How to Play Guilds to Galaxies
Buy, build and charge rent — on nine boards, a century each.
Guilds to Galaxies is the property game, played across nine boards — one for every century from the 1400s to the 2200s. Buy what you land on or let it go to auction, complete a group, improve it in three even steps, collect rent when opponents land on your deeds, and trade deeds and cash with the other seats. Buying and building share a framework across the centuries; the track, the quarter spaces and the trading world change, from caravans and guild halls to routes between planets.
Ways to play Guilds to Galaxies
Two to four at the board
Play Guilds to Galaxies against the computer with one, two or three others at the board. Every seat is filled, so a game always starts.
Online with friends and family
Create a board, share the code, and play together on the same board. Online games count towards your rating and My Stats.
Picked up where you left it
Close the tab mid-game and come back to it — the game is kept in your browser, on the board you were playing.
No ads, ever
No advertising, no interruption, nothing to dismiss. The same promise as every Vanikar™ game.
🎯 Objective
Be the richest seat when the rounds are up — 20 or 40 — or, in a Long game, the last one left.
🎲 Guilds to Galaxies setup
- Choose a century — the 1400s through to the 2200s — and its board, tokens and groups come with it.
- Two to four play, and you go first. Empty seats are the computer’s.
- Every seat starts with the same cash and a token on the first space.
- The track runs round an oval of 28 to 48 spaces — it grows with the centuries — with four wide spaces set a quarter apart.
▶ How to play Guilds to Galaxies
- Roll two dice and move your token that many spaces round the track.
- Land on a holding, a transport or a works the bank still owns, and you may buy it at the price on it. Decline, and it goes to auction among every seat, you included: each bids above the last or goes out, and the last one in buys it at its bid.
- Land on someone else’s deed and you pay its rent — a holding’s bare rent doubled when its owner holds the whole group.
- Land on a transport you own with another of yours somewhere ahead, and you may ride on to it, past whatever lies between.
- A works bills a visitor by the deeds the visitor holds, at a rate that grows with the owner’s works — there are no dice in it.
- Doubles roll again, as often as they come.
- The news and post spaces turn the top card of a deck: money in, money out, a move somewhere, or so much for every deed you hold.
- When your move is done you may still improve a group you own outright, mortgage anything whose group has no improvements, and put a deal — deeds and cash — to another seat, which takes it or leaves it.
📖 Detailed guide
Buying, renting and improving
- Everything on the track that can be owned is bought from the bank at the price printed on it, when you land on it. Let it go and it is auctioned: every seat may bid, the visitor included, and the last one in buys it at its bid — or nobody bids and the bank keeps it.
- Rent is what you pay for landing on someone else’s deed. Hold every holding of a group, unmortgaged, and its bare rent doubles.
- Improvement takes three steps, made evenly across a group: a stall, a workshop and a guildhall in the 1400s; a pilot, a scale-up and a campus in the 2000s.
- You can only improve a group you own outright, on your own turn, and never two steps on one holding while another lags behind.
- A deed whose group has no improvements can be mortgaged for half its price, and lifted later. On your turn you may also put a deal to another seat — deeds and cash each way — which it takes or leaves; nothing improved changes hands, and a mortgaged deed goes still mortgaged.
Transports and works
- Transports are the routes of the century — caravans and ships, then railways, then lines between worlds. Rent rises with how many of them you hold.
- Owning a transport lets you ride from it to another of yours further round, and you are paid if that carries you past the start.
- A works — a watermill, a press, a grid, a swarm round the Sun — bills a visitor by the deeds the visitor holds, at a rate that grows with how many works the owner has. No dice come into it.
- Each works you hold unmortgaged takes a tenth off the cost of building, up to three tenths — the quiet way to win a long game.
The quarter spaces
- Four wide spaces sit a quarter of the way apart round every board: on most boards a start, a rest, a hazard and a hold, while the 1500s has a rest and two hazards and no hold.
- Rests pay you — the Village Well for every group you hold a deed in, Safe Harbour and the Observation Deck for every route, the Co-working Café for every network.
- Only some hazards send you to the hold, and what the hold is depends on the century: the stocks in the 1400s, a tax audit in the 1900s, a suspended account in the 2000s, cold sleep in the 2200s.
- Held is held: nothing about the dice puts you there or gets you out, and the 1500s board holds nobody at all.
Nine centuries
- Each board is a century, made of what the world owned and traded then — herds, fields, mines, workshops and markets in the 1400s; networks and orbitals at the far end.
- Every century brings its own tokens: cowries, sailboats, lanterns, crowns, gears, lamps, rockets, domes, planets — with houses, stars, crystals, pawns and counters besides.
- The shared buying and building rules remain familiar across centuries, while group colors, names and quarter-space effects change.
- Tap any space to read its deed — its group, its price, its rents, and whose it is.
🏁 How Guilds to Galaxies is won
The richest seat when the rounds run out — 20 or 40, as the game was set — wins: cash, plus what the deeds and improvements are worth. A Long game runs until one seat is left. A debt your cash cannot meet is not met for you: you sell improvements and mortgage what you like until the money is there, or give the game up.
❓ Guilds to Galaxies — frequently asked questions
How many players do you need for Guilds to Galaxies?
Guilds to Galaxies is played by 2–4. Seats you do not fill are taken by the computer, so a game always starts.
Where can I play Guilds to Galaxies?
In your browser at play.vanikar.games, on a computer, a tablet or a phone. Sign in with the same Vanikar™ account you use for the card games.
Is Guilds to Galaxies included in my subscription?
Yes. One Card Games by Vanikar™ subscription covers the card games, Chess & Checkers and the board games, and every game released after them.
Does Guilds to Galaxies have ads?
No. No Vanikar™ game has ever carried advertising, and none ever will.
How many boards does Guilds to Galaxies have?
Nine — one for every century from the 1400s to the 2200s. Buying and building follow shared rules, while holdings, transports, works, tokens, colors and quarter-space effects change.
How do I improve a property?
Own every holding in a group, with none of them mortgaged, and then improve on your own turn: one step at a time, spread evenly across the group, three steps in all.
What happens if I cannot pay?
Nothing is done for you. You sell improvements and mortgage deeds as you choose until the debt is covered, or you give the game up and leave the table. What you owe is paid the moment you can pay it.
How does the game end?
A game is set to 20 or 40 rounds — 40 is the default — and the richest seat at the end of them wins, cash plus the worth of the deeds and improvements held. A Long game has no limit: it runs until one seat is left.
Guilds to Galaxies is inspired by The Landlord’s Game, created by Elizabeth J. Magie and described in expired U.S. Patent No. 748,626 (1904). Vanikar’s artwork, board designs, eras, terminology, software, and additional gameplay features are independently created.
Go further with Guilds to Galaxies
Guilds to Galaxies: your first game, step by step
Learn Guilds to Galaxies: choose one of nine centuries, buy holdings, complete groups, improve evenly and build wealth before the round limit.
Read the guide Strategy · 3 minGuilds to Galaxies strategy: buy, group and build
Plan purchases and improvements in Guilds to Galaxies. Compare group completion, rent gains, cash reserves and the number of rounds still to play.
Read the guide Strategy · 3 minGuilds to Galaxies: cash, mortgages and recovery
Manage cash in Guilds to Galaxies, understand when a deed can be mortgaged, and see why forced improvement sales can disrupt an otherwise strong portfolio.
Read the guide Strategy · 3 minGuilds to Galaxies: transports, works and routes
Discover how linked transports change movement and how works interact with your total deeds and building plans in Guilds to Galaxies.
Read the guide Game guide · 3 minGuilds to Galaxies: explore nine centuries of boards
Explore Guilds to Galaxies from the 1400s to the 2200s: nine themed boards, changing holdings and tokens, and the shared strategy behind every era.
Read the guide History · 3 minGuilds to Galaxies and The Landlord’s Game
Meet Elizabeth Magie, explore the expired 1904 Landlord’s Game patent, and see how Guilds to Galaxies develops its own property-game design.
Read the guide