Praga Caput Regni

The main procedure is for 2–4 players. Set the action crane, counters, and plazas for the player count, with a resource board and six-action board per player. Take clockwise turns until everyone has taken exactly sixteen. The box rules also provide a solo variant.

Take one action tile, perform one of its two depicted actions, and receive the wheel bonus. Pay a red-zone cost immediately before taking the tile. Green has no additional positional cost; blue awards points. The wheel bonus may normally be delayed until later in your turn.

Manage Mines or Quarries either adds one production capacity and one corresponding resource, or produces according to existing capacity with unlocked bonuses to its left. Gold and stone each cap at nine. Each marked wealth-threshold bonus is gained only once.

Upgrade an Action takes an available upgrade tile onto its matching action hex, in any orientation, and advances University one or two spaces according to its era. A new upgrade replaces rather than stacks with an old one. Its bonus can apply retroactively to that action already performed this turn and applies whenever that action is performed later.

Constructing a wall or building requires paying its tile cost before taking rewards and placing it legally. Old Town sites add printed costs and points. Matching edge symbols on walls and upgrades grant adjacency rewards; matching corners grant the relevant red or blue bonus tokens.

Each city building borders one plaza. A building with a cube space establishes its owner’s claim; one without a cube scores immediately for buildings currently around that plaza. When enclosed, claimants choose one reward; the most cubes earns both. Ties first compare total gold-plus-stone cost of the tied players’ cube-bearing buildings.

The King’s Road advances to your next colored space. Egg-dependent effects on the first three spaces are optional; entering spaces IV and V requires an egg. A completed bridge still allows tile benefits but no plank-placement bonuses. After reaching V, you cannot take this action again.

Wall/Cathedral icons move you sideways on the matching civic project. Two silver windows buy an upward move; crossing tiers also requires printed gold and stone costs. Once per turn, two gold windows or one gold plus one silver buys an extra action; technology actions follow their own effects. Level I/II technologies begin next turn; III/IV are one-use benefits usable now or later.

End your turn with at most two windows, rotate the crane, return your tile to the start of red, and advance the timer as directed. Replace tiles with Era II around halfway; two players use the star-marked transition. At game end score unresolved plazas, University times technology advances, both civic projects, walls, personal scoring abilities, and eggs. Highest score wins; ties favor the player who started later.

For the printed solo variant, use two-player setup and take the first turn. After your turns, recycle the oldest action tile nearest the blue zone through the normal crane procedure, without performing its actions. Aim for a high personal score; the manual suggests over 140 as good. The separately published Peter Parler card opponent is a different solo procedure.