SETI: Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence Rules: How to Play

SETI: Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence

1–4 players

40–160 min

8.4

In SETI: Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, you lead a scientific institution tasked with searching for traces of life beyond planet Earth. The game draws inspiration from current or emerging technologies and efforts in space exploration. Players will explore nearby planets and their moons by launching probes from Earth while taking advantage of ever-shifting planetary positions. Decide whether to land on their surfaces to collect valuable samples or stay in orbit for a broader survey. Additionally, by directing your telescopes to gaze into distant star systems, you may detect traces of alien signals or undiscovered exoplanets, and collect promising data to examine and study back home. Back on Earth, you can invest in upgrading your equipment so you can analyze incoming data more efficiently, boost your telescope signal capacity, or increase your supply of resources—all to expand the scope of your search that could lead to a discovery of extraterrestrial life forms. Finding traces of extraterrestrial life is only a matter of time—utilize the resources you have at your disposal strategically and you may well end up being the one to make the biggest scientific contribution towards advancing our understanding of alien life within our galaxy. You will also make use of over 200 cards to aid your efforts or focus your research in a particular direction for additional bonuses and rewards. Each card has unique effects and illustrations and depicts real-life technologies, projects, and discoveries (like the ISS, Large Hadron Collider, Perseverance rover, Voyager probe, and many more). The game is played in five rounds. The player with the starting player marker takes the first turn of the round. Players take turns in clockwise order, skipping any players who have already passed for the round. At the end of round 5, the final score is calculated and the player with the most points wins. SETI: Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence pays homage to space and planetary exploration, astronomy, the ongoing search for signs of life in the vastness of space, and efforts to understand the nature of life in the universe. —description from the publisher

How to play

Setup, how a turn works and how the game ends, summarised from the rulebook by Eko, Meepzy's rules assistant.

Here is a general overview of how to play the game:

Setup

Players set up the main board, player boards, tech board, and planetary board, along with components like figures, markers, publicity and score counters, and income cards (p. 2, 21).
Prepare 12 tech stacks with 4 tech tiles each, placing a 2-point tile on top of every stack (p. 5).
Prepare 4 stacks of end-of-round cards, each stack containing one more card than the number of players (p. 5).
Place rotation tokens on the tech board and the first end-of-round card pile (p. 5).
Place the 4 double-sided gold scoring tiles beside the board with a random side up (p. 5).
In games with fewer than 4 players, place nonplayer markers above the 20- and 30-point scoring track milestones (p. 5).

How a Turn Works

The game is played over 5 rounds, with the starting player taking the first turn and players taking turns in clockwise order (p. 7).
On your turn, you take only 1 main action, such as playing a card for its effect, launching a probe, orbiting or landing on a planet, scanning nearby stars, analyzing data, researching a tech, or passing for the round (p. 7, 28).
In addition to your main action, you can perform free actions at any time during your turn—before, after, or even during your main action (p. 7).
Once you have taken your main action and any free actions, your turn ends, and you resolve any milestones or discovered species before the next player takes a turn (p. 7).
If you pass, you are done for the round, but other players continue taking turns; once all players have passed, the round finishes, players collect income, and the starting player marker moves to the next player (p. 7).

How the Game Ends

The game ends after 5 rounds, once the last player has passed and final scoring is calculated (p. 7, 21).
The player with the most points wins, with ties broken in favor of whoever is the biggest Carl Sagan fan (joking that in 100-point games, tied players have earned their tie) (p. 21).

This summary was written by Eko from the game's own rulebook. It covers the essentials, not every edge case. For a specific rule, ask Eko and get the page it came from, or open the manual in the Archive.