Gamehelpinnovationalpha

Overview

Innovation is a card game of civilization building, with 105 unique cards.

Each card represents an innovation throughout ten ages of history, starting in Prehistory (1), and going all the way to the Information Age (10).

Each player has their own personal play area, called their board.

A card's primary use is as an innovation, played face-up to your board, representing your civilization's adaptation of this new technology, idea, or ingenuity.

However, cards can also end up face-down in your score pile, representing your civilization's current power and influence, or as achievements, denoting its legacy throughout the years.

Anatomy of a Card

In the top middle of each card is its title. Each card has its own unique title. In a few cases, titles are compared alphabetically, and a few expansion cards reference specific other cards by their title. Otherwise, it is simply a way to distinguish each card.

"Alphabetical" comparisons are done by the English version of the title, and include leading articles. i.e., The Wheel is considered to come before Tools alphabetically.

In the top right of a card is its value. A card's value matches its age, which is displayed prominently on its back. Cards in the supply are split by age into separate face-down supply piles.

The background of each card will be one of five colors: blue, red, green, yellow, or purple.

(If the preference Card appearance is set to "Third edition", the value of the card will be outlined in a different shape, depending on the card's color.)

In the center of a card are abilities that this card can grant you, called dogma effects. Some are demands that can attack other civilizations. Others help you improve your own civilization. Every effect is preceded by a featured icon.

Going around the left and bottom of a card are four potential icon locations. Each location will show one icon, and exactly one location on each card will have a black hexagon icon with an image related to the card.

In the base game, these black hexes have no game effect, other than to affect where each card's three other icons appear.

There are six basic icon types that appear on cards. Three appear in any age, and three are limited to specific ages. A few expansion cards have icons appearing outside these restrictions. Hover over the player reference card for more info.

Actions

On a normal turn, you must take two actions. If any effect or rule gives you a "free" action, it does not count as one of these two. For each action, you must choose from the following four options (you may choose the same action twice):

DRAW (Click on the blue button at the top of your screen, or the supply pile to perform this action)

Draw a card from the supply pile of the age matching the highest value among all the top cards on your board, into your hand.

Whenever you draw a card for any reason, if the corresponding supply pile is empty, draw from the next higher age's supply pile instead. If multiple ages are empty, keep skipping as necessary.

If you ever attempt to draw a card higher than 10 for any reason, including skipping an empty Age 10 supply pile, the game ends immediately (even in the middle of an action/effect - see End of Game).

If a game effect has you take a card of a specific value from anywhere other than the supply piles, you only do so if the specified value is present. You do not skip to higher numbers in this case.

Cards in your hand are kept secret from other players; although they can see how many cards you have in hand, and which ages they are from. (Also each expansion's card set has different colored backs)

MELD (Click on the card in hand that you want to meld to perform this action)

Place a card from your hand onto your board. If you already have cards of that color on your board, this card is stacked on top of those, becoming your new top card of that color.

If you do not already have that color on your board, it starts a new stack, becoming the top (and bottom) card of that stack.

Each color only ever has one stack on each board, and colors are never mixed within a stack.

If the stack is already splayed (spread to one side, see Keywords below), that splay is maintained by the new card.

You may not take a Meld action if you have no cards in hand.

DOGMA (Click on the top card you wish to activate to perform this action)
A Dogma action has multiple steps, and is the heart of the game. This represents your civilization turning its main focus to one of the innovations it has discovered.

1. To start a dogma action, you must choose one of the top cards on your board, thus activating its effects. All of the effects on the card you chose will be executed, regardless of what happens to the card or other cards during the action (unless game end is triggered).
2. Before executing any of the effects, the amount of times that the featured icon of the activated card (the small version of the icon that precedes each effect) appears is counted on each player's board. Any player with at least as many of that icon as you will share all non-demand effects. Any opponent with fewer of the icon than you is vulnerable to demand effects.

   This count is only performed once per Dogma action, and sharing/vulnerability for all the effects on the activated card will be determined by this count, regardless of how the state of the boards changes while the effects are applied.

   (A running count for how many times each of the six basic icons appears on each player's board is shown in the BGA player panels)

3. All effects on the card must be executed during the Dogma action. They will be executed in order from top to bottom, with each effect completed entirely before moving to the next effect.
   • Effects with a darker background that start with "I DEMAND" are demand effects, which give opponents instructions to follow. All vulnerable opponents, in turn order, follow the instructions as if the activating player is reading them to the vulnerable player. Thus any "you/your" refers to the vulnerable player, and "me/my" refers to the activating player. No other players follow the instructions.
   • Effects that do not start with "I DEMAND" are non-demand effects. Each player who was determined to share non-demand effects of the activated card follows the effect's instructions, in turn order. All sharing players execute the effect before the activating player, who executes it last. Each player who executes the effect does so as if they were the player reading the card. Any "you" in the effect refers to the player currently executing the effect.
4. If any of your opponents shared any of the non-demand effects, and their doing so changed the game state in any way, then after all the effects have been resolved, you must take a free Draw action, with your now-current highest top card (which may be different than what it was before the Dogma action) determining the supply pile you draw from.

   If the game state was changed, and then changed again so that it is now in the exact place it was before, that still counts as changing.

   (For example, if the effect was "Return a card from your hand, then draw a 4". When your opponent shares the effect, they only have a single 4 in hand, and the 4 supply pile is empty. First, they return the 4 to the supply, then since there is now a 4 in the supply, they draw the same exact card back into their hand. This still triggers the free Draw.)

ACHIEVE (Click on the red button at the top of your screen, or the eligible achievement, to perform this action)
During the setup of the game, one card from each supply pile 1-9 is set aside as an available achievement. These cards are always kept face-down, and can never be looked at. They are simply used as markers to denote achievements made by players.

You may only take the Achieve action if you are eligible to claim one of the available achievements. In order to be eligible, you must satisfy both of the following conditions:

• The total of the ages of all the cards in your score pile (usually simply referred to as your "score"), must be at least five times the age number of the achievement.
• You must have a top card on your board of equal or higher value to the age number of the achievement.
  

If you take the action, claim an achievement you are eligible for by transferring it from the available achievements, to your personal achievements pile on the right side of your player reference card.

You may only claim achievements that are set aside as "available". Once another player claims an achievement, it is no longer available to be claimed.

Special achievements are automatically claimed immediately, for free, if they are still available, by meeting the requirements listed on them, even on another player's turn. They cannot be claimed with this action. Each special achievement also has an associated card whose dogma effects can allow a player to claim them.

Like standard actions, once a special achievement has been claimed, it is no longer available for another player to claim.

If you now have the required number of achievements (See End of Game), the game ends immediately, and you win!

You must choose one of these four actions, you cannot simply "pass". However, it is legal (and sometimes strategically preferred) to perform a Dogma action, activating a top card that will have no effect (for example, the card only has a Demand effect, and no player has fewer icons than you), as a way to effectively "pass" the action.

Keywords

Splaying is an important concept to understand. When you are instructed to splay a color in a direction (left, right, or up), if it is not already splayed, all the cards in the stack are fanned out in that direction so that one column (or row, in the case of splaying up) of icons is visible on every card in the stack. If the stack was already splayed, it is re-arranged into the configuration that represents fanning from an un-splayed stack. That is, splays do not compound each other, and only ever reveal one row/column of non-top cards' icons (Every icon on each top card is always visible). This increases the number of symbols visible on that stack, increasing the likelihood you will share other players' dogmas, and that more opponents will be vulnerable to your demands (You can hover over your player reference for a visual example of splayed stacks). Explicitly:

• Splaying left makes the rightmost icon location of every non-top card in the stack visible.
• Splaying right makes both leftmost icon locations of every non-top card in the stack visible.
• Splaying up makes the entire bottom row of icon locations visible on every non-top card.
  

A stack's splay is tracked by the literal fanning of the cards. If a stack is ever reduced to zero or one cards, it loses its splay. A stack does not "remember" what splay it had.

(The nice developers on BGA put handy little arrows under stacks to denote their current splay, but the rule still applies)

Tucking a card means to place it face-up on the bottom of its stack on your board, maintaining any current splay.

Returning a card means to place it face-down on the bottom of the supply pile it came from. If that supply pile was empty, the returned card becomes the only card in the supply pile, and it is no longer empty.

Scoring a card means to place it face-down in your score pile, to the left of your player reference. Your score is increased by the age of the scored card. You may look at the fronts of the cards in your own score pile, but not other players' score piles.

Draw [and ...] when a dogma effect tells you to draw a card, it will always specify what value to draw. Use this value, even if it is different from what a Draw Action would have you draw. If the effect tells you to get that value from another card, and no such card exists (e.g., "Draw a card equal to the value of your top purple", but you have no purples on your board), then the value is 0. As there are no 0 supply piles ever in the game, you skip up to 1 (and further if necessary). If you are are told to Draw and [something else], you do the [something else] with the card that you just drew. "Draw and meld a 6" means you draw a 6 (or 7 if 6 is empty, and so on), and then meld that card. You cannot choose to meld a different one in your hand, or any other, for that matter.

Start the game, already!

Innovation is best learned by playing, and if you've never played before, it is advisable to stop reading here, and just start playing, coming back as you need to reference specific rules or words.
At the start of the game, all players Draw two 1s, then each secretly pick one of the two cards. Once everyone has picked, the chosen cards are simultaneously melded by all players, and the player who melded the card whose title comes first alphabetically goes first. On the first player's first turn, they only perform one action. In a four player game, this is also true for the second player's first turn. After that, all turns are two actions each.

However, playing with 4 players, or any expansions, is not recommended for a first play, if avoidable.

End of Game

The game can end in three ways:

By achievements
The game ends immediately (even during a dogma effect) when a player has claimed the required number of achievements.

In a 2 player game with just the base set, 6 achievements are required.

For each extra player, subtract one from the requirement. For each expansion added, add one to the requirement.

Optional rule: The game may be set up to make the achievement goal one higher, for a longer game. In Options during table setup, choose "Enable" for "Extra achievement to win".

The player who reached the achievement goal wins the game, as their civilization has the greatest legacy.

Drawing above a 10
The game ends immediately (even during a dogma effect) when any player attempts to draw a card higher than a 10, for any reason.
Time has passed by the relevance of your achievements, and the player (or team) with the highest score wins, as their civilization has the most current power and influence.

If tied, the number of achievements is the tie-breaker; if still tied, the game is a draw.

By dogma
The dogma effects of several cards award a win if certain conditions are met. Others allow the single player with the most (or least) [X] win. These will only award victory if there is no tie for [X]. If there is a tie, the effect is ignored.

In either case, if victory is awarded, the game is ended immediately.

In a team game, this grants victory to that player's teammate, as well.

Expansions in General

Each expansion has 105 additional unique cards, split into 10 ages, just like the base set. Each set is kept in separate supply piles, and has unique rules for how its cards are drawn.
Draw actions and Draw effects will draw base cards unless the expansion's rules state otherwise. Once expansion cards are drawn, they act like any other card, except where specifically outlined otherwise in that expansion's rules.
Returned cards are returned to the specific supply pile they came from. In general, if the base card supply pile is empty, all expansion card supply piles of the matching age are considered empty. If an expansion supply pile is empty but the corresponding base pile is not, you usually draw a base card when you would have otherwise drawn an expansion card (Dig events for Artifacts of History are a notable exception).

Artifacts of History Expansion

Artifact cards generally are more powerful than base cards of the same age, but are harder to obtain and get onto your board.
Unless a dogma effect explicitly tells you to draw an Artifact, or to draw a card from any set and you choose Artifacts, the only way to bring Artifact card into play is to trigger a dig event.

Dig Event
A dig event is triggered by a Meld action (and not other meld effects) if the meld action covered up a top card of that color (that is, you already had at least one card in that color's stack on your board), and either:

The melded card is equal or lower value than your previous top card of that color, OR
The location of the black hex icon on the melded card is the same as the location of the black hex on the previous top card of that color.

If either/both are true, you draw an Artifact from the age equal to the value of the covered up card (skipping any ages with empty base supply piles), and place that card "on display".

The dig event is ignored if you already have a card on display, or if the Artifact supply pile of that age is empty (you never put non-Artifact cards on display).

Cards on Display
A card "on display" is not considered part of a player’s board, nor hand, and thus no dogma effects targeting your board, hand, or anything else have any affect on it.
At the same time, because it is not on your board, its icons do not count toward your icon totals, and it is not a top card.

However, if you start your turn with an Artifact already on display, you get a free special action at the start of your turn, before your normal actions. With this action, you choose one of three options:

(1) Take a free Dogma action, targeting the card on display. Solely for the purpose of determining sharing/vulnerability, the card's icons are added to your board's totals. Dogma effects on the card that care about your icon totals will not count the icons on the displayed card during this action. Using your free special action this way will also trigger Echo effects on your board in this color before the card's dogma effects (see Echoes of the Past Expansion). At the conclusion of all the dogma effects, return the displayed Artifact.

(2) Return the displayed Artifact (without triggering the dogma effects).

(3) You may pass the special action, leaving the Artifact on display.

During a normal Meld action, you may treat the card on display as if it is in your hand, and meld it. This may trigger another dig event, and/or any other effects triggered by Meld actions.

Compel Effects
Some Artifacts have a special type of Demand effect that starts with the words "I COMPEL".
Compel effects are considered demand effects for all purposes, and behave exactly the same, except that opponents are only vulnerable to a compel effect if the have the same or more of the featured icon than you. In order words, the same situation where they would share any non-demand effects. In some cases, opponents will be forced to follow the instructions of a Compel effect, and then also share other non-demand effects on the card. Remember that the free Draw action will only be triggered if a non-demand effect is shared (and the game state is changed by it).

Relic Cards (optional)
Relics are an optional addition when playing with Artifacts of History, and must be chosen during table setup to be included. The five relics are placed in an "available" area next to the supply piles at the start of the game. Each Relic has a different age, 3-7, and its card back matches the color of a different Innovation card set/expansion. They are the "lost relics" of each set.

After you dig an Artifact, you may seize the Relic whose age matches the value of the Artifact.
Relics may only be "seized" from the available Relics area, or from any player's achievements pile (including your own).
If you seize a Relic, you transfer it to your achievements pile. Or, if its card back matches the card backs of any set in play this game, you may instead transfer it to your hand.
A Relic in your hand acts like any other card, possibly being melded, scored, returned, etc. While in your hand, on your board, or in your score pile, it cannot be seized. A returned relic is returned to the available Relics area, where it may be seized again.
A Relic in your achievements pile counts as a claimed achievement as long as it stays there (remember that Relics can be seized from achievement piles).
A Relic in an achievement pile or in the available Relics area is not affected by any rule or effect that affects standard achievements. Only the rules that apply to Relics may affect it.
A relic in your hand, on your board, or in your score pile is affected by all the rules and effects that apply to those cards.

The golden rule

Do as many as you can and ignore the rest.

This rule will help you to leverage ambiguities.

This has many consequences:

-Exchanges do not need to be symmetrical. Depending on the situation, 2 cards can be exchanged with 2, 1 card with 4, or even 0 card with 10.

-If you don't have enough cards to fulfill the effect requirement, you can process all the cards that you do have.

-However, if a "you may" effect requires you to return 3 cards to trigger an effect, and you have less than 3 cards, you have to pass.

You can hover on the reference card to have a reminder of the actions and keywords.

Game editions and differences

The game was first published by Asmadi Games in 2010.

Then Iello published another edition of the game in 2011 with the same mechanics and card effects, but using a different terminology.

More recently, Asmadi Games gathered the original game and all its expansions in a new box "Innovation Deluxe" with new graphics, and also made some slight modifications on nine cards for balancing purposes.

The online adaptation is based on the third edition of Asmadi games for the artwork. For the rules, you can choose between:

-Last edition (this is the default): these are the rules of the Asmadi "Innovation Deluxe" pack. The expansions will only be compatible with this version.

-First edition: these are the rules of the original Asmadi game. These rules are consistent with the Iello edition too.

In consultation with the game publisher, we’ve made a small change to this online adaptation which affects when special achievements are awarded. We removed the word “immediately” from some of the special achievements, and those achievements are now only awarded at the end of the execution of each effect and at the end of each action.