Azul rules

Draft colored tiles, fill your pattern lines and decorate the palace wall to score the most points.

Players: 2–4
Time: 30–45 min
Ages: 8+
Goal: Draft colored tiles, fill your pattern lines, and move finished lines onto your wall to score. The game ends after a round in which someone completes a row; most points wins.

How to play Azul

Everyone gets a board; the bag and Factory displays are prepared together.

Boards: Give each player a player board, flipped to the colored wall side.
Score marker: Everyone puts a scoring marker on space 0 of their score track.
Factory displays: Put them in a circle: 5 for 2 players, 7 for 3 players, 9 for 4 players.
Bag: Put all 100 tiles (20 of each of the 5 colors) in the bag.
First player: Whoever most recently visited Portugal takes the starting player marker.
Fill the displays: That player draws tiles from the bag and puts exactly 4 on each Factory display. Return any unused player boards, scoring markers and Factory displays to the box.
Start: They put the marker in the center of the table and take the first turn. Play goes clockwise.

Each round has 3 phases. Keep playing rounds until the game ends.

Factory offer: in turn, take every tile of one colour from one display (its other tiles go to the centre) or from the centre. The first to take from the centre also takes the starting player marker.
Place them in one pattern line: one colour per line, and never a colour already in that row of your wall. Extras go to your floor line.
Wall-tiling: from each full pattern line, move 1 tile to your wall and score it; the rest of that line go in the box lid. Then lose points for your floor line.
Preparation: refill each display with 4 tiles from the bag. Whoever has the starting player marker goes first.

The tiles left over for opponents matter as much as the ones you take.

Placed tile: 1 point alone. Otherwise, for each direction with linked tiles, 1 per tile in that line, counting the new tile.
Floor line: −1, −1, −2, −2, −2, −3, −3 from left to right.
Game-end bonuses: +2 per complete row, +7 per complete column, +10 per colour with all 5 placed.

Example: You place a tile with 2 linked tiles to its left and 1 above it. Across scores 3, down scores 2, so you gain 5.

Game end: after the Wall-tiling phase in which anyone completes a row of 5.
Winner: most points after the bonuses. The tie-breaker is more complete rows; still tied, you share the win.

Flip your board to the gray side for an extra challenge.

Gray side: place each tile in any space of its row, but no colour may appear twice in any row or column.

Only needed if you play with the expansion named on each heading.

Setup: give each player a Crystal Mosaic board instead of the base board; agree on Side 1 or Side 2 and everyone uses that side. Each player lays an overlay on their board so it lines up exactly.
Placing tiles: any free space of the row, as on the gray side.
Side 1: a tile on a ×2 space scores double. Side 2: bigger end bonuses (3 / 10 / 12). The floor line costs less on both sides.