Masons

About this board game

Masons is a board game for 2–4 players that takes about 45 minutes, in which architects establish cities across a shared landscape and compete for the most points.

On each turn, a player places a new wall on the board. The wall is enclosed by towers and has a house on each side, although existing towers or the board edge can reduce how many new pieces are needed. Three dice then determine the colors of the towers and houses, with limited choices available when fewer pieces are placed.

When a wall fully encloses a piece of land, a new city is established. If it borders an existing city, it may be combined with that city. Inside the completed city, two houses of the same color become a palace, setting the stage for a scoring round.

• Build walls, towers, houses, and palaces across the board.
• Complete cities and potentially combine them with neighboring cities.
• Play one or two guild cards during each scoring round.
• Score features such as colored pieces, fields, districts, palaces, color variety, or completed cities.

Guild cards reward careful timing. During a scoring round, every player plays one or two cards and then draws a replacement, with each card scoring a feature of the newly completed city or an area outside it. The player in last place may also discard any number of guild cards and draw replacements.

Masons ends when all pieces of one type have been played. With points shaped by city construction, dice-determined colors, and the timing of guild cards, the architect with the highest score wins.