About the Game

Where can I buy the game?

Politeia has been licensed and can no longer be offered at The Game Crafter.

What makes Politeia unique?

The two distinguishing features of Politeia are the mancala mechanic for action selection and the stacked area majority mechanic for the presence on the map. The former gives the players plenty of opportunities to chain actions, choose between few cheap actions or many expensive actions and to block each other from attractive actions. The latter lets the players manipulate citizens to get majority in the right city at the right time. The Persia/Hades mechanic is also unique as you want presence on the map to get income but also want the Persians to attack you to convert your citizens into victory points.

About the Rules

How is the game best taught to others?

Start with overall economic flow and explain how income move talents to the hand, from where they may be placed on the board and generate more income until they eventually die in battle and generate victory points. Also explain how city majorities work, particularly how the top citizen breaks ties, and what happens when the Persians enter the map. Then move on to the action selection, starting with the four groups and proceeding with the detailed actions within each group. Finally explain the mancala mechanic for selecting and paying for actions.

What happens if Persia attacks a city where they can't get majority? Do they skip the city and attack the next instead?

A Persian attack always removes the leader first and only then the majority is checked. The Persians only skip a city if there is a Persian there already.

Can a city be both populated and adjacent, e.g. can you grow a populated city adjacent to another populated city?

No, a city is either populated (has a citizen) or adjacent (next to a city which has a citizen).

Does the resource color really matter?

Yes, there are several actions where you may only use one resource per color so having many resources of only one color gives you less powerful actions.

Do you pay or receive for all actions you select before you execute them?

No, you complete one action before taking the next and this includes paying or receiving talents for the selected action and paying or receiving resources for taking the action.