Lorenzo il Magnifico FAQ
191 questions players ask · Updated Nov 7, 2026 · Full rulebook
Setup and Round Structure
- Do players start the game with servants?
- Are the development cards placed before or after the pre-game setup?
- How many cards are in each colour deck at setup, and are they all used?
- In which direction are cards placed on the towers?
- How is a game structured into periods, rounds and phases?
- How can you tell which round it is, since there is no round marker?
- Do players take one action at a time, or all their Family Members at once?
- When does the actions phase of a round end?
- What if the supply of coins, wood, stone or servants runs out?
- When are Leader cards drafted during setup?
- Which effects are optional and which are mandatory?
- In what order do you resolve several immediate effects from one card?
- Can resources gained during a Harvest or Production be spent on another card in that same activation?
- What happens to Military Points beyond 25 on the track?
- Can a Family Member's value go below zero?
- Can I pass if I cannot or do not want to place a Family Member?
- What happens if only my neutral Family Member is left and I have no servants?
- Do card bonuses apply to the neutral Family Member?
- Can I decline a bonus when I take a card, such as an extra card or extra harvest?
- How do the cardboard promo tiles with an arrow work?
- When does the personal bonus tile trigger, and does it need a card?
- Can I discard played development cards to free up space?
Family Members and Action Values
- Can two neutral Family Members share a tower, or a neutral and a coloured one?
- Do I pay 3 coins to enter a tower occupied by any Family Member, including a neutral or my own?
- Can my coloured and neutral members both be in the same tower or Harvest/Production area?
- Can a neutral Family Member go in the Council Palace, and does it count for turn order?
- What is the neutral Family Member's value and how do I use it?
- Can I spend servants to raise the value of an action granted by a card?
- Can I spend more servants than an action needs, to get rid of them before an end-game penalty?
- If a discount applies to a card, must I take it?
- Can a modifier from a card get a low or zero-value Family Member to a high space?
Towers and Development Cards
- Can I place a Family Member on a tower if I cannot afford or take the card?
- Can I place on the 3rd or 4th floor just for the bonus if I cannot afford the card?
- Can the bonus on a 3rd or 4th floor space pay for the card or meet its requirement?
- Can a card's own immediate effect pay for it or meet its Military requirement?
- Can an immediate bonus from one card be used to pay for another card in the same turn?
- Is there a limit of six cards of each type?
- Do the numbers beside the Military track for green cards mean I lose Territories if my Military drops?
- Do I pay every resource shown in a yellow Building's cost?
- How does the Military cost on purple Venture cards work?
- Does a discount on wood/stone apply to both?
- Can I take a card whose immediate effect I cannot use?
- Does a card's immediate effect trigger only once?
- What does the question mark in a card's activation value mean?
- What does the Preacher's restriction on 5 and 7 spaces do?
- What does the Abbess card do?
- How does the Improving the Roads card work?
- Does the Preacher restriction apply to the top two spaces under an Adaptation tile?
- Can Pico della Mirandola's discount be used on every purchase?
- Can I gain the Captain's 2 Military Points before placing it if I need them to place it?
- How many cards can one player take from one tower in a round?
- On the blue General card, are points per two Military steps rounded down?
- Do colour-based excommunication penalties apply to a card on the 5th tower?
Taking Cards with Card Effects and Tokens
- Do I pay the 3-coin fee when a card effect lets me take a card from an occupied tower?
- Do I pay the 3 coins when a card takes a card from a tower with no Family Member in it?
- Must I pay 3 coins to take a second card from the tower where I just placed my Family Member?
- Do I still pay the card's cost when an effect lets me take it without placing a Family Member?
- Does the one-colour-per-tower limit apply when an effect lets me take a card?
- Do I activate the immediate effect of a card taken through another card's bonus?
- Do I get the 3rd/4th-floor space bonus when a card effect takes a card from those floors?
- Can I use a Council Privilege first to pay for a card taken with an effect?
- Does Filippo Brunelleschi waive the 3-coin fee for cards taken by effects?
- Does Da Montefeltro's resource-placement work for Buildings from the 5th tower?
Harvest and Production
- Can the -3 Harvest/Production space bring a Family Member below value 1?
- Can I place two of my coloured Family Members in the same Harvest or Production area?
- Can I use both Harvest and Production in the same round?
- Can several neutral members be in one Harvest or Production area?
- Do I have to use every building conversion in a Production?
- Must I activate every Territory or Building at or below my action value?
- Can resources from one Building pay for another Building in the same Production?
- Can a Building's exchange be repeated several times in one Production?
- Do permanent Harvest/Production bonuses from several Character cards stack?
- If a card gives a free Harvest or Production, does the -3 penalty apply or does my personal bonus fire?
- Can a card with a two-card activation trigger the same card twice?
- Can I raise a card-granted Harvest or Production above its stated value with servants?
- Do Farmer/Artisan bonuses apply to Harvests and Productions from special tokens and leaders?
- Is the missing arrow on the Production space a real difference from Harvest?
- Does a +2 pip on a card icon also boost a Production action?
Market and Council Palace
- Do Market, Council Palace, Harvest and Production spaces require resources to occupy?
- Can I put several of my Family Members in the Market?
- Can I discard several Leaders in one turn for Council Privileges?
- Does a card giving two Council Privileges let me take the same one twice?
- How does the Council Palace set next round's turn order?
Vatican Report and Excommunications
- In what order do players decide on supporting the Church?
- In the round 6 Vatican Report do I score faith VP even if I do not support the Church?
- At the final Vatican Report, should I support the Church if I have the Faith Points?
- Can I take the excommunication instead of spending Faith Points?
- Does an excommunication last all game, and can I be excommunicated several times?
- Does anything happen after the round 6 Vatican Report?
- Does a -1 coin excommunication reduce every coin source separately?
- Does the excommunication reduction also hit the personal bonus tile and leader abilities?
- Does the wood/stone excommunication reduce each source of wood or stone?
- If one card gives both wood and stone, do I lose one of each under the wood/stone excommunication?
- Does a resource-reducing excommunication apply to Council Privileges?
- With Santa Rita and an excommunication, which applies first?
- Does the -1 resource excommunication apply to each resource in a multi-resource instant bonus?
- With Ludovico il Moro and the -1 coloured-worker excommunication, which applies first?
- When does the excommunication costing VP per 5 VP apply?
- Does the period 2 -4 dice penalty on green and yellow cards affect their activation?
- Can Faith Points go beyond the top of the track?
- If I am past the fifth step at the end of period 3, do I still gain Vatican VP?
- Does the gain-one-fewer excommunication also reduce Military from Production?
- What do the three New Excommunications promo tiles do?
Leaders
- Can I play a Leader in the middle of resolving an action, such as during a Production or a card's immediate effect?
- Can I use a Leader action between other actions of my turn?
- Can I play a Leader the same turn I meet its requirements?
- Can I play several Leaders in one turn?
- Do I need to meet a Leader's requirements every time I use it?
- Do points not yet scored (like purple cards) count toward a Leader requirement?
- If a Leader requirement is a maximum, is zero allowed?
- Which Leader abilities are once per round and which are permanent?
- What happens to a discarded Leader, and can I discard a played one?
- Are Leader cards in my hand hidden from other players?
- Are a Leader's permanent abilities mandatory?
- Does Santa Rita double Council Privileges from a card?
- What does Ludovico Ariosto actually let me do?
- Can Character cards raise Francesco Sforza's or Leonardo da Vinci's Harvest/Production value?
- Can I raise Federico da Montefeltro's once-per-round value of 6?
- What does Sigismondo Malatesta's Leader ability do?
- Does Ludovico il Moro make every coloured die count as 5?
- Does Lucrezia Borgia's +2 stack with servants and fixed values like Federico's 6?
- What do the promo Leaders Raffaello Sanzio and Niccolo Machiavelli do?
- Is Palla Strozzi's ability once per round or an instant effect?
- Does Martin Lutero undo earlier excommunications?
End of the Game and Final Scoring
Lorenzo il Magnifico: Houses of RenaissanceExpansion
- In what order are bonus tiles, family tiles and leaders chosen in setup?
- What does bidding in the family tile auction cost?
- How does a special token showing a coloured card and a 0 work?
- How does the Harvest or Production special token work?
- Do Farmer/Artisan bonuses apply to special-token Harvest or Production?
- Do special tokens that take a card also give the 3rd/4th floor bonus?
- Can servants boost the value of a special token?
- Can special tokens be kept face up?
- If I pay a special token as a card cost, do I get its effect?
- Does a token placed on a card still count as one of my special tokens?
- If an excommunication cuts special tokens gained by one, does Marsilio Ficino still give a token?
- Are cards on the 5th tower coloured for colour-specific effects?
- Which card effects work on the 5th tower?
- Do base-game cards that take a card from any tower also work on the 5th tower?
- Should the 5th tower be used in a two-player game, and can I play without it?
- Where does the Adaptation tile start and does it move to the 5th tower?
- When can the Gonzaga family tile take its card?
- How does the Aragonesi family's extra Harvest or Production work?
- Can Penitent let me play Leaders with one requirement for free?
- Does a lightning (instant) effect trigger on a card taken through Gonzaga?
- How is the activation value of a '?' card set when it is taken via Aragonesi?
- What activation value do Building the Mill and Colonization give, and when do Library, Aqueduct and City Hall score?
- When do the Library and Aqueduct give their points?
- How does the brown Colonna Family Member work?
- Can I exchange Military Points for coins with the Este tile at any time?
- How does the Sforza family tile work with Leaders?
- How do the special faith tiles and Della Rovere work?
- Where does Army Deployment move my Military marker?
- Can I play a Leader or resolve a token between buying a card and its instant effect?
- Is Torquemada once per round and what does Erasmo do?
- Can I use Bramante's private action space more than once per round?
- Does Jacopo Salviati give an extra different Council Privilege?
- What does Building Catapults (card 137) cost?
- Does Malatesta let me take Invasion without spending Military?
- What does the Colonizzare card cost?
- What must I have to play Lucia de Narni?
- Can Orsini rewards be collected twice?
- Must I place the River Port special token immediately?
- Can a token on River Park trigger an infinite loop?
- Can the 5th tower and new cards be used at any player count?
- What does 'only you can use THIS action space' on a new Leader mean?
- Does a blank die on a token or Leader ignore die value?
- Does Abtei's effect also trigger the personal bonus?
- For a '?' cost, how many points can I pick when activating a yellow card?
- Can Houses of Renaissance be used modularly?
Lorenzo il Magnifico: The Pazzi Conspiracy Kickstarter EditionExpansion
- Can the interactive Pazzi cards target one specific opponent?
- What happens to Artisan Apprentice and Laborer in a 2-player game?
- When a Pazzi card makes opponents pay Military Points to me, do they gain them?
- What do 'pay' and 'give' mean on Siege Tower and Thieves' Guild?
- Can an opponent with one coin pay Thieves' Guild's coin option, and can VP go negative?
- With Santa Rita, how do Raid, Invasion and Occupying a Territory pay?
- When does the church support check happen relative to Gonzaga?
- Does Scientific Research still require paying costs, and can servants raise its value?
- Are harvest effects mandatory, including negative ones?
- With an opponent's Breeder card, do my bonuses and its +1 apply?
- Can Embassy copy a Bishop, and can that loop?
- Does Tainted's doubled floor bonus work on a card from the fifth tower?
- When a Fanatics' Town pull lands in an occupied tower, do I get floor rewards?
- In what order do Sulphurous Area and Rural Village activate?
- Does an Orsini set bonus trigger again when I rebuild a set?
- Does Town Church count only my own Leaders?
- Can VP, Faith or Military go below zero?