How to Play The Old King’s Crown

What you are trying to do

Each player leads one of four factions. During each round you compete for Kingdom cards, place a Herald on the map, commit hidden Faction cards to three regions, resolve those clashes, then use Autumn to build longer-term power through Councils and Lore.

A card in your hand is not merely combat strength. The same hand also supplies bids, clash cards, Commands, Council votes and Lore. Good play therefore depends on deciding which use is most valuable now and which cards you need to preserve for later phases.

Set up the central board

1. Choose a game length. The official standard game is five rounds; short and extended games use four and six.
2. Place the Kingdom board and Councils tile.
3. Shuffle the Kingdom deck and populate the Great Road so four Kingdom cards are visible: three in the road spaces plus the face-up top card of the deck.
4. Create the shared Influence and Lore reserve.
5. Place the Kingdom’s Favour on the Harvest Field, the Season marker in Spring, the Round marker on round one and the three Clash markers in their starting stack.

Use the official rulebook for the component diagram and exact board orientation.

Set up your faction

Choose or randomly assign one of the four factions: Nobility, Clans, Uprising or Gathering. Take its Player Board, Herald, five Supporters, Hand Size marker, four Tactics, Site of Power and Faction deck.

Each faction begins from the same functional Basic Faction deck but develops differently through its Tactics, Advanced Faction cards, HQ cards and Kingdom’s Favour action. That means new players can learn the shared card roles while still getting a genuinely asymmetric faction arc.

Start of the year

Skip this phase in round one. From round two onward, everyone draws up to their current Hand Size and then adjusts the Order Track according to Influence.

The player with the most Influence moves to the first position. Ties reverse the previous order of the tied players. Turn order matters because many Actions and choices resolve in that sequence.

Spring: bid for a Kingdom card

Every player secretly chooses one card from hand as a bid, then all bids are revealed. Resolve the bids from highest total Strength to lowest.

When your bid resolves, the rules give you three broad choices:

• take a face-up Kingdom card from the Great Road and Occupy it with the bidding card;
• steal an eligible Kingdom card from an opponent and Occupy it;
• return your bidding card to your hand instead of taking a Kingdom card.

This is the first major opportunity-cost decision of each round: a high-Strength card can secure an early Kingdom-card choice, but committing it as a bid may remove a powerful option from the clashes that follow.

Spring: place Heralds and hidden cards

Players place Heralds on map locations in turn order. Then everyone simultaneously commits one face-down Faction card next to each of the three regions: Highlands, Plateau and Lowlands.

Each region contains two locations. You are contesting the region; the eventual winner chooses which of its two locations to claim. Your Herald placement is public, while the three committed cards are hidden, so every round creates a bluffing problem before Summer even begins.

Summer: decide clash order

The player who is last on the Order Track places the three Clash markers, determining which region resolves first, second and third. This can materially change the round because some cards can move between unresolved regions.

Do not treat the three clashes as independent fights. The first clash can change the information, cards and mobility available for the second and third.

Resolve a clash

For each region, follow the official sequence:

1. Reveal cards. Turn over the committed Faction cards in that region.
2. Day Action Step. In turn order, players may activate relevant Actions and Commands.
3. Night Effects Step. Mandatory Effects and Commands resolve.
4. Tally Strength and determine the outcome.
5. Claim rewards. The winner chooses one of the two locations in that region and takes the applicable rewards.

Then resolve the next Clash marker until all three regions are complete.

Important clash Commands

Several recurring Commands are easy to confuse:

• Ambush: can add another card from your hand to the current clash.
• Retreat: can pull your Active cards—and permitted pieces—out of the current region.
• Flank: moves an Active card from the current clash to a different unresolved region. It does not let you wait until a clash has been fully resolved and then move.
• Deadly: is a mandatory Night effect that can eliminate opposing Active cards unless another rule protects them.

The exact card text and timing always override this summary.

Herald rewards versus location rewards

These are separate concepts. Winning a region lets you select a location and claim its Location Reward. If your Herald is positioned appropriately, you may also qualify for a Herald Reward. Do not merge the two or assume that placing a Herald automatically means you won that region.

The Harvest Field is especially important because its Location Reward can transfer the Kingdom’s Favour. Holding the Favour gives access to a faction-specific action and also matters in the final tiebreak.

Autumn: Govern, Journey and develop

During your Autumn Action Step you can combine the following in the permitted order:

• Govern: move an eligible card from hand into a Council, adding its votes and contributing to Council control.
• Journey: move an eligible card from hand to the Lost Pile and gain Lore equal to its Lore icons.
• Actions and Commands: activate any that are legal during Autumn.

Lore can be spent to acquire Advanced Faction cards and HQ cards from your Site of Power. This is where the factions become increasingly asymmetric.

Winter and cleanup

Resolve mandatory Winter Effects, then clean up the board. Heralds return to Player Boards. Supporters left on the map move to the Lost Pile. Most Active cards without Influence go to their discard piles; Active cards carrying Influence can persist according to the cleanup rule by losing Influence instead.

Advance the Round marker. If the final round has finished, score the game; otherwise begin a new round.

How attrition works

Attrition happens when you are required to draw from an empty deck—not merely because the deck is empty. When it happens, shuffle your discard pile into a new deck, reduce your Hand Size by one, then finish drawing to the new Hand Size. Hand Size cannot fall below three.

This is one of the game’s central economic pressures. Every card you acquire, discard, lose or keep Active changes when your deck cycles and how exposed you are to future attrition.

Winning and tiebreakers

After the final round, total the Influence in your Supply. Highest Influence wins.

If players tie, the tied player holding the Kingdom’s Favour wins. If none of the tied players holds it, the tied player highest on the Order Track wins.

Common first-game mistakes

• Fighting at individual locations. Clashes occur at regions; the winner chooses a location afterward.
• Forgetting the cost of a bid. A card used to Occupy a Kingdom card is not available for the coming regional commitments.
• Flanking too late. Flank moves to an unresolved region during the current clash’s Day Action Step.
• Mixing optional Actions with mandatory Effects. Check whether an ability says it activates or triggers and which step it belongs to.
• Ignoring attrition until the deck is empty. The penalty occurs on the next required draw, so plan the deck cycle before that point.
• Confusing Herald and Location rewards. They are separate reward sources.

Sources and scope

Checked 6 October 2026 against Eerie Idol Games’ official multiplayer rulebook listing, the publisher’s official game site, and searchable rulebook text. Explanations and examples are original editorial summaries, not reproduced rulebook pages or card databases. Editorial policy and corrections.