Turn Sequence, Reset and End

How a Dominant Species turn runs: the action display, the Planning and Execution Phases, voluntary actions, the Reset Phase (Extinction, Survival, Reseed) and the Ice Age ending with final scoring.

The game is a series of turns with no fixed number: it ends in the turn someone takes the Ice Age card, which sits at the bottom of the Dominance deck.

The action display

Each eyeball is an action space for one action pawn (AP). Sections resolve top to bottom, and within a section left to right:

1. Initiative — 1 space
2. Adaptation — 3 spaces
3. Regression — 2 spaces + the reptiles’ free space
4. Abundance — 2 spaces
5. Wasteland — 1 space
6. Depletion — 1 space
7. Glaciation — 4 spaces, only the left-most pawn acts
8. Speciation — 6 spaces, one per element + the insects’ free species
9. Wanderlust — 3 spaces
10. Migration — 6 spaces, worth 7, 6, 5, 4, 3 and 2 species
11. Competition — 7 spaces + the arachnids’ free space
12. Domination — 5 spaces

The leaf squares next to Adaptation, Abundance and Wanderlust hold 4 elements each; the Regression, Wasteland and Depletion boxes catch the elements that slide down at the end of a turn.

Sequence of play

Each turn has three phases:

1. Planning — everyone places all their action pawns.
2. Execution — the pawns come off in display order and each one triggers its action.
3. Reset — Extinction, Survival, then Reseed for the next turn.

Planning phase

In Initiative order (left to right on the Initiative track), each player places one pawn on any empty eyeball, then the next player does. Go round again and again until everyone has placed every pawn; a player who has run out is skipped.

• One pawn per eyeball, first come, first served.
• You may put several pawns in the same section, on any free eyeball, not just the left-most.
• Spaces with an animal picture (reptile in Regression, insect in Speciation, arachnid in Competition) are not eyeballs: nobody can place there.

Execution phase

Remove the pawns one at a time, top section first and left to right inside each section; each time, its owner carries out that action. Then the pawn goes back to its owner for the next turn (Glaciation pawns that did not act stay on the display).

Voluntary actions

Every action is optional: when your pawn comes off you may forfeit the whole action. The one thing you cannot refuse is a Dominance card when your animal is dominant on a scored tile.

Actions that happen without a pawn

Most empty sections are simply skipped, except:

• Regression hits every animal with matching added elements.
• Wasteland hits every tundra tile with matching elements.
• Speciation — the insects still place their free species.
• Competition — the arachnids still get their free Competition.

Reset phase

Extinction

Every endangered species on earth is eliminated (back to the box). The mammals may save one endangered species each turn.

Survival

Give the Survival card to the animal with the most species on tundra tiles in total — a tie means nobody holds it. Its holder scores the bonus points table for the number of tundra tiles it occupies (cubes per tile don’t matter).

Reseed

Skip this step in the last turn. Otherwise, in this order:

1. Refill the empty Available Dominance Cards spaces from the deck (cards still there stay). When the deck runs out, spaces stay empty.
2. Slide the Glaciation pawns in the 2nd, then 3rd, then 4th space one space left, into empty spaces only.
3. Return the elements in the Regression box, the Depletion box and the Wanderlust squares to the bag.
4. Slide the Wasteland box down into the Depletion box.
5. Slide the Abundance elements down into the Wasteland box.
6. Slide the Adaptation elements down into the Regression box.
7. Draw 4 new elements each for Adaptation, Abundance and Wanderlust.
8. Turn the top tile of each Wanderlust stack face up (an empty stack stays empty).

End of the game

Ice Age

The Ice Age card is always the last card of the deck. When a dominant animal takes it, every animal at once scores the bonus points table for the number of tiles it dominates (its cones). This is the last turn.

Final scoring

1. Finish any remaining Domination actions as normal (dominant animals still take any face-up cards that are left).
2. Carry out Extinction and score the Survival card as usual; skip Reseed.
3. Remove all cones, then score every tile on earth as in a Domination action — by number of species, 1st to 4th — but nobody takes Dominance cards.

Tie-break

The highest score wins. A tie goes to the tied animal higher on the food chain.