How to Play Power Grid
Power Grid is one of the world's most popular board games, having spent many months in the top 10 of BoardGameGeek's Top Hundred Games list. The object of the game is fairly simple: Buy power plants and power as many cities as possible. The game itself is slightly tricky, but fun to play, and very worthwhile. Why not try a game and see if you like it?
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Instructions
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Setup and Purchase Phase
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1
Give each player one color of houses and fifty dollars. For each player in your game, select one of the six regions of the board to use. Take two houses from each player, place one on the zero on the house track, and the other on the turn order track.
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2
Set aside the brown backed power plants and the Step 3 card. Shuffle the rest of the power plants. Place the Step 3 card on the bottom of the Power Plant deck, and place the brown-backed 13 power plant atop the deck. Lay the other eight brown-backed power plants face up on the table in numerical order. You are now ready to start the game.
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3
Choose one of the cheapest four revealed power plants to put up for bid. You must start the bidding at the number written on the plant. Go around in a circle with each player either raising the bid or dropping out of the auction. Once only one player remains in the auction, that player pays his final bid to the bank and takes the power plant.
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4
Replenish the power plants by flipping up the top card of the deck. Choose another power plant to put up for auction, repeating Step 3. However, if you have already purchased a power plant this round, you may not choose a plant or make any bids. In this case, the next player in the turn order, who has not purchased a power plant this round, follows Step 3 instead. Continue this until each player has purchased a power plant.
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5
Purchase resources for your power plants, starting with the last player in the turn order chart. Each resource costs the amount written on the space on which it stands.
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6
Build stations, starting with the last player in the turn order chart. Stations cost an base amount written on the space on which you place them, which starts at 10. After your first station, any subsequent stations cost this base amount as well as a connection fee written on the pipe between your old station and your new station.
Powering Phase and End Game
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7
Power your stations by consuming resources on your power plants. Refer to the payment chart to see how much money you earn for powering a certain number of plants.
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8
Destroy any unclaimed power plants with a number no higher than the highest number of stations any player has built. (For example, if the leading player has 6 stations, you would destroy plants 06 and lower.) Check to see if anyone has built a seventh station. If so, enter Phase 2 by destroying the lowest power plant available for bid, and players may now build a second station per city in the next building round.
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9
Replenish resources to the board, in accordance with the chart. Always place resources to the rightmost available space for that resource.
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10
Re-do the turn order, placing the players with the most stations in front. If two players have the same number of stations, the player with the highest number power plant is first. Return to Section 1, Step 3.
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11
End the game at the end of the building round when a player has built at least 17 stations. Whoever powers the most cities that turn wins the game. If there is a tie for most cities powered, whoever has the most money wins.
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1
Tips & Warnings
Remember to pay a 15 base cost plus your connection fee when building the second station in a city.
Don't play in any cities outside of the regions you are using in the game. You may want to put something over those regions to remind yourself they are off-limits.
