Airlines Europe

To set up, create a stock deck using the stock cards of the airlines in play, as specified by the rulebook based on the number of players. Shuffle three scoring cards into this deck: one roughly a quarter of the way through, one halfway through, and one within the bottom 11 cards. Each player starts with 8 stock cards from the deck and 8 million Euros in cash. Players then simultaneously choose two stock cards from different companies to form their initial share portfolio.

The primary objective of Airlines Europe is to accumulate the most victory points by strategically investing in airlines. Players act as investors, influencing the growth and profitability of various airlines across Europe through their actions, ultimately aiming to have the most valuable portfolio by the end of the game.

On your turn, you must choose one of four available actions. You can buy licenses by taking an airplane from an available airline, placing it on a connected route on the board, paying the cost of the lowest numbered space, and then increasing that airline's stock value by the amount paid. You may buy up to two licenses. Alternatively, you can play stock cards from your hand into your portfolio, either two cards from different companies or any number of cards from a single company, receiving 2 million Euros per card as a dividend. A third option is to trade cards from your hand for Air Abacus shares: discard one card to draw one Air Abacus share, or discard three cards to draw two Air Abacus shares. Finally, you can choose to simply take 8 million Euros from the bank.

Scoring rounds are triggered when a scoring card is drawn from the stock deck. The scoring card is passed to the player to the left of the one who drew it. During a scoring round, each airline is evaluated to determine majority shareholders. Starting with the highest-valued company on the stock market track, players receive victory points based on their share holdings (most, second most, etc.), as indicated by the numbers on the side of the board corresponding to the airline's current stock value. In case of a tie, points are added and shared evenly, rounded up. Players with no shares in a company receive no points. Additionally, Air Abacus shares are scored based on the current scoring round, with points increasing in later rounds.

The game concludes immediately after the third scoring card has been drawn and evaluated. The player who has accumulated the most victory points wins the game. In the event of a tie in victory points, the player who holds the most Air Abacus shares is declared the winner.