Galaxy Trucker FAQ
172 questions players ask · Updated Nov 11, 2026 · Full rulebook
Building Your First Ship
- Can two touching ship parts be placed if their connectors do not match?
- How many components can you set aside while building, and what happens to unused ones?
- If the starting cabin is destroyed, does the whole ship fall apart?
- After a hit splits your ship, which pieces are lost?
- Can you move or rearrange a tile after it has been placed on your ship?
- Can you fix an illegal connection after you have built on top of it?
- If your ship is found illegal in flight, what is the penalty?
- What counts as an illegal connection between two tiles?
- Can you place a tile that does not connect to your ship, such as two smooth edges or a blank-to-blank joint?
- Must each new tile connect to the starting tile, or can it connect to any tile already on the ship?
ComponentsExpansion
- Can other components sit in a cannon's line of fire, and does the cannon still fire?
- Do cannons count toward engine strength when moving through open space?
- Which rows and columns can a cannon cover against large meteors?
- How much does a sideways or rear cannon count toward strength, and is strength rounded?
- How many batteries does a double cannon need, and what does it cover?
- Does an unpowered double cannon or double engine add strength?
- Can you add crew to a cabin that already holds two humans or an alien?
- Can a red cargo cube go in a regular cargo hold?
- How many players can the base game take, and can you play with six?
- Where can engines be placed on a ship?
- How many batteries does a shield cost against a small meteor?
- Does an engine count as an open connector against small meteors from behind?
- Where must a shield generator be placed, and which sides does it protect?
- What are the two rocket pieces each player gets for?
- What are the seven mistakes in the Pop Quiz ship?
- Do you keep your ship's components between flights of the Transgalactic Trek?
- What happens when a planet offers goods the bank has run out of?
- How much does a boosted bidirectional cannon add to its strength?
Preparing for LaunchExpansion
- When you finish building first, must you take starting space 1?
- Does the base game make you remove random tiles for fewer than five players?
- Does the starting cabin get two crew when the flight begins?
- How many adventure cards does each flight use, and how are the piles made?
- Do used adventure cards come back for the next flight?
- How long does the building timer run?
- Must the timer be flipped when the sand runs out, and who may flip it to Start?
- Who gets the starting spaces when the final timer runs out?
- Can you run out of cosmic credits?
- When can you look at the upcoming adventure cards?
- How many cosmic credits does each player start the game with?
- What happens when a spot check finds an illegal ship?
- Are the ship tiles turned face down again for each building phase?
- With The Big Expansion, how many components are removed for fewer than five players?
The FlightExpansion
- Can you leave out unpowered engines or cannons to lower your strength?
- When a card takes goods from you, which goods go first, and what if you have none?
- How far apart do ships start on the flight track in each flight?
- When can you rearrange or jettison cargo you already carry?
- Can you speed up or slow down your ship to choose where a meteor hits your indestructible plating?
- Can a cannon stop a small meteor?
- Is there a finish line, and what does the flight track show?
- Do you move forward by your engine strength before each adventure card?
- Can two ships share a space on the flight track?
- Can you land on a planet and take no goods?
- Does the flight order carry over from one flight to the next?
- What happens to a ship with no engines, or zero engine strength, on an Open Space card?
Adventure CardsExpansion
- After you defeat a pirate, smuggler or slaver, can you skip the reward and keep your flight days?
- Does losing to a pirate or smuggler cost you flight days?
- When an enemy attacks, who is attacked, and does a defeated enemy move on?
- Can you decline an encounter card such as a pirate or a meteor swarm?
- Why must each flight's adventure deck start with a card of that flight's number?
- What happens when an Epidemic card is drawn and two occupied cabins are joined?
- If you have no engines left, can you still land on a planet and take cargo?
- In a Combat Zone, who takes the penalty when players are tied in a line?
- In a Combat Zone, how are cannons and double cannons counted to find the weakest ship?
- In a Combat Zone, can you see the other players' strength before deciding how many batteries to spend?
- How does Space Billiards work, and does each asteroid roll hit every player?
- Which piece does a small meteor hit, and when does it damage anything?
- When should you decide to power a shield against a small meteor?
- Can a shield stop cannon fire, and can heavy cannon fire be stopped?
- Do you roll separately for each meteor or cannon shot?
- When pirates defeat several ships, is the damage rolled once or for each ship?
- Does one battery cover a whole card, or do you pay for each use?
- If your cannons blow up a large meteor, do the other players still get hit by it?
- If everyone else has given up, do Combat Zone and Sabotage still penalize the last player?
- Can more than one player land on the same planet, and can you land just to block others?
- Are stops at abandoned ships and abandoned stations optional, even for the last player?
- How can you empty a crew cabin before an Epidemic strikes?
- Do pirates take your crew?
- In a Combat Zone, do your cannons still count if you have no crew left?
- How many dice rolls does a Sabotage card make before it gives up?
- Are the beginner adventure cards marked with an asterisk used in the full game?
- How many Slaver cards are in the adventure deck?
- In the best-looking-ship award, which ships compete?
- When an adventure card is revealed, who acts first?
- Do solar panels reduce the battery cost of the System Test card?
Journey's End
Additional Ship-Building Rules
- Can any player flip the building timer onto the last space?
- Does the building timer start running when building begins?
- How are the adventure card piles made, and which one stays hidden during building?
- Can you look at the upcoming adventure cards while you build your ship?
- When you finish building, can you take any empty starting space, not just the lowest-numbered one?
- Where do building tiles you reject go, and can you set some aside?
- Once a tile is in your holding area during building, can you return it to the table?
- What happens to a ship piece that breaks a building rule?
- Does a building mistake change your starting order?
Aliens
- What happens to an alien if its life support system is destroyed?
- How much does an alien add to cannon or engine strength?
- Does a brown alien add speed when your ship has no working engines?
- Can a ship have two aliens of the same colour?
- Must life support be joined directly to the cabin it supports?
- Can you choose not to count an alien's bonus in combat?
- Can a ship with only alien crew keep flying?
- Do aliens count as crew members?
- Can an alien live in your starting cabin?
- Can you put a new alien into an empty cabin during a flight?
- How does a life support system keep an alien alive?
Giving Up
- When does a lapped player have to give up, right away or after the card is resolved?
- What do you score and keep when you give up a flight?
- Can you give up a flight voluntarily, and do you pay more afterwards?
- If you lose your last human crew member, must you give up, and what do you keep?
- If the last adventure card leaves no humans aboard, do you still reach the destination?
- If a meteor splits your ship in two, when must you give up and which half keeps flying?
- If several players want to give up at the same time, who decides first?
- If everyone else has given up, must the last ship finish the remaining cards to win the first-place reward?
- If you are the only ship still flying, are you immune to Combat Zone and Sabotage?
Winning the Trek
Rough RoadsExpansion
- How do universal connectors reduce engine strength under the Defective Connectors card?
- What counts as a hit for the Bad Luck Rough Road card, and when does it reroll?
- Do hibernating astronauts count as crew for the Union Ship card?
- How do Deja Vu and its reverse adventure work for open space, enemies and intruders?
- Can a large meteor be shot down when a small one comes first in a Meteoric Swarm pair?
- Can a rear-pointing cannon destroy a large meteor from behind?
- What happens if the bank runs out of a goods type you need to load?
Galaxy Trucker: The Big ExpansionExpansion
- In Evil Machinations, can an Evil Machinations card come up in the first round?
- How do you set up the adventure deck when playing with Evil Machinations?
- Do booster tiles boost only the component they are directly attached to?
- How much does a Cannon Booster add to a side-pointing cannon?
- Do you need the Big Expansion to play with five players?
- Can an engine booster be used again when two engines are attached to it?
- Can the Diplomat be used to escape meteor showers?
- When can you wake astronauts from stasis chambers?
- Do Slavers take astronauts sleeping in stasis chambers?
- Does a stasis chamber count as a cabin for Epidemic, and are its astronauts lost to Cosmic Rays?
- Do shield boosters destroy the shield when they are used?
- Does indestructible plating protect a whole side of the ship?
- On a 1A ship, are the random row and column coordinates based on the ship's orientation or the card's?
- On a Class IIA ship split in two, do large meteors or cannon fire hit both halves?
- Do you lose flight days when you stop at the Junkyard, and how many?
- When Bureaucracy players guess wrong, do they move back starting with the rearmost player?
- Does the Big Expansion remove tiles when you play with fewer than five players?
- In a five-player game, does the extra player pay reduced costs on the Junkyard card?
- When a Star Depot replacement swaps out a component, where does the old one go?
- When Star Depot adds a Luxury Cabin, does it come with crew?
- In Stardust, are loose connectors on two ships added together for flight-day losses?
- In Engine Envy, does the last player take cannon fire, and how is the shot decided?
- In Stiff Competition, do battery-boosted cannons count when deciding which ship is stronger?
- Which ships are uninsurable for the Lawyer alien's half-cost ability?
- When can you take out a loan?
- If you gain more goods than you have aliens, do you still get all the goods from Contaminated Goods?
- Who gets the creativity bonus on the Class 1A ship?
- What is the difference between a component being given up and one falling off?
- Can an engine booster be used on an engine in a Rough Roads dead zone?
Galaxy Trucker: Another Big ExpansionExpansion
- Does a Predator that eats explosive batteries cause an explosion when it runs into armed crew?
- How does the Class IV insurance cost work at the end of a voyage?
- Can you play with six players using both expansions?
- Do Intruder cards affect every player, or only the leader?
- How do you tell whether an intruder is left-handed or right-handed?
- Can a cannon block a small meteor, and does a cannon count as an open connector?
- Can you finish building and take a turn number before the timer reaches the final space?
- Can you put an alien in each cabin connected through a router module?
- Do Intruders count as enemies for the Diplomat alien?
- Do Intruders stop at an open connector that leads to empty space?
- Does the Swindler Support Team's ability take 1 credit off each lost component?
- Can Predators wake the sleeping astronauts in stasis chambers that they will eat later on their path?
- Does a sideways cannon protect the rows above and below it on the Class 2B ship?
- Can the Advertiser or Architect support team ability be used on a 3C ship?
Galaxy Trucker: MissionsExpansion
- In Hilarious Stories, can you use an engine booster to drop lost components and still finish with a full ship?
- How does the Directives mission work, and what does the plus sign on the card mean?
- Can a component in a dead zone hold goods, batteries or crew?
- On Club Gold Trials, how many Supercards do you set aside?
- Does Missions add a fifth player to the base game?