Moonrakers: Overload Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Components
• Game Setup
  • Armory Board
  • Dispatch Board
  • Contract Setup
  • IOspheres and Advanced Action Cards
  • Ready to Play
• Gameplay
  • Advanced Action Cards
  • IOspheres
  • Flex and Head to Head Contracts
  • Additional Rules and Interactions

Components

• Advanced Action Cards x70 (10 per type)
• Rulebook x1
• Objective Cards x10
• IOsphere Tokens x25
• Ship Parts x37
• Contract Cards x20
• Miss Cards x10
• Crew Cards x20

Game Setup

Begin by setting up the base game of Moonrakers as laid out in its rulebook, with the following exceptions:

Armory Board

1. Add the Overload Ship Parts to the main deck of Ship Parts from the base game before shuffling and adding to the Armory.

2. Add the Overload Crew cards to the main deck of Crew from the base game before shuffling and adding to the Armory.

Dispatch Board

1. Add the Overload Contracts to the main deck of Contracts from the base game before shuffling and adding to the Dispatch Board.

2. Add the Overload Objectives to the main deck of Objectives from the base game before shuffling, adding to the Dispatch Board, and dealing 3 to each player. Players will secretly choose 2 and discard the 3rd to the bottom of the Objective Deck like normal.

Contract Setup

1. While dealing the 8 face up Contracts at the start of the game, set aside any Head to Head Contracts and any Contracts with more than 2 Hazard Dice. Shuffle the set-aside contracts back into the Contract Deck.

Note:

• For 1-2 players, remove all Head to Head Contracts from the game. Do not use IO / AI Crew in the Merc Deck.

Note: All expansions have their own marker in the bottom left hand side of the card.

If you wish to play just the base game of Moonrakers or without certain expansions, it's helpful to separate out the expansion cards. You can do so by looking for the expansion marker in the bottom left of the card.

IOspheres and Advanced Action Cards

Some of the new Ship Parts and Crew use tokens called IOspheres. Place these tokens in a pile within reach of all players.

The Overload expansion also introduces new Advanced Action Cards that will be explained further on page 14. Separate those cards by type and put them in reach of all players.

Ready to Play

Once the Overload cards have been combined into the base game's respective decks and the IOsphere tokens have been placed within reach of all players, you are ready to begin the game!

Gameplay

Advanced Action Cards

Overload introduces Advanced Action Cards to the game that can be gained in three ways:

1. Attaching a Ship Part that adds an Advanced Action Card to your deck.

2. Buying it directly from the supply with Credits.

3. When gaining a Bonus Card as a Contract reward, a player may take an Advanced Action Card instead of a random Crew or Ship Part.

As a reminder, when an Action card is acquired, it is added to the player's discard pile unless stated otherwise.

Types of Advanced Action Cards

• Reactor +: +2 Actions, +1 Card
• Reactor x: +3 Actions
• Thruster +: +2 Cards, +1 Action
• Thruster x: +3 Cards
• Shield +: Block 1 Hazard, +1 Action
• Shield x: Block 2 Hazard
• Damage +: +2 Damage, +1 Action

Note: If you are trying to take an Advanced Action Card that is not available, you may take any other card of the same type instead. This includes base game cards. For example, if a player was supposed to gain a Damage + but there are none available, they may instead gain a Damage 3 or other Damage card.

IOspheres

Some Crew and Ship Parts introduced in Overload have special abilities that revolve around collecting and spending IOsphere tokens. When a card instructs you to Add X IOspheres, place X IOsphere tokens from the supply onto that card.

Crew that utilize IOsphere tokens are initially played using 1 Action like normal, however instead of discarding IO Crew, they remain in play and are only discarded when no IOsphere tokens remain on their card.

Contract requirements are considered reduced at the moment a card is played. IO Crew which have persisted from a previous contract do not count towards the requirements of the current contract.

IO L1-ON (Crew card text): Add 3 IOspheres once per contract, remove 1 IOsphere to draw +1 Card. Do not discard until the last IOsphere is removed.

Flex and Head to Head Contracts

There are 2 new types of Contracts in Overload.

Flex Contracts

1. These Contracts have a new requirement type called Flex. (Flex icon) All Action cards, Crew, and abilities that reduce requirements can be used to reduce this requirement.

2. Flex and non-Flex requirements cannot be fulfilled by the same reduction. For example, a Thruster cannot at the same time reduce a Thruster requirement and a Flex requirement.

Head to Head Contracts

1. These Contracts work differently from base game Contracts. If a Mission Leader selects one, all players may decide to join without an invitation from the Mission Leader.

2. The Mission Leader decides the order of play, which can be simultaneous.

3. Players are not considered Allies and all cards that reference Allies cannot be used. Objectives regarding Allies, such as Utopia, cannot be completed on Head to Head Contracts.

4. Players compete to fulfill the most requirements. If players tie, the tie is broken in turn order starting with Mission Leader.

5. When playing with the Nomad expansion, players may travel from any sector to join a Head to Head Contract. When playing with the Binding Ties expansion, Faction Reputation is not gained from Allies during these Contracts.

Head to Head Contract Example

If a player reduces 3 Reactor requirements and 4 Damage requirements, then they have a score of 7 that other players must try and beat.

All cards that reduce either of those requirements or "any" requirement (see Moro Mada and The Gatling Laser as an example) count toward the total.

The example Contract shows: 7 Requirements Reduced. 2nd Place: 3 Reactors, 4 Damage, reward of 3 Credits. 1st Place: 3 Reactors, 5 Damage, reward of 5 Credits and 1 Prestige. (8 Requirements Reduced for 1st place.)

Additional Rules and Interactions

New Buy Phase Rules

Players may now freely discard 1 Crew or Ship Part from the Armory at the beginning of their buy phase. After their free discard, they may spend 1 Credit to discard a second card at any time during their buy phase, but not a third.

Action Card Referencing

Ship Parts and Crew in the base game and other expansions have special abilities that reference categories of Action cards specifically or broadly. With the addition of new Action Cards, here are some rules to follow to know whether a special is referencing a specific card or a category of cards.

A) Specific Card: When a special references an Action Card or list of Action Cards preceded by the word "a" it is referring to that specific card and it can not be substituted for another card from the same category.

Example: Replicator mk1 refers to these specific Action Cards: Shield, Thruster, Reactor, or Damage 1. (Discard 2 of the same card as 1 Action to play as a Shield, Thruster, Reactor, or Damage 1.)

B) Category of Cards: Whenever a special references a category of cards, it will do so without using the word "a" before the specified Action Card. This means the special is referencing any card from that category.

Example: Emulator mk2 refers to any Shield card: Shield, Shield +, or Shield x cards. (Play your first Shield without using an Action.)

C) Special Cases

• Duo 1000: Your first Shield played will count as 2 Shields of the type of card played. Duo 1000 allows you to play your first Shield card of any type twice.

• Shard Spear: When upgrading a Damage 2 you may choose a Damage 3 or a Damage +. You may trash a Damage and a Card from your hand to add a Damage of one tier higher into your hand.

Damage tier order:

• Damage 1 → Damage 2
• Damage 2 → Damage 3 or Damage +

Refer to the diagrams for more information.