Last Updated on February 3, 2026 by The Official Game Rules Team

Concordia is a strategic Eurogame where players expand trade networks, establish colonies, and build economic power across the Roman Empire. Players use a deck of personality cards to perform actions such as moving colonists, constructing houses, trading goods, and expanding influence. Victory comes from efficiently managing resources, timing actions, and earning favor from ancient Roman gods.

If you’re learning how to play Concordia, this detailed guide covers setup, gameplay, personality cards, scoring, and strategy so you can fully understand and master the Concordia game rules.

Type: Economic | Players: 2-5 Players | Length: 45-90 minutes

This image is the box art for the board game Concordia, featuring a central illustration of a woman in Roman attire exchanging goods with an older man in a market setting. The background includes Roman architecture, a soldier, and a glimpse of what appears to be the Colosseum, highlighting the game's theme of trade and expansion in the Roman Empire.

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How to Play Concordia

Game Components

Game Board: Double-sided (Imperium for 3–5 players / Italia for 2–4 players)
5 Player Storehouses
110 Wooden Pieces (in 5 colors) — Each player gets:
- 3 Land Colonists
- 3 Sea Colonists
- 1 Scoring Marker
- 15 Houses
80 Wooden Goods Tokens: Brick, Food, Tools, Wine, Cloth
72 Personality Cards:
- 35 Starting Cards (7 per player)
- 30 Cards for Sale (Decks I–V)
- 7 Concordia personality cards
30 City Tokens
Coins (1, 2, 5, and 10 sestertii)
1 Concordia Card
Praefectus Magnus Tile
Rulebook

Game Setup

Choose Board & Player Count:
- Use Imperium (3–5 players) or Italia (2–4 players).
Distribute Components:
Each player receives:
- 1 Storehouse
- 6 Colonists (3 land, 3 sea)
- 15 Houses
- 1 Scoring Marker
- 7 Starting Personality Cards (their hand)
Prepare Goods & Coins:
Place all goods tokens and coins in separate supply piles.
Set Up Deck Display:
- Create the five decks of cards for sale (Decks I–V).
- Reveal the top four cards into the market display.
Determine Starting Player:
Randomly select the start player. The player to their right receives the Praefectus Magnus tile.
Place Starting Colonists & Goods:
Each player places two colonists in Roma (one land, one sea) and begins with starting goods and coins as indicated in the quick setup guide.

This image displays the full contents of the board game Concordia, spread out for play. The main components include a large map board of the Roman Empire, a long scoring track along the top and sides, stacks of small wooden components representing houses and colonists, various cards (personality, province, and scoring), and coin tokens in different colors. Several player mats (storehouses) are also visible on the lower right, organized by player color.

Gameplay Overview

Turn Structure

Players take turns clockwise. On your turn:

Play one Personality Card from your hand.
Perform the corresponding action described on the card.
Place the card face up in your personal discard pile.

When your hand is empty or nearly empty, play the Tribune card to recover all previously played cards.

Personality Cards and Actions

Tribune

Recover Cards: Take all previously played cards back into your hand.
If you recover more than 3 cards (including the Tribune), gain 1 sestertius per additional card.
Optional Colonist Purchase: Pay 1 food + 1 tool to place a new colonist (land or sea) in Roma.

Architect

Move Colonists:
You can move each colonist a number of steps equal to your total number of colonists on the board.
- Land colonists move along brown lines, sea colonists along blue lines.
- You may move through occupied paths but not end on one.
Build Houses:
After moving, build in cities adjacent to your colonists.
- Goods Cost: 1 brick + the city’s specific good (except brick cities, which require only 1 food).
- Coin Cost:
  - Brick city: 1 sestertius
  - Food city: 2 sestertii
  - Tool city: 3 sestertii
  - Wine city: 4 sestertii
  - Cloth city: 5 sestertii
- The coin cost is multiplied by the total number of houses in that city (yours + others) after construction.
- You can never build more than one house per city or in Roma.

This image is an excerpt from a rulebook for a board game, likely a strategy or civilization game set in ancient Rome. The text describes a player's Red turn, detailing the movement of their three colonists (one from "Roma" to "Massilia" via a sea line, and another land colonist moving two steps from between "Colonia A" and "Novaria" toward "Vindobona"), followed by the actions of buying and placing three new houses in the cities of "Massilia," "Novaria," and "Aquileia", paying the specific costs for each, including a tripled cost for the third house in "Aquileia."

Prefect

Choose one of two options:

a) Produce Goods in a Province

Select a province whose bonus marker still shows its good symbol.
Gain 1 of that good from the bank.
Every house in the province (any player’s) produces 1 of its local good.
Flip the province’s marker to its coin side.

b) Collect Cash Bonus

Gain 1 sestertius per visible coin on flipped markers.
Then, flip all province markers back to their goods side.

Praefectus Magnus: If you hold this tile, your chosen province produces double goods. After your turn, pass the tile to the player on your right.

This image displays an example scenario from a board game, likely focused on trade or civilization building in the Roman Empire. The text first illustrates the Prefect card action where the Red player chooses the Syria province, which has a bonus marker showing a cloth good symbol, resulting in Red receiving one cloth. Following this action, the Syrian bonus marker is flipped to its coin side, and all houses in Syria produce goods: Red and Blue players receive one food each, and Yellow receives one cloth. The second part of the text describes an alternative scenario where a player chooses the cash bonus action, explaining they would receive 6 sestertii from the bank because there are six coin symbols visible across all the current bonus markers (displayed in the bottom-left panel showing provinces like Dacia, Asia, Hellas, Syria, Lybia, and Aegyptus), after which the coin markers would be flipped back to show goods.

Colonist

Choose one of two options:

a) Recruit Colonists:

Pay 1 food + 1 tool per colonist placed.
Colonists may be placed in Roma or in any city where you have a house.

b) Collect Income:

Gain 5 sestertii plus 1 sestertius per colonist already on the board.

This image presents an example of the COLONIST card action from a board game, illustrating the process of placing new colonists. The text explains that the Red player starts with 2 food and 3 tools in their storehouse, pays 2 food and 2 tools to play the card, and then places two colonists. Red chooses to place a new sea colonist in "Roma" and a new land colonist in "Massilia". The text also notes that Red could have alternatively placed one colonist in "Aquileia", but not in "Novaria" because Red does not own a house there, and that a player is also allowed to place both new colonists in the same city.

Mercator

Gain 3 sestertii (or 5 if you have multiple Mercator cards).
Trade up to two types of goods with the bank:
- Buy or sell goods at fixed prices shown on the storehouses.
- Limited by available space in your storehouse (12 total slots).

Diplomat

Copy the top card from another player’s discard pile (not their hand).

You perform that card’s action as if it were your own.
You cannot copy a player who just used Diplomat or Tribune this turn.

This image illustrates an action in a board game where the 5th player plays a Diplomat card, which allows them to execute the action of one of the personality cards recently played by the other four players. The image displays the four cards the 5th player can choose from: a Diplomat (allowing the use of an opponent's top face-up personality card in their discard pile), a Senator (allowing the purchase of up to two new personality cards), an Architect (allowing a player to move their colonists and then build in cities adjacent to them), and a Prefect (allowing a player to choose a province to produce goods or take a cash bonus).

Senator

Purchase up to two new personality cards from the market.
Pay the cost shown on the card plus the goods below its market slot.
Question mark symbols (?) represent any good of your choice.
Refill the display afterward by sliding cards left and revealing new ones.

This image illustrates a board game action involving the purchase of personality cards from a market display. The text explains that a player wants to purchase the Mercator and the Architect cards, which are two of the cheapest four cards on sale. The Mercator card costs 1 unit of wine, and the Architect card costs 1 tool and 1 brick to the bank, though the player is reminded that the question mark on the Architect card allows them to substitute the brick for any other type of good. After taking the two purchased cards, the Prefect card moves one position to the left, and the Farmer card (and any other remaining cards) moves two positions to the left, followed by the two empty display spots being replenished with new cards from the deck.

Consul

Buy one personality card from the display.
Pay only the cost printed on the card (ignore the cost below its position).
Slide cards left and refill the display after the purchase.

This image illustrates the purchase of a Colonist card from the card display in a board game. The text explains that a player wants to buy the Colonist card from the 6th position in the display, but pays only 1 unit of food because the goods listed on the game board (which would typically be a cost of 1 unit of free choice plus 1 cloth) are ignored, suggesting a specific game rule or effect is in play. Since the player cannot purchase more than one card in this scenario, they take the Colonist card into their hand, the Prefect card moves one position to the left, and the resulting empty slot is replenished with a new card from the stack.

Specialists (Mason, Farmer, Smith, Vintner, Weaver)

Each specialist produces one good for each of your houses that produces that resource.
For example:

Mason → bricks
Farmer → food
Smith → tools
Vintner → wine
Weaver → cloth

The player has a total of 4 houses inside wine cities and plays the Vintner. She receives 4 units of wine and puts them on 4 empty storage spaces inside her storehouse. The other players do not receive any goods.

Storehouse Rules

Each player’s storehouse holds 12 total spaces for goods or colonists.
When colonists are placed on the board, their space becomes available for goods again.
Players cannot discard goods voluntarily to make room, except when receiving excess.

Intermediate Scoring (Optional)

When a player uses their Tribune for the first time, they may trigger Intermediate Scoring.

Score points according to the same rules as Final Scoring.
After all players have done so, award bonuses:
- Highest scorer: 2 sestertii
- Second place: 1 sestertius
Reset scoring markers to 0 afterward.

This step is optional for experienced players.

Game End

The game ends when either:

A player builds their 15th house, or
A player buys the last personality card from the display.

That player takes the Concordia Card (worth 7 VP). All other players take one final turn before final scoring.

Final Scoring

Each personality card represents a Roman god, who grants victory points based on your accomplishments.

God	Condition	Points
Vesta	1 VP per 10 sestertii (cash + goods value)	Variable
Jupiter	1 VP per house in non-brick cities	Max 15
Saturnus	1 VP per province with your houses	Max 12
Mercurius	2 VP per type of good you produce	Max 10
Mars	2 VP per colonist on the board	Max 12
Minerva	Points per city type, as shown on specialist cards	Varies

Add the 7 VP Concordia Card bonus (if earned).
The player with the highest total wins.
Ties go to the player with the Praefectus Magnus, or to the next eligible player clockwise.

Scoring Example:

Strategy Tips

Diversify Provinces: Expanding into multiple provinces maximizes your Saturnus scoring.
Efficient Movement: Use your Architect wisely — plan builds where you can use the same movement for multiple cities.
Balance Your Deck: Buy cards that complement your current strategy and scoring gods.
Use the Diplomat: Copy strong plays, like Prefect or Senator, to benefit without spending your own cards.
Manage Storehouse Space: Keeping room for high-value goods can make late-game trades far more profitable.

Concordia FAQ

Can I move through another colonist’s route?

Yes. You can move through, but not stop on, lines occupied by other colonists.

Can I build in a city if all spaces are full?

No. You may only build if there’s at least one open house slot.

What happens if I can’t pay full cost for a building?

You must have all required goods and coins before constructing.

Can the Diplomat copy the Tribune?

No, Tribunes and recently used Diplomats cannot be copied.

Do I gain anything for unspent goods?

Yes, their value is added to your Vesta scoring total (1 VP per 10 sestertii equivalent).

Conclusion

To successfully play Concordia, mastering the Concordia rules and the core mechanics of personality cards is essential. By strategically utilizing your colonists, carefully managing your resources, and efficiently building houses, you will expand your influence across the Roman provinces.

Understanding how to play Concordia revolves around selecting the most advantageous personality cards each turn to optimize production, trade, and settlement. Ultimately, the path to victory lies in accumulating the most diverse set of scoring opportunities provided by the various Roman gods and the final bonus from the Concordia card.