TODO: Please consider whether this page is an improvement over Variants. If it's not enough better to be worth changing the links on the game creation screen, then please delete this page.

You can create a game using almost any mix of the expansions, variants, and other options detailed below.

Besides what the brief description below says, most expansions also adds more corporations and project cards.

• All (a shortcut button to select all official expansions with a single click)
• Corporate Era (the complete base game; most never play without it)
• Venus Next (a fourth, optional global parameter)
• Prelude (two free cards to jump-start your engine)
• Colonies (compete over growing piles of resources)
• Turmoil (influence the new Martian government to your benefit)
• Promo Cards (includes all of them as a single batch, except any that require an expansion you aren't using)
• Fan-made
  • Ares (a variety of special tiles that focus the game more on the planet's surface)
  • Agendas (requires Turmoil; provides alternative ruling policies and bonuses)
  • Moon (alpha) (a second board with its own global parameters and tile types)
  • Community (a mixture of other fan-made stuff selected by the devs)

• Tharsis (the default map, milestones, and awards that come with the base game)
• Hellas and Elysium (two new boards with unique milestones and awards)
• Random (use a randomly chosen board from the three above)

Also see the "Randomize board tiles" option below.

For each "regular" Research phase, upon drawing 4 cards the players then select one at a time, passing the rest (alternating direction per generation), finally choosing which of their four selected cards to buy in the usual way.

Standard when Venus Next is included, but can be enabled or disabled separately. Each generation, the World Government raises one non-maxed global parameter (the outgoing start player chooses which one). Include to shorten the game.

A score-attack game -- but if you don't fully terraform the planet before the generation clock runs out, you lose! (No button: you get this mode automatically if there's only one player. Per official rules you should include the Corporate Era expansion.)

Changes the victory condition: now reach 63 TR any way you can. A new Standard Project "Buffer Gas" (16 MC -> 1 TR), available only in this game mode, can help.

These mostly apply to multiplayer games only, except Starting Corporations and Randomize Board Tiles.

To play this variant... add a sixth player. And maybe prepare for severe claustrophobia. No rule changes.

Set the number of corporations each player will select from during initial research.

Use drafting in the initial research phase. When drawing starting cards, draw only 5 project cards. Perform the usual select-one-pass-repeat routine with these 5 (passing in turn-order direction). Draw another 5 and do it again (passing against turn order). For Prelude cards, if present, do the procedure a third time. Now the game begins as usual.

The player on turn must perform two actions, or be forced to pass. For a group who tend to be clear on their top two priorities most of the time, the game will play faster this way.

Add Hoverlord/Venuphile to the game – or to the random pool (below). On by default (disabling it is the variant).

Endgame will not trigger until Venus is completed as well.

Endgame will not trigger until the Moon tracks are completed as well.

Give player(s) up to 10 additional starting TR as a game handicap. Or, give all players the same boost to slightly shorten the game.

Normally, each game board comes with a standard 5 Milestones and 5 Awards in play, with the Venus Next and Ares expansions adding an extra of each. These two variants instead choose the appropriate number randomly from a pool of all 15-17.

You get what you get. They might align too well, letting one player run off with them all.

Chooses milestones and awards meeting the conditions listed below. Synergy scores are based on this matrix.

• Total synergy score is 20 or lower. (Tharsis board has a total synergy score around 20. The other two boards have much lower scores.)
• No pair with synergy score 7 or above. (Prohibit landlord & desert settler or terraformer & benefactor.)
• At most two pairs that are 4+ in synergy score. (Allow two mayor & landlord or gardener & polar explorer.)

Rearranges the hex spaces of your selected map randomly, to provide a unique layout with every game.

Take the corps you hate out of the deck, add some from expansions you aren't using, or try a few community corporations.

List project and prelude cards by name (with autocompletion) to leave out of this game.

Choose what's in the colony pool, including community colonies.

Exclude all global events that decrease player resources, production, or global parameters.

Note the "game id" seen at the start or end of a Game Log; choose it here to replay that game, down to the exact shuffled order of every deck. Unselect "Random first player" to control which seat players are sent to.

Lets players undo their first action of any Action Phase turn (requires browser refresh afterward). In Solo, you can undo repeatedly, all the way back to the start of the phase (refresh after each!). Note that in either case, Undo can be abused to peek at the deck.

Seats all players at the table randomly (otherwise, exactly as entered, beginning with the generation-one start player).

Everyone will see a real-time VP total for their opponents, not just for themselves. Includes all point sources, but chairperson/party-leader VPs appear only once the endgame is triggered. Award VPs are assigned as shown on the award tracker (i.e., ignoring that a final production will happen).

A stopwatch is displayed for each player, counting upward whenever the game is waiting on that player. For informational value only - there are no consequences on the game.

Technically the game would start by offering each player a B.C., but that would get very old. So if anyone does want it, choose it here. Gets them into the game quicker without having to make big decisions up front. Expansions except Corporate Era disable this option. In solo just flip the switch called "Beginner".