How to play Tanggu. Vale of Ten Suns

Rules

Ten suns rise from Tanggu, one each round. Each sun has three parts, shown at the top of the table: Seek, Act, Stir.

1 · Seek

Two spirits per keeper come down into the vale. In turn order, each keeper marks one with their seal; then, in reverse order, each marks a second. The keeper who chose last chooses twice in a row.

2 · Act

In turn order, each keeper takes a whole turn, doing any of these as often as they like:

• Release a marked spirit. It leaves beads according to its phase (see below) and goes to the discard.
• Befriend a marked spirit: it goes to your hand. There is no hand limit.
• Summon a spirit from your hand by paying its cost in beads. Nobody gives change, and every bead you pay must be needed. Its on arrival effect happens at once.
• Send home a spirit in your sanctuary by paying beads equal to the number of the sun. This only frees its place.

You must release or befriend both of your marked spirits before you end your turn.

Cards are controls: click a card to do what its button says. Hover or focus any card to read it in full at the side. On a touch screen the first tap shows the card and the second plays it.

3 · Stir

In turn order, each keeper stirs their spirits: every each sun effect happens once, in whatever order its keeper likes. None may be skipped, though a few say “you may”.

A spirit cannot arrive if its on arrival effect has nothing to work on; such cards say what they need.

Limits

• Sanctuary: one place per sun that has risen. Under the third sun you may have three spirits.
• Beads: you may hold four. Cinnabar is worth 1, jade 3, gold 6. If you ever hold more, you choose which to leave behind.

Ending

The game ends when the sun sets on any keeper with 60 merit, or when the tenth sun sets. Most merit keeps the vale; a tie goes to the fuller sanctuary, and after that it is shared. Later seats start with a little more merit, because they choose later.

The five phases

• Fire leaves 3 cinnabar · cheap, quick, cinnabar
• Water leaves 1 jade · jade and its worth
• Wood leaves 1 cinnabar + 1 jade · wind, cards, echoes
• Earth leaves 4 cinnabar · gold and hard bargains
• Metal leaves 1 gold · rare, costly, decisive

Almanac

All seventy spirits: fifteen each of Fire, Water, Wood and Earth, and ten of Metal. There is one of each.

About this edition

Tanggu (汤谷) is the valley of the suns in the Classic of Mountains and Seas: ten suns bathe there and take turns crossing the sky from the Fusang tree. This is an unofficial fan edition of The Vale of Eternity by Eric Hong, published by Mandoo Games. The rules, and the cost and effect of each of the seventy cards, follow that game; the four elements plus dragons have become the five phases. The spirits, their names, the wording and the paintings are this edition’s own, drawn mostly from Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Indian and Balinese stories and from the peoples of the Americas. Bots are labelled, see only what a keeper in their seat would see, and choose from the same legal moves.