Moctezuma's Revenge! - Rules

MOCTEZUMA'S REVENGE
by Seth Jaffee
A game of research and exploration for 2-6 players

Overview:
At the height of the Aztec empire, great temples were built for the Kings. When their time had come, the Kings were entombed in their temples to be revered forever, surrounded by great treasures of the Aztec people! While researching the temples it’s easy to make off with Aztec treasure, but some of the kings are cursed!

Research the temples and collect treasure, but beware of cursed treasure – it’ll count against you! Also, some temples contain clues to the whereabouts of the fabled lost City of Gold! Find all the clues and lead the way to El Dorado!

Components:
1 Game board with spaces for 10 temple decks, as well as a chart for Aztec king names and spaces for curse chits.
16 Curse chits – 7 “Cursed!” And 9 “Safe”
10 Temple decks of 11 cards each, labeled with a number (1-10) and with a VP value (5/3/3/2/2/2/1/1/1/1/1)
10 Name cards – 7 with names of Aztec kings, and 3 that indicate Clue temples
6 Researcher pawns in 6 different colors
1 pad of Record sheets

Setup:
Shuffle the Name cards face down and distribute 1 to each Temple deck. Shuffle the temple decks separately and place them in the 10 temple locations on the board.

Mix the Curse chits and distribute them face down to the 15 Curse Chit spaces on the board (next to the names of the Aztec kings).

Each player chooses a player color and places the Researcher of his color on the Library space.

Randomly determine who will play first. Play will continue clockwise around the table.

Turns:
On your turn you will have 5 Action points to spend. The actions you can do are:
Move:
1 action: Move your Researcher to an adjacent location.
Research Kings (at Library):
2 actions: Peek at 2 face down Curse chits.
3 actions: Peek at 5 face down Curse chits.
Explore Temple (at a temple):
2 actions: Draw 2 temple cards. Keep 1 and put the rest on the bottom of the deck.
3 actions: Draw 5 temple cards. Keep 1 and put the rest on the bottom of the deck.
* Note: you may never keep the Name card from a temple deck.
After each player has had 1 turn, flip 1 Curse chit face up (start with the first column of chits, turning up the topmost face down chit, then moving to the 2nd column, and finally Moctezuma’s 3rd chit).

Game end:
When Moctezuma’s 3rd chit is turned face up, the game is over and scores are tallied. Determine which treasure cards come from a Cursed temple, which come from a Safe temple, and which come from a Clue temple.

Each temple card from a Safe temple scores the number of VPs on the card. For each treasure card from a Cursed temple, subtract the VP value on the card from your score. Double the points scored or subtracted from the temples of Moctezuma I and Moctezuma II. All treasure cards from Clue temples are worth zero points, but if a player has at least 1 treasure from each Clue temple, that player scores a 12 point bonus for finding the City of Gold.

The player with the most points is the winner! In case of a tie, the tied player with more total treasure cards is the winner. If still tied, the players in question share the victory.