Gamehelpgaiaproject

Factions

Faction	Planet Type	Ability	Planetary Institute	Starting Research	Basic Income
Terrans	Terra	During the Gaia phase, move the power tokens in your Gaia area to area II of your power cycle instead of to area I.	During the Gaia phase, when you move power tokens from your Gaia area to area II of your power cycle, you may gain resources as if you were spending that much power to take free actions.	Gaia Project	1 Knowledge, 1 Ore
Lantids	Terra	When you take the “Build a Mine” action, you may build a mine on a planet colonized by an opponent (including the Lost Planet). Place your mine next to the opponent’s structure. You do not have to pay for terraforming, but you must still pay the mine’s cost. This mine counts as a normal mine in all ways except the following: this mine cannot be upgraded, and it does not count for any effects that relate to how many planet types or Gaia planets you have colonized.	Each time you build a mine on a planet colonized by an opponent, gain two knowledge.	NA	1 Knowledge, 1 Ore
Xenos	Desert	You place a third starting mine after all other starting mines have been placed.	You can form federations with a total power value of six instead of seven. You gain one Q.I.C. as income instead of one power token.	Artificial Intelligence	1 Knowledge, 1 Ore
Gleens	Desert	If you would ever gain Q.I.C., gain that much ore instead; once you have upgraded to the indicated academy, this effect no longer applies. To make a Gaia Planet habitable, pay one ore instead of one Q.I.C. Each time you build a mine on a Gaia Planet, gain two additional VP.	When you upgrade to the planetary institute, immediately gain the Gleens’ federation token (gaining the resources shown as normal). Gaining this tile counts as forming a federation. The planetary institute itself can still be part of a federation on the board.	Navigation	1 Knowledge, 1 Ore
Taklons	Swamp	The Brainstone counts as one power token (when starting a Gaia Project, building satellites, etc.), but you can spend it as if it were three power.	Each time you would charge power from “Passive Action: Charge Power,” you gain one power token. You can choose to gain the power before or after charging.	NA	1 Knowledge, 1 Ore
Ambas	Swamp	NA	Once per round, as an action, you can swap your planetary institute with one of your mines on the game board (this can help you form a new federation). This has no impact on existing federations, even if their power value becomes less than seven. The swap does not count as a build or upgrade action; no VP or power can be gained from it.	Navigation	1 Knowledge, 2 Ore
Hadsch Hallas	Oxide	NA	You can spend credits instead of power to take free actions that allow you to gain resources. Example: You can spend 3 credits to take the free action that allows you to gain one ore.	Economy	1 Knowledge, 1 Ore, 3 Credits
Ivits	Oxide	During setup, do not place mines. Instead, after all other players have placed mines (including the Xenos’ third mine), place your planetary institute on any red planet. You can only have one federation, but each time the power value of your federation becomes a multiple of 7, you may take the "Form A Federation" action again. You must discard Q.I.C. instead of power tokens to make satellites.	As a special action, place a space station on an accessible space that does not contain a planet or another space station. The accessibility of a space follows the same rules as the “Build a Mine” action.	NA	1 Knowledge, 1 Ore, 1 QIC
Geodens	Volcanic	NA	The first time you build a mine on each planet type, gain 3 knowledge. (You do not gain knowledge for planet types you colonized before upgrading to your planetary institute.)	Terraforming	1 Knowledge, 1 Ore
Bal T'aks	Volcanic	You cannot advance in the “Navigation” research area, even if you take the tech tile below the “Navigation” research area. If you do take that tech tile, no advancement occurs. As a free action, you can move a Gaiaformer from a Gaiaformer space on your faction board to your Gaia area to gain one Q.I.C. Gaiaformers in your Gaia area are not available until the next Gaia phase. In the next Gaia phase, move any Gaiaformer in your Gaia area back to its Gaiaformer space.	You can now advance in the “Navigation” research area.	Gaia Project	1 Knowledge, 1 Ore
Firaks	Titanium	NA	As an action, you can “downgrade” a research lab into a trading station and immediately advance one level in a research area of your choice. Advancing in a research area is explained on page 15. This counts as an “Upgrade to a Trading Station” action. You can later upgrade the trading station back into a research lab using the normal rules (including gaining a new tech tile).	NA	2 Knowledge, 1 Ore
Bescods	Titanium	The positions of your planetary institute and academies are swapped on your faction board, as is the income you gain for trading stations and research labs. As with the other factions, upgrading to an academy or a research lab allows you to gain a tech tile. Once per round, as an action, you can advance your lowest-level token in a research area (without paying knowledge). If multiple of your tokens are tied for the lowest level, choose which of the tied tokens to advance. To advance to level 5 this way, you must still flip a federation token as normal. Remember, only one player can reach level 5 of each research area.	The power value of your structures on gray planets (your home type) is increased by one (in addition to any other effects that increase their power value).	NA	1 Ore
Nevlas	Ice	As a free action, you can move one power token from area III of your power cycle to your Gaia area to gain one knowledge (these power tokens follow the normal Gaia phase rules). This does not count as spending power.	You can spend power tokens in area III of your power cycle as if they were each two power. Otherwise, they count as one power token (when starting a Gaia Project, building satellites, etc.). When paying for a power action with an odd power cost (1, 3, 5, etc.), the unspent power is lost.	Science	1 Knowledge, 1 Ore
Itars	Ice	Each time you discard a power token from area II of your power cycle to move another power token to area III, place the discarded power token in your Gaia area instead of returning it to the supply.	During the Gaia phase, you can discard 4 power tokens from your Gaia area to immediately gain a tech tile (standard or advanced).	NA	1 Knowledge, 1 Ore, 1 Power in Bowl I

Rules to Remember

• Starting Resources (before receiving income at the beginning of Round 1) - Credits: 15, Ore: 4, Knowledge: 3
• Resource Storage Limits - Credits: 30, Ore: 15, Knowledge: 15

Actions

1. Build a Mine - This places a mine on the board, which usually give you ore as income. These mines must be at most a distance away from another building of yours equal to your navigation (the second track from the left). You must pay the cost of the mine. If it's a Gaia planet (green planets without gaiaformers on them), you must also pay one QIC. If it's some other planet type, you must pay additional ore - the exact cost is determined by your terraforming ability (the first track from the left) and the number of terraforming steps required to make the destination planet habitable for your faction.
2. Start a Gaia Project - This allows you to transform Transdim planets (purple) into a Gaia planet. You can only do this if you have at least one available gaiaformer, which you can get as a result of the Gaia Project track (the fourth track from the left). To do this, move power tokens into the gaia section of your board. These tokens are not lost - you'll get them back as the last step of the income phase. At the start of the next round, these planets are now Gaia planets and you can build mines on them normally (without spending a QIC like you normally would to build on a Gaia Planet). The gaiaformer is removed (and sent to your faction board) only after you decide to build on these planets (they are "reserved" for you until then).
3. Upgrade Existing Structure - Mines can be upgraded to Trading Stations, which usually produce credits - note that this has a cheaper cost if it's at most two units away from an opponent's structure. Trade Centers can be upgraded to either a Planetary Institute (which produces power and unlocks an ability specific to your faction) or Research Labs, which produce knowledge and allows you to immediately take a technology tile and advance on one of the tracks (if able, depending on your current position in the track). Research Labs can be upgraded to Academies, which also let you gain more technologies and produce either knowledge or QIC (or other resources depending on the faction).
4. Form a Federation - This allows you to combine structures to gain more points. To do this, you need any cluster of structures whose total power level is 7 or more. This can include empty space as well, but for each empty space included this way, pay 1 power token from any bowl to create a satellite. For doing this, you gain a federation token, which gives you immediate points, some other resource bonus, and can later be spent to advance to the top position of a research track or gain advanced technology tiles.
5. Research Progress - Spend 4 knowledge to advance on any track. The tracks are
   1. Terraforming, which improves your ability to terraform planets
   2. Navigation, which increases the range at which you can build structures
   3. Artificial Intelligence, which gives you more QIC
   4. Gaia Project, which allows you to start Gaia Projects on Transdim planets
   5. Economy, which increase your ore, credits, power charge income
   6. Science, which increases your knowledge income.
6. Power and Q.I.C. Actions - Spend power or QICs to take any of the actions at the bottom of the research board. Each of these can be taken only once per round.
7. Special Actions - Use any actions printed on booster tiles or your faction board. These can be taken only once per round.
8. Pass - Select a new booster tile. Wait until all other players have passed too.
9. Free Actions - Resource Conversions (or burn power to move power from Bowl 2 to Bowl 3).
10. Passive Action - Charging power. Spend VP as necessary depending on the amount of power being charged. This is optional.

Auctions for Drafting Factions

Each player submits bids for every faction that has been drafted. Once all bids are submitted, a round-robin auction is automatically conducted in turn order until each player has the top bid on one faction.

A typical auction might look like this behind the scenes. 1) The first player bids zero VP on the faction that has his highest maximum bid (i.e. the faction he wanted most) 2) If the second player submitted the same top bid for two different factions, he'll automatically bid zero on the faction no one has picked yet. If he had placed a higher bid on the same faction as player 1, he would have increased that bid to one VP instead. 3) The third player looks at the current bids and compares those to his maximum bid. He'll automatically bid one higher on the faction with the greatest difference between his maximum bid and the current bid of that faction.

This is all resolved quickly and automatically behind the scenes. It's not uncommon for players to get factions for free if no one outbids them.

After the auction, all players are given VP so that the player that paid the most still starts with 10 VP to use during the game.

Undoing your turn

Beware: The developers have decided to not add an option to undo your turn!