Overview

You have inherited your family's distillery. Buy ingredients, recipes, equipment, and staff to create renowned spirits and earn the title of Master Distiller. The goal is to earn the most SP (Spirit Points) at the end of seven rounds. SP is earned mostly by selling the spirits you make, but also by gaining premium upgrades and items.

Gameplay

Before the game starts, you are given two Master Distiller characters to choose from. Each has a different signature recipe and a special skill to aid you in the game. You also receive 3 Spirit Awards (goals) that give you SP at the end of the game.

Before each round, you may perform any "start of round" actions allowed by your character or distillery upgrades.

Recipes

Recipes are the combination of ingredients (cards) you need to distill certain kinds of spirits. You cannot make a spirit if you do not own the recipe for it, even if you have the cards (you cannot "discover" brandy). Each player gets a different "Tasting Flight" or list of available recipes.

To distill a spirit it must include some type of yeast, water, and a sugar. There are three kinds of sugars: grain (brown wheat), plant (green root), and fruit (red fruit).

When you start, you only have three recipes you can make: moonshine, vodka, and your signature recipe. But you won't be able to make your signature recipe in the first round. Other recipes must be purchased during the market phase.

Phases of a Round

Each round has four phases:

1. Market
2. Distill
3. Sell
4. Age

Market

In other words, shopping. In this phase, you purchase recipes, ingredients, items, and distillery upgrades.

There are five places to buy things:

1. Basic Market: The top row displays basic elements to make any spirit. Some have no cost. But you can only purchase 2 items from the Basic Market each round.
• If you buy yeast, you gain 1 money.
• If you buy water, you can look at the top card of either any market deck and purchase it if you wish.
2. Distillery Upgrades: Gain advantages by getting discounts, free ingredients, or other benefits.
3. Premium Ingredients: Premium ingredients get more SP if they appear in your spirit.
4. Premium Items: Containers to distill and sell your spirits. Some spirits require a barrel or clay vessel to age in. Bottles are used when the spirit is sold and can increase SP if they match the spirit's country of origin.
5. Recipe List: Found near your player card. To make a spirit, you must first unlock the recipe. Bronze recipes cost 2 money, silver costs 4 money, gold costs 6 money. You start with the moonshine and vodka recipes unlocked.

When all players have passed, the market phase is over. The rightmost cards for each market are discarded and shifted to make room for new drawn cards.

Purchased ingredients go into your pantry and equipment goes into your storeroom. These will eventually be combined when you sell the spirit. But first you have to distill it.

Distill

Optional: Before distilling, you can trade 1 ingredient or item card for a basic ingredient of equal or lesser cost. You cannot trade your starting barrel or bottle.

Each player selects ingredients to put in their washback (the vessel used for fermentation). Yeast and water and at least one sugar are required ingredients to distill anything. The type and number of sugars determine what spirit will be made. If you have Alcohol in your pantry from previous spirits, you can use that in place of yeast or water.

When distilling takes place, all the cards are shuffled together, including one Alcohol card. Two of the cards are returned to the pantry (these represent the "heads" and "tails" formed during fermentation, which are cut from the liquid, but reusable). If the remaining cards match a known recipe (and you have the appropriate barrel) you can create that spirit and store it in a warehouse. The recipe must not contain any type of sugar that is not part of the recipe.

Tip: Because two cards from the recipe are returned to you, you may want to include more sugars than necessary into the mix to increase the chances of getting the spirit you want.

You may have to choose between different recipes if there is more than one match. Vodka is always an option if the result contains any sugars, or moonshine if it contains no sugar.

Once you have your spirit, you must choose a barrel to combine it with. The recipe's "spirit label" is claimed and the cards are stored in one of your two warehouses. If you don't need to age it, you may be ready to sell.

Sell

Any spirits in your warehouse may be sold for money and SP. Recipes with the non-age icon (crossed out hourglass) MUST be sold this round. Recipes that do have the age icon (brown hourglass) must wait at least one round after distillation to be sold.

To sell, you must choose a bottle to put the spirit in. All players start with a glass bottle, but premium bottles bought from the market can increase the SP or money value.

The SP and money value is the totals from the cards (ingredients, flavors, barrels, bottle) and recipe. The label is used to choose a selling bonus, either SP or some other benefit. Starting equipment is returned to your storeroom. Premium bottles are put on display and may earn additional SP at the end of the game.

If you cannot or choose not to sell a spirit this round, you hold a "tasting" where you can exchange up to 4 SP for money.

Age

Recipes with the age icon (brown hourglass) must wait at least one round after distillation and cannot be sold immediately. A spirit gains 1 Flavor card for each round it is aged. The value of these flavor cards is not revealed until the spirit is sold. (You never know what your spirit will taste like until you sell it.)

You can age a spirit for more than one round, which will increase its SP, but not sell value.

In the last round, if you do not sell an aged spirit, you will still receive SP for it, but not money.

End of Round

BGA checks to see if you have achieved any Spirit Awards (goals) and adds the SP to your total.

If this is the end of the third round, choose one Spirit Award to discard.

After seven rounds, the game ends and scoring commences.

Scoring

Spirit Points are gained from:

• Spirits stored in the warehouse, counting the cards in the spirit stack, barrel, and recipe. You do not receive SP from flavors but receive 1 SP per flavor card.
• Bottles with a Region icon. Score 2/4/7/10/15 SP for 1/2/3/4/5/6+ bottles from the same region. Add 5 SP if you have one bottle from each of the three different Regions.
• A distiller's home region counts as an icon of that Region, not a separate fourth icon.
• Distillery upgrades
• Spirit Awards (goals)
• Money at a rate of 1 SP for 5 money

If players are tied for the most SP, the player with the most money wins.

Solo Mode

In Solo Mode, your objective is to fulfill a set of goals and earn enough SP to meet the threshold determined by those goals. Fourteen goals are arranged into five rows in a "tree" formation. Achieving one will unlock the goals above it. This row becomes the active row. You cannot complete goals below your active row.

To win, you must A) complete one goal from each row and B) earn at least as many SP as the total from your achieved A goal and B goal.