Louis XIV: The Favourite
Louis XIV: The Favourite Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Components
- 4 Favourite personal boards (1 per colour)
- 1 Favourite marker
Setup
Each player receives the Favourite board in their colour and places it in front of themselves, where their opponents can see it. Then they take one of their influence markers (the wooden cylinders) from the general supply and place it on one of the 4 spaces on their Favourite board.
During the game, a player may have at most 1 marker on each of the 4 spaces of their Favourite board. Each of the 4 spaces of the Favourite board, when activated (that is, when an influence marker is on it), provides a privilege that can be used in one of the 4 phases of the turn.
Gameplay
The markers placed on the Favourite board introduce variations to the game in Phase 1 (Revenue) and Phase 3 (Evaluation) of each turn.
Phase 1: Revenue
After revealing the card from the money deck and placing the Louis XIV marker on the character indicated accordingly, place the Favourite marker on the character located opposite Louis's.
EXAMPLE: if Louis is on character 3, place the Favourite on character 1.
Next, before dealing the 5 influence cards to each player, in turn order starting with the starting player, each player may, if they wish, move as many influence markers as they want (that is, from 1 to 4) from their Favourite board to their personal reserve. By doing so, however, although they will have more markers available to place on the character tiles, the corresponding privilege associated with the space of the Favourite board where the marker was placed will no longer be available for the current turn (see below).
Phase 3: Evaluation
The player with the most influence markers on the character tile with the Favourite receives, in addition to the character's privilege, 2 influence markers of their own colour from the general supply and, for each of them, decides immediately whether to place it in their personal reserve or on an empty space of their Favourite board. If there are not enough markers in the general supply, the player may decide to take them from their personal reserve in order to place them on the empty spaces of the Favourite board.
Each other player who has placed at least one influence marker on the character with the Favourite receives, in addition to the character's privilege, 1 influence marker of their own colour from the general supply, deciding immediately whether to place it in their personal reserve or on an empty space of their Favourite board. Here too, if there are no more markers in the general supply, the player may decide to take one from their personal reserve in order to place it on one of the empty spaces of the Favourite board.
In case of a tie for first place, all players who have placed at least one influence marker on the character with the Favourite still receive 1 influence marker from the general supply and decide immediately whether to place it in their personal reserve or on an empty space of their Favourite board.
Favourite Privileges
During their turn, each player may, if they wish, activate the Favourite privilege associated with the phase of the turn in progress. To do so, there must be an influence marker on the corresponding space of their Favourite board. If the player decides to activate the privilege, the marker must be removed and returned to the general supply.
The privileges are:
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Phase 1 – Revenue: after they have been dealt to everyone, you may discard as many influence cards (green back) from your hand as you wish, drawing the same number of replacements from the deck.
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Phase 2 – Influence: after placing influence markers on a character by playing the appropriate influence card, you may move those same markers along a diagonal to any character tile, that is, "jumping" over the tiles in between. The privilege applies to a single influence card.
EXAMPLE: markers may be moved directly from tile 12 to tile 1 or to tile 7.
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Phase 3 – Evaluation: by playing a plot card (red back), you may place one additional influence marker (that is, you may take 2 from the general supply and 3 from your personal reserve).
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Phase 4 – Missions: you may keep up to 3 mission tokens for the next turn instead of only 1.
End of Game
At the end of the game, every 2 influence markers left on your Favourite board entitle you to draw one extra banner (so up to a maximum of 2 banners, if 4 markers remain on the Favourite board).