Umbra Via

Umbra Via is set up by placing the main game board in the center, alongside the path tile deck and offering board. Each player takes a player screen, a set of bidding tiles, and a bag containing soul and energy flowers. In a two-player game, a third neutral color is introduced with its own supply of flowers to manage the neutral player tiles.

The main objective of Umbra Via is to be the first player to completely empty your personal tile of soul flowers and flip it over. Players achieve this by strategically bidding on, placing path tiles, and successfully scoring closed pathways during the summoning phases of the game.

Each round, four path tiles are revealed on the offering board. Players draw three flowers from their bag and use their bidding tiles behind their player screens to secretly allocate flowers to each of the four available tiles. Once everyone has locked in their bids, the screens are lifted, and the bids are revealed. Tiles are then ordered and placed onto the main board based on who contributed the fewest to most flowers, with tie-breakers resolved using the dedicated track.

When a path tile placement completely closes off a path, a summoning event is triggered. Players count the number of soul flowers on the completed path, and the player with the majority of flowers removes soul flowers from their player tile. Energy flowers and soul flowers used in the path are then cleared and returned to players' bags or the supply, depending on the rules for neutral players and standard players.

The game concludes immediately when a player successfully removes all soul flowers from their personal tile and flips it over. This triggers the end-game condition, and that player is declared the winner of the race.