The base game has 208 project cards, and a new player can feel buried by them. The good news is that every card is built the same way. Once you know where to look, a card you have never seen tells you everything in a few seconds. This lesson walks through a card from corner to corner, using the current FryxGames rulebook.
Top left: the cost
The number in the upper left corner is what you pay to play the card from your hand. Remember that you already paid 3 M€ to buy it into your hand during research, so its true price is the printed cost plus 3.
Some blue cards in play give you discounts, and two resources help you pay:
- Steel pays 2 M€ each, but only toward cards with a building tag.
- Titanium pays 3 M€ each, but only toward cards with a space tag.
You can mix M€ with steel or titanium, but you never get change for overpaying.
Next to the cost: the requirement
Not every card has one. When it does, it sits beside the cost and comes in a few kinds:
- A minimum, such as oxygen at least 5%. The card waits until Mars is far enough along.
- A maximum, such as oxygen at 9% or lower. The card only works early, and the window can close.
- Tags or production you must have, such as titanium production.
The requirement only matters at the moment you play the card. If oxygen passes the limit later, the card stays in play and keeps working.
There is one more hidden requirement: you must be able to do what the card says. A card that lowers your own energy production needs you to have energy production. The rulebook lists three exceptions. You may still play a card that raises a parameter already at its goal, adds resources you have nowhere to keep, or removes red-bordered resources you cannot or do not want to take.
Top right: the tags
Each card has 0 to 3 tags. Tags have no rules of their own. They matter because other things count them: discounts, requirements, milestones, awards, and other cards. The base game tags are building, space, power, science, Jovian, Earth, plant, microbe, animal, city, and event.
Two tags do extra work. Building lets you pay with steel, and space lets you pay with titanium.
The bottom panel: what happens now
The lower panel shows the immediate effects. Two visual rules cover most of it:
- A brown box means production. A plant symbol in a brown box raises your plant production one step. The same symbol without the box gives you plants once.
- A red border means any player. You choose who it hits, and you can choose yourself. Removing red-bordered resources is optional, and you may do it partly. Lowering red-bordered production is not optional: if no opponent has that production, you lower your own or you cannot play the card.
Tiles shown on a card follow the normal tile rules. If a tile cannot be placed, you still play the card and skip that part.
If you see a star, read the text in parentheses. It explains an exception to the normal rules, and that text is the final word on how the card works.
The three colors
The color of the frame tells you where the card goes after you play it.
| Color | Kind | After you play it |
|---|---|---|
| Green | Automated | Stacked face up with only the top row showing. Its tags still count. |
| Blue | Active | Laid out with the top panel showing, because it keeps working. |
| Red | Event | Turned face down in your event pile. Its tags counted only while you played it. |
Blue cards: effects and actions
A blue card’s top panel has a blue ribbon. Inside it is either an effect, which is always on, or an action, marked with a red arrow. An action costs whatever sits left of the arrow and gives what the arrow points to. You may use each action once per generation, and you mark it with a player cube so nobody forgets.
Victory points
A VP symbol on a card is ignored during play and counted at the end. Some cards show a flat number. Others score from resources collected on the card itself, such as animals, so they grow as you use their actions. A few cards are worth negative points, so check before you assume every card helps your score.
Corporations use the same language
Your corporation card is read the same way. It shows your starting M€, resources, and production, and some corporations add an effect, an action, or a fixed first action. Our explainer on the tableau covers why the row of cards in front of you becomes the story of your game.
A five-second read
When a new card comes into your hand, read it in this order:
- Cost plus 3. Can I afford it soon?
- Requirement. Can I play it now, later, or never?
- Tags. Does it pay with steel or titanium, or count toward something?
- Effect. Brown box or not? Red border or not?
- Color and points. Does it keep working, and does it score?
After a game or two, this takes a glance.
Next lesson
Your First Three Games of Terraforming Mars
Next, your first three games. We cover the rules slips almost every new table makes, so you can catch them before they cost anyone points.
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