Carnegie FAQ
115 questions players ask · Updated Nov 7, 2026 · Full rulebook
Setup and Components
- How many rounds does a game of Carnegie last, and how many turns does each player get?
- Does the setup movement example show 6 or 7 moves on the company board?
- Which rulebook version matches the physical game, and what changed in version 1.2?
- How do I place the neutral blocking discs in a 2 or 3 player game?
- Do neutral discs go into one-space (small) cities such as Reno during 2 and 3 player setup?
- Do I use all 40 solo action cards or one set of 20 to place the neutral discs?
- How many department tiles are removed in a 2, 3 or 4 player game, and which ones?
- Does the arrangement of the department tiles or gaps between them matter?
- Where does each player place their starting Housing project during setup?
- Must my first built department be the one I reserved during setup?
- Are the housing disc placement and first department selection in setup done in reverse turn order?
- Are employees moved during setup active or inactive, and do I pay for them?
- Do project disks removed from the Housing track during setup go back onto it?
- Do players reserve a department each during setup?
- Does the Deluxe or Kickstarter edition include the extra departments, New Beginning notepad and new donations?
- Can the expansion departments be mixed with the base departments in setup?
- Does the New Gifts bonus for a medium city connected to a large city pay $2 or 2 VP?
- How can I exchange victory points for money in New Beginning if I have 0 VP?
Company, Employees and Departments
- Does the starting Lobby count as one of my departments?
- Can a department hold more inactive employees than it has workstations?
- Do I pay the activation cost again each time a standing employee is used?
- Which cost do I pay to stand up an inactive employee?
- Can I own two copies of the same department?
- Can an employee be placed straight onto an empty space without passing through a lobby?
- How do the two lobbies work once the New Lobby is built, and can employees move between them?
- Can I build a new department in a higher row with nothing beneath it, and where may it go?
- Can I build a department that matches one printed on my company board?
- Does each player choose which side of each project tab to use, and is the choice public?
- Is project-tab income cumulative when I have several built projects?
- Is a project tab's victory-point space scored if earlier spaces still hold discs?
- What does side B of a project tab do for donation points?
- Can I trade a goods cube for money?
- What do the money and cube symbols at the bottom left of the player board mean?
The Round: Timeline and Events
- How does choosing an action on the Timeline work each round?
- What happens if the action marker of the row I choose is already at the end of its track?
- Can the first player use their own Action Choice tile to take a different action than the one they chose?
- How many actions does each player get in 2, 3 and 4 player games, and how do Action Choice tiles change that?
- Who is the first player for the Wait option, and does it delay only the action?
- On the rightmost Timeline events, which comes first: returning workers for income or making a donation?
- Can I take income in the first round, or is the first event wasted when it is an income event?
- Does the region activated on the Timeline limit where I can build, research or send employees?
- When I recall employees at an income event, what exactly do I collect?
- Can an employee get home from a Mission when no more income events in that region remain?
- Does building in a small city with an exclamation mark give any income besides transport income?
- When do I activate inactive employees: at the end of each turn or after everyone has acted?
- Do my buildings on the map have to be contiguous?
- Is it legal to block an opponent by building in a city or space their route needs?
Using Departments and Missions
- When I use my departments, can I switch back and forth between them?
- How many moves does Human Resources give, and does moving employees off it reduce them?
- Can employees returned from a Mission be moved with Human Resources in the same round?
- What happens to an active employee that I move with Human Resources?
- Do employees get exhausted after their department is used?
- Do passive departments (such as Communications) need activation, and does their employee get laid down?
- If a department offers a choice and I have several active employees, can each pick a different option?
- Can I send an employee on a Mission when I cannot meet the action's requirements?
- When a department's secondary option sends an employee on a Mission, which employee goes?
- Can Recruiting still send an employee on a Mission after all new employees have been recruited?
- Does Property Management let me move employees from the Lobby to a new department?
- How many projects can I build in one Construction action, and can several go in the same city?
- Can I build when no disc is left on the matching project tab?
- Can I place a disc on top of another player's disc in a city or project space?
- Can my first disc go in one of the biggest cities?
- Is an employee activated for free when I build a department over it, or placed on an empty space?
- How much does Strategic Planning charge to build a department?
- Does Construction Outsourcing (Department 10) allow more than one project per use?
- Besides the Recruiting department, how can I get extra employees?
- Can I spread the R&D points from one action across several project tabs and transport tracks?
- Do I add up all study points before spending them, and are leftover points lost?
- Can R&D points from a transport track be spent when R&D was not the chosen action?
- How do discs get onto project tabs?
Transportation Tracks
- Is transportation income cumulative across track positions?
- What happens on the last space of a transportation track, and can two players share it?
- Do I lose the railroad level if my disc moves past the railroad space?
- Do I get a bonus when I first land on a transport track space?
- If I return two employees from a track at once, can I spend the study points from the first before returning the second?
- What does a transport symbol on a small city give, and is it paid per worker on a Mission?
- If a small-city build gives study points, must I spend them immediately?
- Does the Telegraph Operator discount apply to each transport step?
Donations
- How much does each donation cost, and is there a limit?
- How much does a second donation cost with the Communications department?
- Can I make more than one donation when a donation event triggers?
- Where does the disc for a donation come from?
- Is there a cap on VP from a single donation?
- When do donations score their VP?
- Do a donation's scoring conditions count for all players or only the one who placed the disc?
- Does the Housing and/or Commerce donation count both types?
- How do I count built projects for project-based donations, including small cities?
- Which departments count for the Education donation?
- How do the Public Health donations count projects?
- Does a transport marker on the final track space count as railroad for donations?
- How does Charitable Giving (Department 15) work: where can its donation go?
- Can Charitable Giving place a disc on a spot blocked by neutral setup discs?
- Can a New Donations tile cover another New Donations tile, and do I have to cover all columns?
- Can I make a Welfare donation during the game?
End of the Game and Scoring
- What scores at the end of the game?
- Do I score a city's VP once per city or once per disc I have there?
- Do starting departments score the 2 to 3 VP per department?
- How do connection points for linking major cities work?
- Must connected cities form a straight line, or can the network double back?
- Do I use the lowest transport level across the regions of my connected major cities?
- How many connections does San Francisco count for?
- Can I convert goods into money during final scoring?
- Can I still pay to activate employees after the last round's actions?
- Do end-game VP on a project tab score if the disc to their right is gone?
- What counts as a small city?
Solo Game
- Is the solo setup the same as a 2-player game, including the 18 neutral discs?
- Does Andrew take his turn first each round?
- Can Andrew take the same department tile twice?
- How are Andrew's donations scored, and do I have to spend cubes or money for them?
- Is Andrew's score for a single donation capped at 12 VP?
- Do I use both standard and advanced solo cards?
- Does Andrew resolve every action on his card, and what happens on a question-mark card?
- What does Andrew do when the Timeline lands on the last space or a marker reaches the track end?
- How far does Andrew's transport disc move when the rulebook and card differ?
- How is the New Beginning module set up for solo?