Norsemen Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Components
  • Basic icons
  • Tokens
  • Map board
  • Territory tiles
  • Jarl action board (double-sided)
  • Player boards
  • Leader cards
  • Scoring cards
  • Exploration card board
  • Exploration cards
• Setup
  • General setup
  • Player setup
• Important Concepts
  • Resources
  • Trading costs
  • Lore Icons
  • Spending Silver coins or VP
  • Coin Discount
  • The Ladders
• The Territories
  • Settlements, forts and thing actions
• Round Sequence
• 1. The Exploration Phase
  • Building your route
  • Exploration Phase Part 1
  • Exploration Phase Part 2
  • Scandinavia
  • Normandy
  • Adding additional cards to your route
• 2. The Expansion Phase
  • Performing Actions
    • 1. Place 1 jarl
    • Combined jarl actions on 2/3-players games
    • 2. Place 1 longship
    • 3. Perform a thing action
    • 4. Repair 1 or more longships
    • 5. Use the title space
    • 6. Pass
• 3. The Return Phase
  • Income, Majorities and Reset
    • 1. New playing order
    • 2. Lore majorities
    • 3. Settlement incomes and effects - Legendary tokens
    • 4. Return jarls, lawspeakers and longships
    • 5. Ports - Discard route
    • 6. Reveal new territory
• 4. End of Game
  • Final Scoring – Winner
• Appendix: Actions & Effects Descriptions
  • Jarl actions
    • Build Longships
    • Train Lawspeakers
    • Build Settlements
    • Build Forts
    • Buy Exploration Cards
      • Cost of exploration cards
  • Leaders
  • Scoring cards
  • Thing actions
  • Settlements — Income & effects
  • Exploration card bonus effects
• Slaves during the Viking Age — Note from the Designers

Components

• 1 map board
• 1 jarl action board
• 1 exploration card board
• 4 player boards
• 4 player helpsheets
• 1 rulebook
• 12 territory tiles
• 7 scoring cards
• 9 leader cards
• 128 exploration cards
• 8 jarl tokens
• 24 lawspeaker tokens, 4 of them legendary
• 28 longship tokens, 4 of them legendary
• 20 settlement tokens, 4 of them legendary
• 16 fort tokens, 4 of them legendary
• 12 scoring tokens
• 8 VP and playing order tokens
• 60 silver coins tokens of value 1
• 16 silver coins tokens of value 3

Basic icons

Wood, Sailing, Raid, Food, Fabric, Silver coin, Victory points (VP), Trade, Gems, Runes, Spices.

Tokens

Jarl, Lawspeaker, Longship, Settlement, Fort, Playing Order, Scoring, Silver Coins (value 1 & 3).

Map board

The map board has the victory points track, 12 spaces for territories of different ages, the Normandy territory printed on the board, and the playing order tracks.

Territory tiles

Each territory tile shows the territory symbol and name, its territory bonus VP, a fort space, a thing action space with its thing action effect, an assigned lawspeaker space, and a settlement space with its settlement effect.

Jarl action board (double-sided)

Shows the jarl actions, their primary action spaces, and their secondary action spaces.

Player boards

Each player board has an available lawspeakers space, jarl spaces, an available longship space, a damaged longship space, a title action space, trading costs, and 4 production ladders (lawspeakers, forts, settlements, longships), plus exploration card costs.

Leader cards

Each leader card shows a name, a starting settlement, starting silver coins, a starting effect, and an ability.

Scoring cards

Each scoring card shows a title, a requirement, scoring spaces, and bonus scoring.

Exploration card board

Space for exploration cards of three ages (green for age I / yellow for age II / red for age III).

Exploration cards

4 sets of 10 starting cards / 30 age I cards / 24 age II cards / 24 age III cards. Each card shows a name, a territory symbol, VP, damage or lore icons, a lawspeaker space, resources, a longship space, and a bonus effect. The 4 decks of 10 starting blue coloured exploration cards each have a distinguished icon for each deck.

Setup

General setup

1. Place the map board on the center of the table.
2. Place the jarl action board next to the map board. Use the proper side of the board inlays according to the number of players.
3. Shuffle the exploration cards (without the starting decks) into 3 face down decks according to their age (you can tell them apart from their front side color: green for age I, yellow for age II and red for age III). Place each deck in its respective space on the exploration card board.
4. Place the three blue territory tiles (Denmark, Sweden and Norway) on their spaces on the map board.
5. Shuffle the other territory tiles in three different face down decks according to their age. Then return one card of each age to the box. Only 2 cards of each age are used in a game of Norsemen. Reveal the two age I (green) territory tiles and place them on their space.
6. Then place the two age II (yellow) tiles on top of the two age III (red) territory tiles, forming the territory deck, and place it face down next to the map board.
7. Shuffle the scoring cards and reveal 3. Place them face up next to the board. Return the rest to the box. Only 3 scoring cards are played in a game of Norsemen.
8. Place the silver coins next to the board forming a general supply.

Player setup

A. Each one of you takes a player board, a starting set of 10 blue exploration cards (cards of a set share the same symbol) and all tokens of your chosen color: jarls, lawspeakers, longships, settlements, forts and scoring, VP and playing order tokens.

B. Shuffle your starting exploration cards into a deck and place it face down next to your board.

C. Place your 2 jarl tokens on the appropriate space on your board.

D. Place 3 longships and 2 lawspeakers on the "available longships / lawspeakers spaces" on your board.

E. Fill the ladders on your board with the appropriate tokens (from left to right: lawspeaker, forts, settlements and longships), always placing the legendary token of each type – the bigger sized token with a slightly different shape – on the bottom-most space.

F. Place 3 scoring tokens of your color next to the scoring cards.

G. Place your VP token on the VP track on space 5.

H. Randomise the players turn order and place your playing order token on the appropriate space on the turn order track on the map board. The 2nd/3rd/4th player gains 1/2/3 silver coins and 1/2/3 VP respectively.

I. Shuffle the leader cards and deal 2 leader cards to each player. Choose and keep 1 and place it next to your board. Return the rest to the box. They are not used for this game.

J. Gain the starting silver coins and starting effect (if any) of your leader. Place your starting settlement on the territory space matching the symbol of your leader.

Important Concepts

Resources

In Norsemen most of the actions and effects require resources in order to perform them.

You get resources mainly from exploration cards. When you have an exploration card in your route which has a longship on it, all its resources and lore icons on the resource space are available to you for each action and/or effect you perform as long as a longship is on the card. You do not spend them; you just need them to be available to you.

In that way, resources can be used any number of times as long as they remain available to you (through longships), but you still need a different icon of a resource for each number that is required by an action in order to perform it.

Example: Since there is a longship on this exploration card, you have 2 fabric available for every action or effect you want to perform that requires 1 or 2 fabric. If an action would require 3 fabric, you are missing 1 fabric, which you have to get from another exploration card or use a trade by paying 4 silver coins for it. If an action would require 4 fabric and you do not have another card that produces it, you cannot perform it since you can use trade only once per action/effect.

Trading costs

When performing an action or effect, you can use a trade in order to get exactly one resource icon you are missing by spending an amount of silver coins depending on the resource you buy (see costs in trade table below and on your player board).

You can use only one Trade per action or effect. Some abilities or effects may give you extra trades per action.

Lore Icons

Besides the icons on the resource space, you may also find lore icons on the top, left corner of some exploration cards. Icons depicted there are available to you as long as that card is in your route, regardless if there is a longship on it or not.

Spending Silver coins or VP

When you see these red icons you actually have to spend the silver coins or the VP in order to perform the action.

Coin Discount

Spend 1 less silver coin for each action, effect or trade you perform, when you see this green icon.

The Ladders

The production ladders on your player board, or simply ladders, are used when performing actions and effects that let you produce and bring into play more lawspeakers, forts, settlements and longships. Each type of token has its own ladder and each ladder has 4 spaces in a column with the top space being the first while the bottom space the 4th and last one. In between, you will find the costs in resources as well as a VP bonus. During setup each space takes a token, while the last space takes the legendary token of each type (the bigger one with a slightly different shape).

Whenever you perform a jarl action that produces a certain type of token - lawspeakers, forts, settlements and longships - you can advance any number of tokens on that ladder in any combination, as long as you have the total required resources to make those advances. Furthermore, you gain the bonus VP (if any) from each advancement you make. If after advancing a token it leaves the first (top) space of the ladder, it comes into play. Longships and lawspeakers come into play to their respective "available longship / lawspeakers spaces", while forts and settlement are placed directly on territories (these actions are described later).

Example: In order for this fort token to advance to the next space you need 1 raid and 1 sailing, and you get 1VP.

Example: Vasilis performs a build longships jarl action. He has available a total of 4 wood and 1 fabric. He decides to advance the longship on the top space on the ladder one space (the longship becomes available then), as well as the longship on the bottom space two spaces. The total cost of his action is 4 wood and 2 fabric. He uses a trade paying 4 coins for the missing fabric. He also gains a total of 4VP.

The Territories

Settlements, forts and thing actions

The territory tiles are referred to in the game as a territory. On territories you will start building forts and settlements on the appropriate spaces. Each player can have only 1 fort and 1 settlement on each territory.

When you have a fort on a territory, then you can send one of your lawspeakers to that territory (instead to the one on the exploration card or Normandy) at the end of the exploration phase (see below). You can't build forts on the three starting territories.

When you have a settlement on a territory, you will get the settlement income for this territory during the return phase (see below).

Each territory also has 1 thing action which is performed by using lawspeakers. During the exploration phase you assign a lawspeaker to the appropriate space, then later on the expansion phase you can use that lawspeaker to perform that territory's thing action. Again each player can have only 1 lawspeaker on a territory regardless if it has performed a thing action or not. Some effects allow you to move a lawspeaker. You can never move a lawspeaker that has already performed a thing action.

• Whenever a player builds a fort on a territory, all players who have already a fort there gain the territory's bonus.
• Whenever a player builds a settlement on a territory, all players who already have a settlement there gain the territory's bonus.
• Whenever a player performs a thing action on a territory, all players who already have performed a thing action there gain the territory's Bonus.

The starting territories do not have spaces to build forts, but all other rules apply to them.

Round Sequence

Norsemen is played through 5 rounds which are spread into 3 ages of the Age of the Vikings. Each round consists of 3 phases:

1. Exploration phase
2. Expansion phase
3. Return phase

1. The Exploration Phase

Building your route

During the exploration phase all players play simultaneously (without looking or interacting with their opponents). In the first part you start revealing and adding exploration cards one by one next to your board forming your exploration route (or simply called route), while on the second part you gain any longship bonuses and send your placed lawspeaker to the respective territories.

Exploration Phase Part 1

1. Reveal exploration card. Reveal the top exploration card from your exploration deck and place it next to your board, if it is the first one, or next to another card in your route for every following card.
2. Damage a longship every second damage icon (mandatory). Check first if a longship is damaged; you damage 1 longship for every second damage icon that is revealed during this phase. Move a longship to the "damaged longships space" on your player board. Damaged longships cannot be used until you repair them.
3. Place a lawspeaker on the exploration card you have just revealed (optional). Then, you may place an available lawspeaker and/or an available longship on the appropriate spaces of the exploration card you have just revealed (not on cards you have previously revealed).
4. Place a longship on the exploration card you have just revealed (optional).
5. Repeat 1-4 or stop if you like or must (see below). You may now reveal and add a new exploration card to your route following the same steps, unless you have no more available longships (all your longships are damaged and/or placed on exploration cards), you have reached the limit of 8 exploration cards in your route or you just want to stop.

If at any time during the game, you need or want to draw a card from your exploration deck, but it is empty, shuffle all your discarded cards into a new exploration deck and place it face down next to your board. Then draw a card from it.

Example: Dimitris is starting the exploration phase having 3 available longships and 2 available lawspeakers. He reveals the top card of his exploration deck and places it next to his board. The card has 1 damage icon, but since it is his first, nothing happens. He decides not to place a longship and/or a lawspeaker on it. He then reveals a second card to his route placing it next to the first one. Thankfully it has no damage icon. He places a longship on it, as well as a lawspeaker. He reveals a third card and adds it to his route. It has a damage icon, and since it is the second one, he has to damage a longship. He decides to place a lawspeaker on the card. Since he still has 1 available longship and has just 3 cards in his route, he can continue adding cards, but decides to stop at this point. He proceeds to the next part of this phase.

Exploration Phase Part 2

6. Move lawspeakers from exploration cards to respective territory tiles.
7. Gain bonus effects from exploration cards with a longship.

Once you are done with adding cards in your route (either by force or choice), you move the lawspeakers from the exploration cards to the territories. You have the following choice for each lawspeaker:

• Move it to the territory on the exploration card where you placed the lawspeaker.
• Move it to a territory with one of your forts.
• Move it to Normandy.

On each territory you cannot have more than one lawspeaker regardless if it is on the assigned or thing action space (exception to this rule is Normandy). Move any lawspeaker on an exploration card that cannot be placed on a territory to Normandy.

Finally, gain all bonuses (if any) from the longships that you have placed on exploration cards in your route (you choose the order as well as which to gain and which not).

Your exploration phase is over. Be kind and wait for your opponents to finish their own exploration phase. If timing matters resolve this second part in playing order.

Example: Dimitris has just finished the first part of his exploration phase. He now sends the lawspeaker on the Sweden card and the lawspeaker on the Denmark card to the assigned spaces of the Sweden and Denmark tiles on the map board respectively. Then he performs the bonus effect on the card with his longship on it and gains 1 silver coin.

Scandinavia

Scandinavia is one of your starting exploration cards in your deck and is not tied to a specific territory, but to all 3 starting territories.

Whenever you use Scandinavia to assign lawspeakers to a territory, you may send it to any of the 3 starting territories Denmark, Norway or Sweden.

Normandy

Normandy is a territory printed on the map board where you can send and activate more than 1 of your lawspeakers, and you can send lawspeakers here from any exploration card regardless of the territory of the card.

When you perform Normandy's thing action you either gain 2 coins or score a Title card (see details below).

If this is your first lawspeaker that performed Normandy's thing action, you move its token to the leftmost available circle space under the playing order track that is next to the Normandy territory. This is going to affect the playing order of the next round (see details below).

Adding additional cards to your route

Whenever you add an exploration card to your route outside the first part of the exploration phase, you may immediately place a longship from your "available longships space" on it getting its resources, activating its bonus effect (if any), and/or move a lawspeaker from your "available lawspeakers space" onto the assigned lawspeaker space of the card's territory or to Normandy. You may exceed the 8-cards-limit of your route, as well as ignore damage icons, when adding cards in your route this way.

2. The Expansion Phase

Performing Actions

During the expansion phase players take turns in playing order performing actions. During your turn you may do one of the following actions as long as you have not passed:

One of the following:

1. Place 1 jarl on a jarl action
2. Place 1 longship on an exploration card
3. Perform a thing action with a lawspeaker
4. Repair 1 or more longships
5. Use the title space
6. Pass

You may perform one of these actions multiple times during a round, but always one action during your turn (except for some "free" actions).

1. Place 1 jarl

Place an available jarl on a jarl action space and perform its action. If your are the first to place your jarl on that action, place it on the primary action space, if not place it on the leftmost secondary action space. Performing an action on a secondary space gives you a penalty or a lesser bonus, depending on the action. Your two jarls have to be placed on different jarl actions, regardless if you have placed them on a primary or secondary action space.

Combined jarl actions on 2/3-players games

In a 2/3-players game some of the jarl actions are combined sharing a common primary action space.

If you are the first to place your jarl on either one of them, place it on the primary action space leaning towards the action you want to perform.

Any other player has to place their jarl in this round on a secondary action space, regardless of which of the two actions they want to perform.

If you have placed your jarl on the primary space of 2 combined actions in order to perform an action, you can still place your jarl on the other action, but on the secondary space.

Example: Gina and George are playing a 2-players game. It is Gina's turn and she decides to perform an exploration card jarl action. She places her jarl on the primary space of the combined fort / exploration card jarl action (since she is the first placing a jarl token there) towards the exploration action and performs it, getting 3 coins in addition to her action. George, on a later turn, wants to perform a fort jarl action and places his jarl on the first secondary space of the action (since Gina has placed her jarl on the primary space of the combined action) and performs it. He gets 2 coins in addition to the action. It is Gina's turn again and she places her second jarl on the second secondary space of the fort jarl action (she has used the combined action, but for the exploration card side, so she is allowed to place it on the fort side). She gains 1 coin and produces forts.

2. Place 1 longship

Take 1 available longship and place it on an exploration card in your route that has no longship on it, gaining its bonus (if any and if you want to). Each exploration card cannot have more than one longships on it, and as long as it has one it, it grants you its resources for each action you perform.

3. Perform a thing action

Move a lawspeaker assigned on a territory to the thing action space of that territory and perform its action, as long as you have the resources required. Each player that has already performed this thing action in this round (has a lawspeaker on the territory's thing action space), gains the territory's bonus.

4. Repair 1 or more longships

Choose a number of damaged longships and repair them by paying 2 coins for each longship you have repaired. Move the longships you repair from the damaged space to the available space. You may repair all your longships in one turn or in multiple turns, as long as you can pay for the action. Longships stay damaged until you repair them, even if the round changes.

5. Use the title space

Place 1 jarl or 1 longship on the title space on your board to either gain 2 coins or to place one of your tokens on the leftmost available space on a scoring card, if you fulfill its requirements, and gain the VP of that space.

Each player can have only 1 token on a Scoring card, but you can have 1 token on each card.

You can use the title space multiple times in a round, but always using a different jarl or longship, and of course in different turns.

6. Pass

Instead of performing one of the actions mentioned before you may pass. If you cannot perform actions anymore you have to pass. You either perform an action or you pass. You cannot just skip a turn. After you pass, you no longer take turns during this round's expansion phase.

Once all players have passed, the expansion phase is over.

3. The Return Phase

Income, Majorities and Reset

The return phase consists of 6 Steps.

All players have to resolve a step in order for all players to proceed to the next one. Whenever timing matters resolve it in playing order.

During the return phase, you define the new playing order, score points for your lore icons, resolve income from your settlements, reset your tokens and your route and get ready to start the next round.

After the return phase of the 5th round, the game ends.

1. New playing order
2. Lore majorities
3. Settlements income and effects - Legendary tokens
4. Return jarls, lawspeakers and longships
5. Ports - Discard route
6. Reveal new territory

1. New playing order

Rearrange the playing order according to the order of the lawspeakers on the spaces under the playing order track, i.e. the player whose lawspeaker is on the first space becomes first, the next one becomes second etc.

If more than one player doesn't have a lawspeaker here, they keep their relative playing order as it is, behind those who have lawspeakers here.

2. Lore majorities

In Norsemen there are 3 types of lore – gems, runes and spices – which you get from exploration cards and settlement effects. During this step check out the majority for each type separately.

Count all lore resources with longships on the card and bonus lore on the left side of the exploration cards even without longships on the card. In addition there may be permanent lore icons from settlement incomes.

Players get points according to the following table:

	2-player game	3-player game	4-player game
1st	2 VP	3 VP	3 VP
2nd	1 VP	2 VP	2 VP
3rd	-	1 VP	1 VP
4th	-	-	0 VP

If you have 0 icons of a type you do not participate in its majority scoring and thus do not gain any points. In case of ties, the playing order acts as the tie-breaker.

Example: Gina, Dimitris and Leonora are resolving the lore phase. First, they compare their gem icons: Gina has 3, Dimitris has 2 and Leonora has 1, so they get respectively 3VP, 2VP and 1VP. Then the runes: Gina has 2 and Leonora has 1, while Dimitris has none, so Gina gets 3VP and Leonora 2VP. Finally, they compare their spices: Each one has 1 so they break the tie according to the playing order; Leonora gains 3VP, Dimitris 2VP and Gina 1VP. So, in total Gina gained 6VP, Leonora 6VP and Dimitris 4VP.

3. Settlement incomes and effects - Legendary tokens

In playing order resolve the income and effects from territories where you have a settlement. If you have settlements on more than 1 territory, perform them in the order of your choice.

During this step you also score 2VP tokens for each legendary token you have in play.

Example: It is the income phase and Daphne resolves her incomes. She has 1 settlement on Denmark and since she has 2 fabric, she gains a total of 3 silver coins. She also has 1 settlement on Ireland, but because she doesn't have the required sailing she only gains 2 silver coins. Finally, her special lawspeaker is in play which grants her also 2VP.

4. Return jarls, lawspeakers and longships

Return your jarl, lawspeaker and longship tokens back to the appropriate spaces on your board.

Damaged longships stay on the damaged space.

Only repairing them will get them available to you again.

5. Ports - Discard route

During this step, first you activate your ports. Each player starts by default with 1 port, but later some effects may give you more. There is nor marker for the number of ports you have, as it will be zero, one or two, but one most of the time.

When you activate a port, you may choose exactly 1 card from your route and place it on top of your exploration deck (even if it is empty). You can only choose an exploration card of an age that matches the highest age settlement you have or earlier, e.g. if you have an age I settlement, you can choose either a starting or an age I exploration card to keep from your route. More settlements don't grant you more ports. They just let you keep higher age exploration cards.

After activating your ports, discard all remaining cards in your route to your discard deck next to your board. You may look at your discard deck at any time.

Example: Stergios and Electra are resolving the port step of a round: Stergios has an age II Settlement and no extra Ports, so he can keep 1 starting, age I or age II card. Electra has an age I Settlement on England, which means she can keep up to 2 cards, starting and/or age I.

6. Reveal new territory

Finally, reveal the top tile from the territory deck and place it face up on the appropriate space on the map board. The round has ended. Proceed to the next round.

If the territory deck is empty and you cannot reveal a new territory, the game ends.

Example: It is the new territory step of the 3rd round. The players reveal the top tile of the territory deck and find Iceland (age II). They place it on the appropriate space on the map board. Round 3 has ended.

4. End of Game

Final Scoring – Winner

After the end of the 5th round, and since there are no more territory cards to add on the map, the game ends. Proceed to the final scoring of the game.

Get the bonus VP of each scoring card with one of your tokens as long as you meet the extra requirement of the card. You get only one of the two VP values, they are not cumulative.

Then gain the VP from your exploration cards. Finally, you get 1VP per 3 coins you have.

Final Scoring

1. Gain VP bonus from scoring cards
2. Gain VP from exploration cards
3. Gain 1VP per 3 silver coins

Add all your final scoring VP to the ones on the main board VP track. The player with the most VP is the winner of the game. In case of a tie, the player who is higher up in the playing order track wins.

Example: The game has come to its end and players calculate their final scoring. It is Ginas, the red players, turn. She has scored 2 scoring cards during the game: Foringi to score longships and Forstjori to score forts. She has 6 longships gaining 4VP for Foringi. Moreover she only has 2 forts and thus does not gain any extra VP from Forstjori. Her exploration cards give her 9VP. Finally, she has 14 silver coins left gaining 4VP from the coins.

Appendix: Actions & Effects Descriptions

Jarl actions

Build Longships

Produce longships using the longship ladder. If a longship leaves the ladder, it comes into play on the available space and you can use it in this round.

Secondary space penalty: Longships come into play damaged. Place them on the damaged space instead of the available space.

Train Lawspeakers

Produce lawspeakers using the lawspeaker ladder. If a lawspeaker leaves the ladder, it comes into play and you may instantly send it on the assigned space of ANY territory on the map board, as long as you do not have another of your lawspeakers on that territory card (exception to this restriction is Normandy).

When a lawspeaker is produced through a thing action or a settlement income, it will also be placed on any territory not already containing one of your lawspeakers or to Normandy.

Secondary space penalty: Lawspeakers who come into play are placed on your board on the available space instead of sending them instantly to a territory.

Build Settlements

Produce settlements using the settlement ladder. If a settlement leaves the ladder, it comes into play. Place it on the settlement space of ANY territory. Each player that has already a settlement on that territory gains the territory's bonus.

Each player cannot have more than 1 settlement on a territory card.

Secondary space penalty: Lose 3VP to perform this action.

Build Forts

Gain 3 coins and produce forts using the fort ladder. If a fort leaves the ladder, it comes into play. Place it on ANY territory's fort space (if it has one). Each player that has already a fort on that territory gains the territory's bonus. Each player cannot have more than 1 fort on a territory card.

Then you may perform this territory's thing action ignoring all costs and requirements (and without the need of placing a lawspeaker there).

Secondary space penalty: Gain 2, 1 or no coin, depending on the space you have to use.

Buy Exploration Cards

Gain 3 coins. Then draw the top 4 cards from a single exploration deck of your choice (age I, age II or age III) and keep up to 2 cards. For each of those cards separately, choose to add them either to the top of your exploration deck or to your route applying all rules. Return the rest of the cards on the bottom of their deck.

Secondary space penalty: On the first space gain 2 coins and draw 3 cards from a single exploration Deck (instead of 4) and keep up to 2, on the next space gain 1 coin and draw 2 card from an exploration deck and keep up to 2, on the last space you gain no coins and draw 2 cards from an exploration deck and keep up to 2. For each of those cards separately, choose to add them either to the top of your exploration deck or to your route applying all rules. Return the rest of the cards on the bottom of their deck.

Cost of exploration cards

The buy exploration cards action is the only jarl action that does not use a ladder. Instead when buying exploration cards you choose one of the 3 available decks (green, yellow, red) and the number of cards you keep - 1 or 2. The number of cards you draw from the chosen deck is determined by the action space you place your jarl on. The cost of the resources needed depends on the type of deck you drew from and the number of cards you kept according to the following:

• You need 3/4 sailing in order to keep 1/2 age I cards.
• You need 4/6 sailing and 1 food (in total) to keep 1/2 age II cards.
• You need 5/7 sailing and 2 food (in total) to keep 1/2 age III cards.

Leaders

Freydis Eiríksdóttir Starting settlement: Denmark Starting silver coins: 3 Ability: Once per round, you may flip an unoccupied exploration card in your route to gain 1VP and reveal the top card of your exploration deck. You may either add this card to your route or return it on top of your deck. During the return phase on the last step you may return the flipped card in your route on top of your exploration cards (this is additional to your starting port).

Cnut the Great Starting settlement: Denmark Starting silver coins: 2 Ability: When choosing this leader, draw 2 exploration cards from the age I deck (green) and place 1 of them face up next to Cnut. It stays here for the rest of the game and counts being in your route but without occupying a slot. It adds its damage (if any) on the first part of the exploration phase and you may place ships during the expansion phase on it as usual, but not during the exploration phase, when you are building your route.

Audr Ketilsdóttir Starting settlement: Sweden Starting silver coins: 5 Ability: Once per round, you have 1 extra trade for an action. This extra trade costs 2 coins less.

Harald Blåtand Starting settlement: Denmark Starting silver coins: 3 Ability: When choosing this leader, advance the first fort on the ladder 1 space ignoring all cost and place it on an available age I territory (and gain 1VP). During the game, whenever you perfom the thing action on a territory with one of your forts gain 1VP.

Sigryda Storråda Starting settlement: Sweden Starting silver coins: 6 Ability: Once per round, ignore the cost and requirement of a thing action performed by a lawspeaker.

Björn Ironside Starting settlement: Sweden Starting silver coins: 6 Ability: At the start of each age take the third territory of that age (the one that is not used in this game) and place it next to your board. You exclusively may use these territories as if they were on the map board. Gain 2VP whenever you perform a thing action and 3VP whenever you build a settlement on one of these territories.

Erik the Red Starting settlement: Norway Starting silver coins: 6 Ability: Once per round, when placing a longship you may place it on a starting or age I/II Exploration card in your route that has already a longship on it gaining the bonus effect (if any). As long as there are 2 longships on a card, double ALL resources and icons from this card's resource space.

Leif Eriksson Starting settlement: Norway Starting silver coins: 3 Ability: Once per round move an undamaged longship from any location (not the ladder) to an exploration card without a longship there, getting its bonus effect (if any).

Ivar Ragnarsson Starting settlement: Norway Starting silver coins: 2 Ability: Whenever you build a settlement on a territory, you may perform that territory's thing action ignoring the action's cost and requirements. Players that have a lawspeaker on that thing action do not take the territory's bonus.

Scoring cards

Foringi Requirement: 5 or more longships in play. Final scoring bonus: Gain 4/9VP if you have 6/7 longships in play.

Forstjóri Requirement: 2 or more forts in play. Final scoring bonus: Gain 5/11VP if you have 3/4 forts in play.

Logmaðr Requirement: 4 or more lawspeakers in play. Final scoring bonus: Gain 4/9VP if you have 5/6 lawspeakers in play.

Flotnar Requirement: Exploration cards in your route from 3 different ages. Final scoring bonus: Gain 4/9VP if you have 15/16+ exploration cards.

Hilmir Requirement: 3 or more settlements in play. Final scoring bonus: Gain 3/7VP if you have 4/5 settlements in play.

Smiðr Requirement: 1 or more legendary token in play. Final scoring bonus: Gain 6/15VP if you have 2/3 legendary tokens in play.

Audoefmadr Requirement: 3 or more lore icons of a single type in your actual route. Final scoring bonus: Gain 4/9VP if you have 4/5+ lore icons of a single type.

Count all lore resources with longships on the card and bonus lore on the left side of the exploration cards even without longships on the card. In addition there may be permanent lore icons from settlement incomes.

Thing actions

Sweden (starting): If you have 2 wood, gain 4 silver coins.

Denmark (starting): If you have 2 raid and spend 2 silver coins, draw the top card of the age I exploration deck and add it to the top of your exploration deck or to your route applying all rules.

Norway (starting): If you have 3 food and spend 1 silver coin, gain 2VP and advance a longship 1 space on the ladder gaining that space's VP (if any). You do not need to fulfill the ladders requirements.

England (I): If you have 3 food and spend 1 silver coin, gain 2VP and advance a fort 1 space on the ladder gaining that space's VP (if any). You do not need to fulfill the ladders requirements.

Scotland (I): If you have 4 wood and spend 2 silver coins, gain 2VP and advance a lawspeaker 1 space on the ladder gaining that space's VP (if any). You do not need to fulfill the ladders requirements.

Ireland (I): If you have 2 fabric, gain 1VP and advance a settlement 1 space on the ladder gaining that space's VP (if any). You do not need to fulfill the ladders requirements.

Rus (II): If you have 3 sailing, gain 2 silver coins and 2VP. Then you may advance 1 token on any ladder gaining that space's VP (if any). If you do this, you must decrease 1 token on another ladder (you lose no VP). You do not need to fulfill the ladders requirements.

Iceland (II): If you have 2 sailing, gain 2 coins and reveal the top card of your deck and add it to your route applying all rules.

Greenland (II): Gain 1VP, repair 1 longship and move a longship from any location (not the ladder) to an exploration card without a longship there, getting its bonus effect (if any).

Byzantium (III): Spend 3 silver coins to gain 6VP (once per thing action).

Sicily (III): If you have 3 raid, you gain 6VP. You don't get more VP if you have more raids.

Vinland (III): If you have 3 food and spend 1 silver coin, gain 2VP and advance a fort 1 space on the ladder gaining that space's VP (if any). You do not need to fulfill the ladders requirements.

Normandy (starting and colorless): Gain 2 coins or place one of your tokens on the leftmost available space on a scoring card, if you fulfill its requirements, and gain the VP of that space (same rules as with title space on your board apply).

If it is your first lawspeaker who performs this thing action, move it to the leftmost available space on the playing order track.

Settlements — Income & effects

Sweden (starting): Gain 1 silver coin. Then you may lose 1VP to gain 1 silver coin (once).

Denmark (starting): Gain 1 silver coin. Then gain 1 silver coin per fabric you have.

Norway (starting): Gain 2 coins. Then gain 1VP per fort you have in play.

England (I): You have 1 extra port to activate during the appropriate step of the return phase.

Scotland (I): During the return phase, you may keep one of your lawspeakers on the assigned space of the territory card it was on. Then if you have 2 raid, gain 3 silver coins (once).

Ireland (I): Gain 2 silver coins. Then if you have 2 sailing, gain 2 silver coins (once).

Rus (II): Gain 2 silver coins. Then gain 1VP per fort you have in play.

Iceland (II): Gain 1 silver coin. Then gain 1 silver coin per 2 food you have.

Greenland (II): If you have 3 Wood, gain 3VP (once).

Byzantium (III): You have a permanent rune icon. Gain 1VP for each different age exploration card in your route.

Sicily (III): You have a permanent gem icon. Gain 1VP per lawspeaker you have brought in play (equals the number of lawspeakers that are missing from the ladder, not including the 2 starting lawspeakers).

Vinland (III): You have a permanent spice icon. Gain 1VP per longship you have brought in play (equals the number of longships that are missing from the ladder, not including the 2 starting lawspeakers).

Exploration card bonus effects

• Spend the amount of silver coins shown as a cost to perform the effect.
• Gain silver coins equal to the number shown.
• Gain VP equal to the number shown.
• Gain the amount of VP shown for each token / resource / lore icon / card shown that you have.
• Gain 2VP for each pair of lore icons shown that you have.
• Reveal the top card of your deck and add it to your route applying all rules.
• Move a lawspeaker that has not yet performed a thing action (either from a territory or your available space) to an assigned space of a territory of your choice that does not has one of your lawspeakers.
• Advance 1 token of your choice 1 space on its ladder gaining that space's VP (if any). You do not need to fulfill the ladders requirements.

Slaves during the Viking Age — Note from the Designers

It is well known through history that slavery and human trafficing was a big part in the Viking culture. These slaves, called thralls, were seen as a commodity, owned but "higher class" people and being sold or traded. Although we have tried to honor facts and history in "Norsemen", we decided not to include slavery in any way in our game, since it is just a game and not a simulation of history and we are against desiging a game which helps players getting familiar with such a terrible fact.