How to Play Forbidden Stars

How to play Forbidden Stars: the quick explanation

Forbidden Stars is a 2015 asymmetric conquest board game from Fantasy Flight Games for two to four players, set in the Warhammer 40,000 universe. Each player commands one faction—the Ultramarines Space Marines, Evil Sunz Orks, Craftworld Iyanden Eldar or World Eaters Chaos Space Marines—and fights for objectives placed across a modular star-system map.

Every round follows three phases: Planning, Operations and Refresh. During Planning, players secretly place four orders each on systems. During Operations, they resolve their accessible orders to deploy units, gain assets, buy upgrades or attack. During Refresh, players collect objective tokens from friendly worlds, earn materiel, rally routed units and process Warp Storms and events.

You win by collecting your own objective tokens equal in number to the players. In a two-player game, two objectives are enough; in a four-player game, four are needed. If nobody meets the requirement by the end of round eight, the player with the most collected objectives wins under the official tie-breakers.

In short, this is a game of hidden order timing and objective control, not a game won by the largest army alone. Our Forbidden Stars game hub covers factions, edition history and out-of-print buying considerations; the companion Forbidden Stars strategy guide develops tactical decisions around objective timing, order stacks, combat and upgrades. This article teaches the complete core gameplay loop, including the order-stack rule, deploy restrictions, combat cards and morale, Warp Storms and the official 2016 errata.

Source priority: use Fantasy Flight’s Learn to Play for the teaching sequence, the Rules Reference for precise legality, and the version 1.1 FAQ/errata from August 17, 2016 to resolve changed text. The Rules Reference takes precedence over Learn to Play; a card or faction sheet takes precedence over the reference when they directly conflict.

The one-page Forbidden Stars rules overview

1. Setup: build the modular map and faction forces

Choose two to four distinct factions and give each player their matching faction sheet, unit miniatures, plastic structures, control tokens, orders, combat deck, upgrade cards and event deck. Each player claims their Initial Forces listed on the reverse of their faction sheet and starts with the indicated materiel amount—six in the published initial setup.

Randomly select the first player using the participants’ structure markers. Each player receives a system tile with their faction icon. Arrange the remaining system tiles using the official player-count construction procedure, placing initial units and structures and the faction-specific objective tokens as directed. The order in which tiles are selected and placed matters, so do not simply scatter all twelve tiles at random. The objective markers are positioned during setup and remain visible by faction.

The official Rules Reference specifies distributing each player’s objective tokens to opponents and positioning them on the allowed system-tile spaces, with restrictions on the placement sequence. That is why a game can already contain meaningful geographic threats before anyone has placed an order. Do not assume your own objectives will start on your homeworld or that collecting another faction’s objectives helps your victory total.

Place Warp Storms along allowed system-tile edges according to setup. Prepare the round track on round one and separate the shared asset-token pools, dice and structures. For a first game, use the suggested faction combinations in the publisher guide; the setup diagrams help ensure everyone gets reasonable initial conditions.

For exact tile assembly, objective-token distribution and initial placements, consult the Rules Reference, Setup section. This article explains the logic without reproducing the publisher’s proprietary map illustrations.

2. The three phases of every game round

In Planning, the first player places one face-down order token, the next player does the same and turns continue around the table until everyone has placed four. The placement location is a system tile, not a particular world or void. Multiple hidden orders can share a system and stack.

In Operations, starting with the first player and proceeding clockwise, each player selects one of their orders that is currently at the top of a stack, reveals it and resolves the chosen effect. If you have no accessible top order, skip your opportunity; you will get to resolve remaining orders later as the stack opens. The stage continues until all orders are off the map.

In Refresh, the order is fixed: collect faction objectives from friendly worlds; gain materiel from friendly worlds; rally routed units; then resolve event draws and Warp Storm movement in first-player order. Finally pass the first-player token clockwise and advance the round marker.

Although many things happen during Refresh, keep the timing clear: occupying a world with your objective during Operations does not necessarily mean you immediately win. The objective must be collected at the correct Refresh step. This distinction helps make defense and counterattacks meaningful.

3. Planning hidden orders: what you can place and where

Each faction has two copies of each of the four base orders: Deploy, Dominate, Strategize and Advance. But each player places only four tokens total in a round. You can mix order types based on your intended objective, subject to your token availability and where you have a unit or structure.

An order may be placed only in a system where you have a unit/structure or a system adjacent by a shared edge to one where you have a unit/structure. A diagonal corner does not count as adjacent. This prevents players from programming an action on an arbitrary distant system without any presence nearby.

The key tactical restriction is that an order placed later goes on top of the existing stack. If your Deploy is hidden beneath an opponent’s order, you cannot just pull it out. A series of planned actions can therefore wait longer than expected, even when the order would otherwise be legal.

For beginners, narrate one simple set: Deploy to reinforce an important front, Strategize to improve your next attack, then Advance toward an objective, while reserving a Dominate for useful assets. Your actual order locations and resolution sequence still depend on the stacks; the game does not guarantee you can perform them in your preferred chronological order.

4. Order stacks: why the top token must resolve first

During Operations, only the top order token of each stack may be chosen. The player whose token is exposed can resolve it on their next applicable Operations opportunity. Other players’ orders underneath remain waiting. You may inspect your own exposed token, but opponents do not learn the hidden contents of the stack from your planning intentions.

Worked example: Blue places an Advance in a system. Red places a Deploy on top of it. Blue subsequently places a Strategize above Red’s Deploy. The stack from top to bottom is now Blue Strategize, Red Deploy, Blue Advance. Blue can resolve the Strategize when selected, then Red’s Deploy becomes exposed. Until Red removes it, Blue’s Advance is blocked; Blue cannot choose the lower token instead.

This interaction is not merely administrative. Putting a token above a rival order can delay their reinforcements, interrupt an anticipated invasion sequence or expose you to an action they perform when the stack clears. Conversely, planning too many of your own orders in one system can trap them under other players’ tokens.

The Rules Reference permits a player who has no exposed orders to skip a turn, then resume after other orders are removed. All placed orders still resolve during the Operations Phase; skipping due to inaccessible orders does not automatically discard them.

5. Deploy: build units and structures at the right place

Resolve a Deploy in two steps. First, if you control a factory in the active system, you may spend materiel to purchase ground units or ships within the system, respecting the unit and deploy limits. Second, you may purchase one structure for a friendly world in the active system that does not already contain one, paying the printed cost.

Ships are placed in void areas; ground units and structures go on worlds. You do not need the new unit to appear in the exact area that holds the factory, but standard unit purchasing requires a factory somewhere in the active system. The 2016 FAQ explicitly clarifies that a card or faction ability may purchase or grant a unit without that normal factory requirement; do not misapply the restriction to every possible source of new units.

A player’s command level equals the number of cities they control, limiting which advanced units and upgrades they can buy. Factories enable ordinary purchasing. Bastions strengthen a world in combat and cannot be routed. Before buying a high-end unit, check both the materiel cost and its command requirement, plus any forge-token cost.

The unit-capacity rule is a frequent source of mistakes. The official FAQ permits temporarily placing too many units during a Deploy, but you must destroy excess units at the end of the order to obey the area’s capacity. Buying an illegal final arrangement is not a way to keep extra units in reserve.

6. Dominate: collect assets and use your faction power

Dominate grants the assets printed on friendly worlds in the active system, then lets you resolve the special ability on your faction sheet. This matters because world assets—such as forge, cache or reinforcement tokens—are not the same resource as the materiel you collect during Refresh.

A forge token can help pay a unit’s additional requirement or temporarily reduce a single purchased unit’s command-level requirement by one, within the printed limitations. A cache token reduces a particular unit or structure’s materiel cost by two. Reinforcement tokens support battles as temporary extra combat participants, although they do not contribute dice in the same way as ordinary units.

Because faction abilities are asymmetric, do not teach Dominate as having the same result for all four factions. The Ultramarines can use their published ability to improve some units under specific costs and conditions; the Orks, Chaos and Eldar have different printed effects. Check the faction sheet when Dominate resolves.

Use Dominate to support a concrete follow-up action. Assets that make an upcoming purchase or battle feasible are more useful than an aimless collection. However, do not confuse a world being adjacent to the active system with a world being in the active system for the assets you actually collect.

7. Strategize: improve orders and rebuild the combat deck

Strategize permits purchasing an eligible order upgrade, a combat upgrade or both if you can pay their costs and satisfy the relevant command level. An order upgrade is kept face up and modifies one of the four order types. A combat upgrade changes the composition of your faction’s fighting deck.

The important combat-deck rule is exact: a combat upgrade comes in a pair of identical cards. You remove both copies of one existing card from your combat deck and replace them with the two new ones. The deck remains ten cards—two copies each of five different card choices. Do not simply shuffle every purchased upgrade into an ever-growing combat deck.

After using a Strategize order, put its order token on top of your event deck as directed. It will later influence your event draw during Refresh. For ordinary Advance, Dominate or Deploy orders, you may instead forgo the order effect and put the token on the event deck, giving you a tactical option when circumstances make your planned action undesirable.

A combat card’s specialist unit ability only works if its listed kind of unit is present and unrouted. Buying a card because it advertises powerful text may be poor value when your actual armies cannot meet its unit requirements. Check your faction’s typical formations before selecting a replacement pair.

8. Advance: move ships and armies, then fight

Advance has a specific sequence: move ships first, then move ground units, then resolve any resulting combat. If no area is contested, the active player may make an orbital strike instead, subject to the strike restrictions.

Ships may move to voids in the active system from within that system or one adjacent system. Ground units move to worlds in the active system through a legal path of friendly connected areas in that system and one adjacent starting system. If ships were moved from an adjacent system first, the ground units cannot then come from a different adjacent system during that order.

Warp Storms block movement across their boundary unless a specific effect says otherwise. Diagonal system corners do not permit a movement connection. You may create a maximum of one contested area during a single Advance order, so an intended multi-pronged invasion that creates two simultaneous battles is not legal as one ordinary order.

There is also a capacity distinction: void areas normally hold up to three ships, while each world shows its own capacity in skull icons. You may temporarily exceed capacity during an order but must comply by destroying excess units when the order is finished. For exact routing through friendly voids and any edge case involving enemy ships, use the Rules Reference’s movement diagrams.

9. Orbital strikes: ships can hurt enemy worlds without a ground battle

After an Advance, when there is no contested area, you may use your ships in a suitable void to launch an orbital strike on an enemy world in the same active system. The void must be orthogonally adjacent to that world. Roll dice based on the combined combat value of the ships in the chosen void; offence icons deal damage to enemy units on the target.

An orbital strike is not an alternative way to resolve a normal contested ground battle during the same Advance. If combat is triggered, you resolve that combat instead. Nor can ships strike a world diagonally across the system or simply choose a hostile world in another system.

Bastions prevent orbital strikes against their world. This makes bastion construction a meaningful defense against fleet pressure, not just a morale or health boost in ground combat. The 2016 official FAQ also clarifies that a world containing only enemy structures may still be targeted by an orbital strike if it is an enemy world, although an ordinary strike may have no unit damage to assign; related upgrade abilities can still matter.

Before declaring a strike, check that the target is legally an enemy world, that an eligible adjacent void contains your ships, that there is no contested area and that no bastion blocks the attack.

10. Combat: dice, cards and three execution rounds

Combat occurs when an Advance or other effect produces a contested area. The player entering the enemy-held area is the attacker and the other is the defender. The normal battle has three stages:

1. Preparation: each side rolls dice according to the combat value of its unrouted participating units (and relevant bastions), draws five combat cards, then may add reinforcement tokens. The attacker chooses reinforcements before the defender.
2. Three executions: each round, both players choose one combat card secretly; the attacker reveals and resolves first, followed by the defender. Then damage is assessed. The battle can end early if one side has no surviving eligible fighting pieces.
3. Resolution: if both sides remain after the third exchange, total their morale. The side with more wins; the defender wins morale ties. The loser retreats, and the winner captures relevant enemy structures as instructed.

Offence, defence and morale are distinct icons. Offence contributes damage; defence absorbs the opponent’s offence; morale determines the final winner if the battle lasts to comparison. Combat card icons can persist across the three execution rounds, whereas temporary combat tokens are returned according to the printed timing.

Each side has a hard cap of eight combat dice. More unit combat value does not entitle the player to ignore this limit. Combat outcomes depend on the units, the chosen three cards, reinforcement tokens and the order in which effects resolve—not just an initial dice roll.

11. Damage, routing and the morale tie-breaker

When assessing damage in each combat execution, compare the opponent’s offence icons against your defence. If damage gets through, allocate it to eligible defending pieces following the health and routing rules. A unit receiving damage equal to or greater than its health is destroyed; if it survives lower damage, it is normally routed instead. Routed figures are laid on their sides.

Routed units do not move, contribute combat dice or morale, or satisfy unit ability requirements on combat cards. They are rallied—stood upright—during the Refresh Phase unless another effect acts earlier. A player cannot freely route their already-routed unit again to satisfy an effect that requires routing a fresh one.

Why morale matters: assume an illustrative battle reaches the end of its third execution with attackers showing a hypothetical total morale of five and defenders showing five. The defender wins the tie and the attacker must retreat if they have surviving units. The initial number of attacker dice does not override this result.

Bastions contribute their printed combat statistics but are structures, not units. They cannot be routed. If the attacker wins through morale, surviving enemy bastions can be captured rather than simply destroyed. These distinctions affect whether your invasion accomplishes the objective you wanted.

12. Objectives: when a controlled world becomes a victory token

Each faction’s objective tokens are visible on worlds across the modular board. You can block a rival by controlling a world containing their token, but you only collect your own tokens toward victory. Collect them in the first step of the Refresh Phase if they are on a friendly world—one containing your units or structures and no enemy pieces that prevent control.

That timing makes the period between an invasion and the next Refresh strategically important. If you land on an objective and your opponent can counterattack before collection, taking the world may not secure the token. In a two-player game, however, you need only two of your own objective tokens, so a successful coordinated push can end the game rapidly.

The number needed to win is always the number of players, not the number of remaining active factions after an elimination. If a faction loses all its friendly worlds, it is eliminated, and its removal does not automatically reduce the goal for other players.

If nobody reaches the threshold by the end of round eight, the player with the most collected objective tokens wins. Official tie-breakers proceed by total collected objectives, then number of friendly worlds, then units remaining, and finally a shared victory if still tied. These conditions are defined in the Rules Reference’s Winning and Losing section.

13. Refresh in the correct order

Refresh is not just an upkeep intermission. Resolve the steps exactly:

1. Collect objective tokens: claim each of your faction’s objectives currently on a friendly world.
2. Collect materiel: add the production values of all friendly worlds to your dial; you cannot exceed the 14-materiel maximum.
3. Rally routed units: stand them upright so they can contribute again.
4. Events and Warp Storms: in turn order, draw events based on tokens on your event deck, choose an event as instructed and move one Warp Storm using the permitted symbol and constraints.
5. End the round: pass the first-player token clockwise and advance the round marker.

If you drew no event cards because no order tokens were placed on your event deck, you still follow the special procedure for revealing the top event’s Warp Storm movement symbol without resolving its event ability, then shuffle it back. This is easily overlooked in games where someone never used Strategize or the order-for-event option.

Warp Storms can reroute a future invasion by blocking an edge between systems. They do not float freely through the map: movement follows the icon on the selected event and the Rules Reference’s placement restrictions. A Warp Storm cannot occupy the same border as another storm.

14. Official 2016 FAQ: corrections that still matter

The version 1.1 FAQ, August 17, 2016 is the official published errata for the original game. Four clarifications are worth explaining before your first session:

1. Factory exceptions: a standard Deploy unit purchase requires a factory in the system, but a purchase granted by a card or faction ability does not, unless that effect says otherwise.
2. Movement paths: an Advance cannot chain through several systems to circle around a Warp Storm. Ground movement’s legal paths are established before ground units move, so newly captured areas cannot retroactively become a path for another unit that same Advance.
3. Unit capacity: an order may temporarily push a system area above its capacity, but the excess must be destroyed at the end; exceeding capacity is not legal as a permanent board state.
4. Retreats: attacker units that entered via the Advance must retreat to an area from which at least one of those units arrived. Units placed into battle solely by another effect may have no legal retreat and can be destroyed if forced to retreat.

The FAQ also clarifies that a bastion cannot be routed, that a victorious attacker can capture a surviving bastion, and that a reinforcement token is treated as an appropriate command-level-zero unit for many combat purposes but does not contribute combat dice. This is an easy nuance to miss when using token substitutes for miniatures.

Some errata concern specific faction upgrades and event cards, such as Chaos’s Dread Ritual and Eldar’s Warp Gate. Consult the FAQ when playing those cards instead of applying remembered pre-errata wording.

15. A teaching example: hidden orders, a contested objective and Refresh

Consider a hypothetical two-player game with Blue controlling a factory system and Red positioned near an objective bearing Blue’s faction icon. Blue plans to reinforce, attack and hold that world through Refresh. Red expects a rush and tries to delay Blue’s advance.

Planning: Blue places a hidden Deploy in their factory system. Red places an order on a nearby system. Blue puts an Advance in the system adjacent to the target and later uses another order to support the plan. Other tokens stack on the map, hiding their identities. The positions must obey the presence-or-adjacency requirement and the fact that only four orders per player may be programmed.

Operations: Blue may resolve their Deploy when it is on top of the stack. Units are bought if the required factory, resource and command-level conditions are met. Later, an exposed Advance moves ships before ground forces along legal paths. If Blue enters a world containing Red’s units, they resolve one contested-area combat: dice, secret combat cards across up to three execution rounds, then destruction or routing and morale as necessary.

Refresh: If Blue’s forces control the relevant world and it is friendly when the objective-collection step arrives, Blue collects the objective. Red may have had an Operations opportunity to defend or retake it first, depending on stack timing. The players then collect materiel, rally routed units, move storms and advance the round.

This is an invented teaching situation, not a recorded match or a guarantee that every possible token sequence permits all these actions. The real board determines legal paths, capacities, factory access and combat outcomes.

16. Nine common Forbidden Stars mistakes

1. Placing orders anywhere: an order needs friendly presence in or adjacent to the target system.
2. Pulling buried orders from a stack: only an order on top may be resolved.
3. Using four copies of one base order: each faction begins with two of each type, although players place four total orders.
4. Buying standard units without a factory: check the Deploy requirement and the explicit exception for card abilities.
5. Ignoring command level: cities control which high-level units and upgrades can be purchased.
6. Moving across diagonal tile corners or Warp Storms: legal paths follow the board’s precise adjacency rules.
7. Starting multiple battles from one Advance: the ordinary order allows just one contested area.
8. Assuming most damage wins combat: morale can decide a surviving three-execution battle, with defender-favoured ties.
9. Taking an objective as soon as you invade: collect your faction’s tokens during Refresh, if the world is still friendly.

Forbidden Stars board game rules FAQ

How many players can play Forbidden Stars?

Two to four, each with a different Warhammer 40,000 faction. There is no official solo mode in the original box.

How do you win Forbidden Stars?

Collect your faction’s objective tokens equal to the number of players, normally in the Refresh Phase. If none wins by round eight, collected objectives and official tie-breakers determine the winner.

What are the four orders?

Deploy, Dominate, Strategize and Advance. Every player places four face-down tokens each round, chosen from their available order types.

Can I place two orders in the same system?

Yes. They form a stack and only its top token is accessible in Operations.

Can I resolve an order under an enemy order?

No. You must wait for the orders above to be removed. If none of your orders are exposed, you skip that Operations opportunity.

Where can I put an order token?

In a system where you have a friendly unit or structure, or one sharing an edge with a system where you have a unit or structure. Diagonal corners do not count.

Can I get units without a factory?

For normal unit purchases through Deploy, you need a factory in that active system. Card and faction abilities can provide exceptions as confirmed by the official FAQ.

What is command level?

The number of cities you control. It determines the higher-level units and upgrades you may buy.

What is the difference between a city and a factory?

Cities raise command level. Factories allow normal Deploy unit purchases in their system. A bastion provides defensive combat value and prevents orbital strikes against its world.

How many combats can one Advance start?

Normally at most one contested area. Resolve the battle generated there before the order finishes.

How many combat cards do you draw?

Five at preparation; each player normally selects and plays one in each of up to three combat execution rounds.

Does a combat-card upgrade increase my deck size?

No. It replaces both copies of an existing card with both copies of an upgrade; the combat deck stays ten cards.

Who wins tied morale?

The defender, if both sides survive until the morale comparison.

Do routed units count as morale?

No. Routed units do not contribute combat dice, morale or required active unit abilities.

How many dice can I roll in a battle?

At most eight per side, even when combined units would otherwise provide more.

Can orbital strikes hit worlds with bastions?

No. A world containing a bastion cannot be targeted by an ordinary orbital strike.

When do players get materiel?

During Refresh from friendly worlds, with the dial capped at 14. Dominate can instead collect the world’s printed asset tokens.

Can I take an opponent’s objective token?

You may occupy or block that world, but only your own faction’s objective tokens can be collected toward victory.

How many rounds can the game last?

At most eight. It may end earlier when a faction reaches its objective threshold, or when only one non-eliminated player remains.

Is Forbidden Stars the same as Old Ones Origins?

No. The newer game is a separate reimplementation of ideas associated with Forbidden Stars, not an official relabeling of its Warhammer 40,000 rulebook or components.

Where are the official rules and errata?

Read the Learn to Play, Rules Reference and 2016 FAQ/errata published by Fantasy Flight Games.

Official publisher sources, errata and editorial scope

Official Learn to Play: Forbidden Stars Learn to Play (Fantasy Flight Games). This teaches setup, the three phases, four orders, combat, objectives and the eight-round deadline. Rules authority: FFG Rules Reference provides the decisive wording on movement paths, combat sequencing, events, objectives, capacity and victory tie-breakers.

Errata: Fantasy Flight Games Forbidden Stars FAQ version 1.1 (August 17, 2016) corrects a Deploy-rule omission, retreat situations, movement and unit capacity and specific card text. Rulebook excerpts should be interpreted alongside this later official correction.

Additional context: BoardGameGeek’s catalogue entry identifies the 2015 base game, while the BoardGameArchive overview discusses its out-of-print status and how it differs from more recent related games. This article is limited to rules for the original Fantasy Flight release, not hypothetical new editions or unofficial variants.

Prepared for BoardGameArchive on 2 November 2026. The article uses original prose and hypothetical teaching examples, without copied Warhammer artwork, claims of firsthand play or unverified strategy rankings. No embedded Adsterra or external advertising scripts were added. Corrections follow our editorial policy.