch.

• 6 rounds in two eras. The first era is rounds 1-3 (baseline +6, Influence grant 3); the second era is rounds 4-6 (baseline +10, grant 4).
• Tipping thresholds and penalties are as in the full game, and Collapse is at 600.
• Agendas are dealt face-down as normal.
• No Accelerationists. Remove the Accelerationist cards from the Agenda deck before dealing: 3 players use 2 Steward and 2 Opportunist cards; 4 players 3 and 2; 5 players 3 and 3.
• No Schemes and no Tribunal. Open Throttle does not exist in this mode.
• Scoring uses the full matrix above.