Witchstone

To set up Witchstone, place the central board in the middle of the table and populate its crystal ball locations with random purple action tokens, leaving the center spot empty. Lay out bonus and objective cards in their designated spaces, and prepare the pentagram and track markers. Each player takes a cauldron player board, filling its interior bubbles with blue crystal tokens and placing a black crystal in the center. Players also receive their witch meeples, marker cubes, and a hidden supply of five random action tiles behind a player screen, replenishing their selection at the end of each round.

The main objective of Witchstone is to accumulate the highest total of victory points by the end of the game. Players act as powerful witches and wizards weaving a magical network of energy across the central board. Success relies on spreading your influence, strategically placing crystals, expanding witch paths, and fulfilling secret or public objectives to outscore your opponents.

A player's turn consists of taking one of their five hidden action tiles and placing it onto an empty space on their cauldron board. Each tile features two action symbols. Placing the tile immediately triggers those two actions. If the newly placed tile connects matching symbols with adjacent tiles already on your cauldron, you chain those actions, allowing you to repeat them for even greater effect. After resolving all triggered actions, you draw a replacement tile from your reserve to maintain your hand size.

Scoring happens throughout and at the end of the game. You gain points by connecting locations on the main board with energy paths, moving witches along tracks, forming pentagram patterns, clearing crystals from your cauldron, and advancing on various bonus markers. Additional points are awarded at the game's conclusion based on fulfilled objective cards and remaining resources.

The game triggers its conclusion after 11 complete rounds, corresponding to when the players' supply of action tiles is exhausted and no more replacements can be drawn. Once the final round ends, players proceed to final scoring by tallying points from all accumulated bonuses, tracks, and objective cards to determine the ultimate winner.