Solo: Green Opponent

Set up and operate the automated green opponent using the solo cards and four difficulty levels.

Setup

Set up the game for two players. Use a player board with its solo side up and any character board for the green opponent; set aside components of any color. Shuffle the 20 solo cards. Put the solo supply token on the middle of the taxonomy track, shuffle six green solo lenses and place them face-down above it. Put the opponent’s marker on the top taxonomy space, give it a random starting book and its matching sample, sort its flowers into the three piles shown, and put three coins in the printed starting slots. Give it a random starting voyage card and a ship on its harbor. Put the opponent in the rightmost turn-order position and take that reward, then place your marker in another position and take that reward. The human player always goes first. Choose difficulty by starting with zero, one, two or three green lenses on the opponent’s instrument spaces: Student, Journeyman, Master or Genius. In the advanced game, the opponent starts at least at Journeyman and does not use a character power.

Turn structure

At the start of each opponent turn, draw and place solo cards according to the solo player-board sequence. Resolve the indicated rows at the instrument’s strength: one for glasses, two for magnifier, three for microscope. The cards automate Explore/ Research, Correspond, Grow and Sail. If an indicated task cannot be performed, follow the card’s fallback; do not substitute a human strategy. The turn-order token uses the solo instructions and its printed track.

The solo opponent follows its own simplified rules for costs and rewards. For example, a required paid effect it cannot afford is replaced by the printed point fallback, and its Explore movement ignores route costs. Apply the solo page’s specific row instructions whenever they override the multiplayer rule.

Round end and scoring

At income, discard the opponent’s three played solo cards. It does not gain recurring income from completed voyage and book pairs. After five rounds, score the opponent using the game’s normal categories with the solo exceptions: it automatically scores its exotic samples, then converts coins and scores its remaining components. Compare its total with yours; the difficulty level changes only its starting green lenses.

The solo cards provide exact row-by-row instructions and should remain available during play. See Actions and Rounds for the shared rules and Advanced Game for character-mode restrictions.