In Rulers, players all act simultaneously during the current turn, with the GM acting for all NPC Realms. Once all rolls and actions have been resolved, then the GM declares the end of the turn for all players, and advances the game to the next turn.

Each turn is comprised of four phases: Warfare, Economy, Diplomacy and End of Turn.

Actions come in three categories, and each type of action can only be taken during a certain phase:

• Economic Actions - Economy Phase

• Political Actions - Diplomacy Phase

• Military Actions - Diplomacy Phase

Actions can be taken any number of times during their phase, providing players continue to have enough Basic and Special resources available to pay for those actions. However, once play moves onto the next phase of the turn, players cannot go back to an earlier phase and continue to take those actions limited to that phase, even if they still have available resources. For example, during the Diplomacy phase, both Political and Military actions may be taken in any order, however Economic actions can no longer be taken.

⚒️ Economic Actions

⚖️ Political Actions

🏹 Military Actions

Turn Order

Warfare Phase

1. Resolve combat rolls between opposing Armies

2. Resolve Sieges

Economy Phase

3. Calculate total Resource production (Base & Special)

4. Calculate total amount lost to Upkeep (Base & Special)

5. Calculate available Resources for the turn

6. Spend Resources on Economic Actions

   ⭕ Economic Actions (Costs 🪙 🪵 🌾)

   • Construct Building
   • Demolish building

Diplomacy Phase

7. Spend Influence to take Political or Military actions

   ⭕ Military Action (Costs 💠)

   • Muster an Army
   • Disband an Army
   • Issue Orders

   ⭕ Political Actions (Costs 💠)

   • Send Message
   • Send Reply
   • Draft Treaty
   • Sign Treaty
   • Renounce Treaty
   • Offer Exchange
   • Accept Exchange
   • Announce Assembly

End of Turn

8. New Year:
   1. Garrisons replenish.
   2. Defeated Armies return to Realm with their remaining Might

9. Available Resources for the turn are reset to 0

Passage of Time

Rulers assumes that one turn is equivalent to one season, and that there are four seasons in a year (Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter). Every 4th Turn is referred to as the New Year, and certain events or actions resolve at that time.

The players and the GM may decide to have a different time scale for their turns, such as a week, a month or a year. If this is the case, every 4th turn is still the turn where certain events and actions resolve when they refer to the “New Year”.

The only thing adjusting the time scale would do to gameplay, is change the number of turns a Ruler has to live before they die of old age.

Communication in Play

Rulers can be played with a group at a table, or that group can be communicating online via voice or text, in either real-time or asynchronously. Rulers can also be played solo with a notebook. Whatever your medium or player count, there is a certain amount of communication that needs to happen to resolve each phase of the turn, agree a phase has concluded, and agree to move onto the next phase. However, in-character communication is intentionally limited to certain actions.

Negotiation that occurs between Rulers, must happen through the Send Message action according to the game rules. The ability for Rulers to freely speak to one another in real-time is limited to an Assembly, after the Announce Assembly actions has been taken by any player or NPC Realm. Therefore, no amount of back and forth discussion of trade-deals or alliances is permitted in the medium through which the game is being run, without those players having paid for the cost of those actions.

However, Rulers is still a roleplaying game. Everyone is encouraged to look for every opportunity to embellish moments with the emotion and to build the narrative of their Ruler and their Realm. However, these narrative moments should not constitute an attempt to communicate with another Ruler.

The golden rule is:

• When Rulers are communicating with other Rulers, this happens in-game.

For example, the Warfare phase is a great opportunity to describe the scale and the stakes of armed conflict, and to fill every dice roll with your imagination. However, if a player were to describe how their Ruler gives a rousing speech to their assembled forces, about their willingness to retreat should an exact amount of resources be sent via the Offer Exchange action by the end of the next turn, then the GM should point out that such in-character communication should be delivered by the Send Message action.