Expansion: The Solo Game

The Castles of Burgundy's official solo game on duchy 13A or 13B: fill all 37 spaces in 25 rounds, with a falling victory point target that grants extra actions.

Short tag: [Solo]

Fill all 37 spaces of your duchy within 25 rounds. Points are not the goal: they buy extra actions each time your counter reaches a falling target. All base rules apply except the changes below.

What it adds

• Two solo duchies: 13A for beginners, 13B for experienced players. Their regions are linked by rivers.

Setup changes

1. Set up the game board as for 2 players (12 + 4 hex tiles each phase).
2. Take duchy 13A or 13B; put a castle on any dark green space.
3. Start with 1 silver, 2 workers and 3 random goods beside your duchy. There is no limit on goods colours.
4. Take your dice, the white die, and both playing pieces: one counts your points from the 0/100 space, the other is the target marker on space 50.

Adjust the difficulty with the target: 49 down to 45 is easier, 51 up to 55 harder.

A solo round

Roll all three dice at the start of each of the 25 rounds.

1. Put the top goods tile on the depot shown by the white die.
2. Remove one hex tile from that depot from the game: top to bottom in depots 2, 3, 5 and 6, left to right in depots 1 and 4. If that depot is empty, take from the next depot clockwise.
3. Take your 2 die actions as usual.

Changes to the rules:

• You may expand into another region only across a river: place a ship in it, then build next to that ship as you built next to your castle.
• A sold goods tile scores 2 VP, as with 2 players.
• A scoring monastery scores when you place it, not at the end. Monastery 26 scores 3 VP per colour completed so far.
• You choose the order of all actions and part-actions.

Ships and black tiles

When you place a ship:

1. Take all goods from one depot, then remove every other goods tile on the board from the game.
2. Now — and only now — you may trade any 5 goods (back to the box) for one tile from the black depot. Put it face down (black side up) on a storage space.

A face-down black tile is a joker: it fits a space of any colour, following the normal placement rules. It helps complete areas and colours but has no other effect — a black “mine” gives no silver, a black “ship” gives no goods and no trade.

Completing a colour

When you cover every space of one colour, you get no bonus tile. Instead take a tile from the black depot and place it straight into your duchy (face up, normal placement rules) with its effect. If that completes another colour, take another black-depot tile, and so on. Completed areas still score size and phase points.

The target marker

Every time you gain points, move your counter. You may also buy points: 1 silver per VP.

When the counter reaches the target marker:

1. Put the counter back to 0 — points beyond the target are lost.
2. Move the target marker 5 spaces down (50 → 45 → 40 …).
3. Take one free action of your choice, as if you had placed a castle.

Winning

You win if all 37 spaces of your duchy are filled by the end of round 25; otherwise you lose.

The later Special Edition’s solo opponent is a different solo mode and is not covered here.