Actions

Main and Executive actions in Orbit and on the Martian surface.

Orbit actions

Take these only while your marker is on the Orbit side. An action showing a red Colonist needs one of your Colonists on its slots (placement costs).

Tech Grid tiles are refilled only when the Colony levels up. The numbers above the Laboratory columns are the Tech levels; the numbers below are end-game OP. Laboratory benefits are optional.

Colony actions

Take these only while your marker is on the Colony side.

Bots and the Rover

Bots build. A Bot’s hex and the 6 around it are its Building Zone: you construct and upgrade only there. A Bot that ends its move on a Discovery or Research tile destroys it; on a Crystal, returns it to the supply.

Your Rover explores. It starts the game on the starting Mine. It picks up every Crystal it passes over (below your Depot, as usual). If it ends its movement on a Discovery or Research tile, take the tile and resolve it at once — provided you don’t already have a Research tile of that colour and letter, you pay any cost, and you can use at least part of it.

Bots and Rovers may pass through, but not end on, a hex with an Advanced Building, a Colonist, another Bot or another Rover. Movement is “up to”.

Constructing

Place the new Building:

• next to a Building of the same type, making or enlarging a Complex — you must use a Tech tile of that type whose level is at least the number of Buildings you connect to; or
• exactly 2 hexes from one of the same type, and not next to another one — no Tech needed.

Your Shelters and other players’ Shelters count as different types. Then:

1. Pay the cost on the Building display (a Shelter costs 1 Oxygen; a Mine costs a Colonist from your Living Quarters, placed on it).
2. Place the tile face down; put 1 Crystal on each empty adjacent hex its arrows point to, then flip it.
3. Gain Resources of that type equal to the new Complex size (1 if it stands alone); a Shelter gives Crystals instead.
4. The first time you create or enlarge a Complex of a type (not Shelters), move that type’s Progress cube from your board to the Progress area.
5. An LSS Building moves its LSS marker up and may give LSS rewards.

Displacement: building or upgrading on a Crystal returns it to the supply; on a Discovery or Research tile, removes the tile from the game; on a Bot or Rover, its owner moves it to the closest empty hex or Building with no piece on it.

Upgrading

Choose one of your Blueprints and a matching Building in a Bot’s Building Zone, pay 1 Mineral, and move the Advanced Building marker from the Blueprint onto the Building. A level-1 Blueprint upgrades any Building of its type; a level-3 Blueprint only one in a Complex of size 3 or more. Each Building and each Blueprint is used once; you can’t upgrade another player’s Shelter. A Colonist on an upgraded Mine returns to its owner. With the Upgrade Tech you may upgrade as many extra Buildings as its level.

The Blueprint is now an Advanced Building: it produces when you travel to Orbit, and its action becomes an Executive action.

Scientists and Earth Contracts

At the start the display shows the 6 Scientists. Each costs what its space shows (the Geologist: send 2 Colonists to your Working Area). Take the card and its Scientist marker; at the end of your turn, fill the space with any Contract you choose. A Scientist scores 3 OP at the end for each Advanced Building of its type on Mars, anyone’s.

An Earth Contract costs 1 Crystal. At the end you gain its OP if you completed it and lose them if not:

• Delivery: the depicted items must be on the card. You may place them at any time — even straight from where you gain them — but they never come back. Minerals can’t stand in for other Resources here.
• Upgrade: you need an Advanced Building marker on a Building of that type in a Complex of at least size 4.

Missions and Executive actions

Missions

Three Mission cards show what the colony needs. Each time you contribute, take the Crystals shown on the card and move its tracker cube down one space. When a cube reaches the checkmark, the Mission is complete: remove the card and move the Remaining Missions marker one space right. A boosted action contributes once per item.

Private Goals

You start with 3. On your turn, before or after an action, you may complete one whose requirement you meet and take one of its rewards — only one per game. You may also discard any of them, unseen, to use as a Crystal (not for Contracts).

Executive actions

Once per turn, before or after your Main action, pay the Crystals for one Executive action next to an uncovered Depot slot. At the start only the bottom 3 are open; each Ship you welcome uncovers another.

Scientists at work. To use another player’s Advanced Building, move your Scientist of that type onto its Blueprint. While it stays there, both you and the building’s owner use that action without paying Crystals. It leaves only to work in another building of its type.

Boosting Tech with Colonists. Some Advanced Building actions show a teal Colonist: each Colonist you send to your Working Area adds 1 to the level of a Tech that is already in play.

Movement and costs

Using Tech. Whenever an action or benefit matches a Tech tile, you may use one such tile — yours or another player’s (never another player’s Shelter Tech). Its owner takes 1 Oxygen to the top of their board; at the end of your turn they either develop that tile for free (returning the Oxygen) or keep the Oxygen. Each use counts separately.

Crystals. Any Crystal you gain goes below your Depot and moves up at the start of your next turn; your Depot holds only as many as its uncovered slots. Other Resources can be used as soon as you gain them. Ways to get Crystals: Missions, Shelters, your Rover, the Warehouse, Laboratory and Turn Order benefits, LSS benefits and Advanced Buildings on Shelters.

Free-cost icon. You always pay normal costs unless the tile or card shows the free-cost icon (Research tiles and some Private Goal rewards).

See Game End and Scoring for the end trigger and final scoring.