How to Play Splendor With 2-4 Players

Setting Up

Open up your pack of cards and tokens. The game comes with development cards, Noble Tiles, gem tokens, and gold tokens. The development cards come in 3 colors (green, yellow, and blue), and they’ll be the main deck you’re pulling from. You can separate the Noble Tiles and the gem tokens and put them in their own piles. The aim of the game is to get as many Prestige points as possible. You get Prestige points by purchasing development cards with your gem tokens. Whoever has the most Prestige points at the end of the game wins!

Divide the cards by color and arrange them in decks. The development cards come in green, yellow, and blue. Shuffle each color, then put green on the bottom, yellow in the middle, and blue on top. You can also look at the dots on the bottom of each card. Green has 1 dot, yellow has 2 dots, and blue has 3 dots.

Deal 4 cards from each deck, leaving them face-up in rows. Make a grid pattern with your cards to set up the game. Leave all 4 cards face-up so every player can see each development card. Make sure everyone can see all of the cards!

Shuffle and deal the Noble Tiles. Count up the amount of players you have, then add 1 extra tile. Put your Noble Tiles above your development cards in a line to arrange the Nobles. If you have any extra Noble Tiles, just put them back in the box.

Sort each token by color and put them at the bottom of the table. For 4 players, use all of the tokens. For 3 players, use 5 of each gem type but all of the gold tokens. For 2 players, use 4 of each gem type but all of the gold tokens. Put the gold tokens on the very end of the row of gems to separate them.

Taking Actions

Win the game by getting the most Prestige points. You can earn Prestige points by buying development cards and getting the attention of Nobles. The first person to get 15 Prestige points triggers the final round, but the person who has the most Prestige points at the end of the final round wins the game. Have every player keep track of their Prestige points on their own.

Start with the youngest player and go clockwise around the table. Figure out how old everyone is to start the game. Continue taking turns clockwise around the table as you play.

Choose from 4 different actions during your turn. When you first start the game, focus on taking gems to build up your stash. As you continue, you can work on buying development cards and getting Noble Tiles.

Take 3 different colored gems when you first start the game. You need gem tokens to purchase development cards, so it’s a good idea to build up your gem pile when you first start the game. Pick out 3 different colored gems and place them in front of you. If the gem tokens are running low, you can use this action to grab 2 different gems instead of 3.

Take 2 gems of the same kind if there are more than 4 in the stack. If you really need a certain type of gem, you can use an action to stockpile on 1 particular kind. However, if there are less than 4 gems in the stack, you can’t do this action. This action gets you less tokens than taking 3 different ones, so it’s a little bit of a desperate move. Try saving it for the end of the game when you really need to focus on buying cards and getting Noble Tiles.

Purchase a development card using your tokens. Every development card has a price on the top right corner, and you can use your gem tokens to buy it. Replace the card with a card from the stack on the left and pay by discarding the required tokens. Development cards give you Prestige points, so it’s important to stock up. You don’t get any new tokens with this option.

Reserve a development card if you can’t buy it yet. If there’s a development card that you really want but you can’t quite afford it yet, you can pick the card up and keep it in your hand instead of placing it in front of you. Once you have enough gems to buy the development card, you can use an action on your turn to purchase it and place it down in front of you. You can only reserve 3 development cards at a time.

Continuing Your Turn

Trade in gold tokens for any gems you need. Gold tokens are wild, which means you can trade them in and replace them with any gem token you’d like. You can do this at the beginning of your turn to build up gems and buy the cards you want. One gold token = one gem token.

Collect a Noble card if you’ve gotten their attention. Every Noble card has a combination of development cards that they’re interested in. Before you end your turn, take a look at each card to see if you have the combination to grab someone’s attention. If you do have enough development cards for a Noble, collect that card and put it in front of you. You can only use your development cards to attract attention, not any gem tokens. You can only take 1 Noble card per turn, even if you attract the attention of multiple Nobles.

Discard tokens if you have more than 10. At the end of your turn, count up how many tokens you have in front of you. If you have more than 10, pick some to put back into the gem pile before you move on. Remember, gold counts as a token too!

Begin the final round when someone reaches 15 Prestige points. If you get 15 Prestige points, let all the other players know. Let everyone who hasn’t had a turn that round take their turn before ending the game. This gives the other players a chance to get as many Prestige points as they can before the game ends.

Tally up your Prestige points to find out who wins. After everyone has taken their turn in the final round, count up your Prestige points from all your development cards and Noble Tiles. Crown the winner when you figure out who has the most points! Even if you got 15 Prestige points to start the final round, there’s no guarantee that you’ll be the winner. Other people may have gotten more points than you during the final round. If there’s a tie, the person who has purchased the least amount of development cards wins.