Regulation and Maintenance

Feed and pay Overseers, resolve optional disasters, and refresh between rounds.

Regulation order

Resolve these steps in order: Feed Overseers; Natural Disasters (if using the optional rule); Check the Caravan Escort; Validate Caravan Loadings; Pay Overseers.

Feeding and pay

Count Overseers in City Quarters, the City Entrance lower space, Corrupt Administration, Caravanserai scoring spaces and Workshops. Count each Workshop at its level (one, two or three). Return Peasants on Rice, Fruit or Maize Fields to your supply to feed them: 3–5 Overseers require one Peasant, 6–8 require two, 9–11 require three, and 12 or more require four. If you cannot feed some, take one Misfortune tile per unfed Overseer.

For wages, count the Command lines on cards played this round plus any Overseers used to reinforce those actions. Pay 0 Yínzi for 3–5, 1 for 6–8, or 2 for 9–12. If you cannot pay, take one Misfortune per unpaid Overseer. Each Misfortune is −2 WP at game end. Merchant bonuses Food for All and Pay Day can satisfy the corresponding requirement.

Optional Natural Disasters

Caravan tiles can show Fire, Flood or Drought. Resolve each type shown during Regulation; duplicate symbols trigger only once. Fire: in turn order, return one Overseer from one of your Workshops, reducing its level; remove a Good if required by reduced storage. A Level I Workshop with no Overseers becomes inactive. Flood: move each Ambassador on the Transport Capacity track back one space, but not below 1. Drought: remove one of your Peasants from each Province where you have any.

Validate Caravans and check escort

Take the Caravan tile for each demand you completed this round and return the Peasants or Goods on it to their owners. Incomplete Caravans remain on the board. Compare the total Caravanserai Overseers against all Steppe Mongol values showing on displayed Caravans, including those not claimed. Highest contributor gets one Overseer on the 4 WP reward if the escort meets or exceeds the threat, otherwise on 2 WP. Ties go to the player who placed their Overseer earliest.

Maintenance

After rounds 1–3: return Overseers from Player boards and City Quarters to supply, except City Entrance and the Caravanserai scoring spaces. Move City Entrance lower Overseers to upper. Discard displayed Caravans and reveal replacements equal to the player count. Refresh all six Crop spaces; return discarded Crop tiles to the bag if it runs empty. Remove the three used Order cards from the game, reveal three new cards and place their indicated Overseers. Move Merchants to the Turn Order track in their current top-to-bottom order. After round 4, skip Maintenance and score.