Ceylon

About this board game

Ceylon is a board game for 2–4 players that takes about 60 minutes, placing you among the pioneers of Sri Lanka’s tea industry during the second half of the nineteenth century.

After a deadly fungus destroyed the island’s coffee plantations and caused a serious economic crisis, entrepreneurs began replacing coffee with tea. In Ceylon, players help develop this new industry by building plantations across different districts and at different altitudes.

Players produce tea and work to sell it to important export companies. To support their progress, they must win the favor of the counselors in each district and develop the technology needed to move ahead of their competitors.

Plantation development, tea production, export opportunities, district influence, and technological progress all contribute to the competition. The game’s setting reflects the transformation that helped establish Ceylon—now known as Sri Lanka—as a source of tea that many connoisseurs consider among the world’s best.

At the end of the game, players score points in several areas:

• Having plantations in each district
• Meeting the demands that have been set
• Reaching a high level of technological development
• Collecting money

The player with the most points wins. With its focus on plantation building, tea production, district counselors, export companies, and technology, Ceylon presents a concise historical contest over the growth of an important tea industry.