Gamehelpmedievalacademy

Overview

You are young pupils at King Arthur's academy. Over 6 rounds you draft learning cards and use them to move your pawns along seven tracks: Kitchen, Jousts, Tournaments, Studies, King, Village and Quest. Each track scores in its own way and at its own time. Points are noted secretly on your diploma and revealed at the end. The player with the most points wins.

A round

Each round has the same steps:

1. Draft: everyone gets 5 cards. All players choose one card at the same time, keep it and pass the rest on, until

everyone has kept 5 cards. Cards go to the left in rounds 1, 3 and 5 and to the right in rounds 2, 4 and 6. With 2 players, you simply swap hands.

1. Play: starting with the first player (the one with Excalibur), each player in turn plays one card and moves

their own pawn on that card's track by the card's value. A Jousts / Tournaments card may be used on either of the two tracks. Everyone plays 4 cards; the fifth card is discarded.

1. Kitchen bonus and scoring (see below).
2. Reset: after scoring round 3, all pawns on Kitchen, Jousts, Tournaments, Studies and King go back to the start.

Village and Quest pawns stay for the whole game.

1. The first player passes Excalibur to the left.

Who is ahead?

• A pawn that lands on an occupied square is placed on top of the stack and counts as being ahead of the

pawns below it.

• The last square of a track is the exception: whoever reaches it first stays first, later pawns go

underneath. A pawn cannot move past the last square.

• A pawn on the start square never wins anything on that track, but it can still lose points on Studies and

Village.

Scoring (3 to 5 players)

Track	When	Result
Kitchen	every round	No points. Before the other tracks score, the 1st player moves one of their own pawns on another track 3 squares, the 2nd player 2 squares and the 3rd player 1 square (3rd place only with 4 or more players). The bonus is optional ("Don't advance").
Jousts	every round	1st: 3 points, 2nd: 2, 3rd: 1 (3rd place only with 4 or more players)
Tournaments	every round	Same as Jousts
Studies	every round	Last player: −3, second to last: −1
King	rounds 3 and 6	6 points from square 6 on, 12 points on square 12
Village	round 6	Last player: −10, second to last: −5
Quest	round 6	1st: 17 points, 2nd: 10, 3rd: 4 (3rd place only with 4 or more players)

If several pawns share the start square of Studies or Village, they are all last together.

Hover over a track banner or a round marker on the board to see how that track scores in your game.

2 players

• Draft: swap hands instead of passing left or right.
• Kitchen: only the 1st player gets a bonus: 1 square, plus 1 for every Kitchen symbol between the two pawns.
• Jousts and Tournaments: 1st: 3 points, 2nd: 1. Whoever is 1st on both tracks gets 2 extra points.
• Studies: only the last player loses 3 points.
• Village (round 6): the 1st player gets 3 points for every full 3 squares of lead.
• Quest (round 6): the 1st player gets 7 points, plus 2 for every Quest symbol between the two pawns.
• "Between" means strictly between the pawns: a symbol under a pawn does not count. Symbols are on every 5th square.

Night side (advanced rules)

Choose "Board side: Night" when creating the table. Kitchen, Studies, Village and Quest work as on the day side.

Black Knight and White Knight

• Jousts and Tournaments become the Black Knight (left) and the White Knight (right), each with 10 squares.
• Between them lies the track of the Cup. Every Knight card you play moves your pawn and the Cup by the card's

value towards the Knight you chose. The Cup stops at the end of its track. The Kitchen bonus on a Knight track moves the Cup as well.

• The Knights score in rounds 2, 4 and 6. On the Knight with the Cup on its side: 1st 8 points, 2nd 5, 3rd 2. On the

other Knight: 5, 3 and 1. With 2 or 3 players there is no 3rd place. If the Cup is exactly in the middle, both Knights score as the other Knight (5, 3, 1).

• After scoring rounds 2 and 4, the Knight pawns and the Cup go back to the start.

King and the parchments

• Every square of the King track shows its own value. A parchment lies on square 6 and on square 12.
• The first player to reach or pass square 6 or 12 takes its parchment.
• The King only scores in a round in which a parchment was taken: every player scores the value of their square,

twice if both parchments were taken in that round.

• The King is not reset after round 3. Instead, in the round the parchment of square 12 is taken, all King pawns and

both parchments go back to the start after scoring.

First player bonus

Before scoring, the first player may take one of their own pawns that has other pawns on top of it and put it on top of its stack. This is not possible on the start square.

End of the game

After scoring round 6, all diplomas are revealed. The most points wins. On a tie, the player furthest ahead on the Kitchen track wins.

Options on BGA

• Scoring: Hidden (default, as in the rulebook): you only see your own points; other players' diplomas stay

closed until the end. Open: everyone's points are shown during the game.

• Board side: Day (basic game) or Night (advanced rules).
• Player preference Board: Illustrated (the printed board, with zoom) or Compact (one row per track).