Praga Caput Regni

The game is set up by placing the large central board in the middle of the table, populated with various tiles such as buildings, wall pieces, and technology advancements, alongside resource pools for gold and stone, and egg tokens. Each player receives a personal player board equipped with resource tracks, production wheels, and purple cubes representing their markers. Players also start with a standard allocation of gold, stone, and initial action tiles, preparing the play area for a euro-style management experience.

The main objective of Praga Caput Regni is to accumulate the highest number of victory points by assisting King Charles IV in developing the city of Prague. Players accomplish this by strategically erecting buildings within the city, constructing city walls, building plazas, advancing along university tracks, and contributing to the King's Road and major infrastructure projects.

On a player's turn, they select one of six available action tiles from the action wheel on the board. Depending on the tile's position on the wheel, the player may have to pay gold to acquire it, take it for free, or even earn victory points. Once chosen, the player performs the primary action depicted on the tile—such as mining, quarrying, constructing buildings, building walls, upgrading actions, or building bridges—while also benefiting from any inner wheel bonuses and potential extra actions unlocked through windows.

Scoring happens continuously throughout the game and during a final end-game phase. Players earn points instantly when upgrading tracks, completing building clusters around plazas, and utilizing special technology tiles. At the end of the game, additional points are awarded based on final positions on the university and knowledge tracks, unused resources, remaining eggs, and specific end-game scoring criteria tied to built structures and bonus tokens.

The game's end is triggered by the action wheel. Each time a player takes an action, the tile's slot on the wheel rotates, and a central cube periodically advances. Once the cube falls into a designated hourglass space on the board, a final round of turns is completed, leading directly into final scoring.