Build a startup.
Betray your friends.

Set up in five minutes

Separate the 15 Startup cards and 5 Reference cards from the 98-card draw pile. Shuffle the draw pile and deal 5 hidden cards to every player. No particular attack or defense is guaranteed.

Deal each player 3 different Startup types from the Startup supply. They choose 1 and return the other 2; reshuffle before the next player chooses. Replace duplicate types within a deal. Different players may choose the same type.

Your company starts at $50M

Put your chosen Startup face-up. Its $50M always counts and it can never be taken or discarded. All five startup types use the same rules. Choose a random first player and play clockwise.

The finish line

Reach $1,000M or more at the end of your own completed turn, after every effect and reaction has resolved. Only one player wins. Your partner does not share the win. Players are never eliminated.

1 / Draw one

Draw 1 card from the draw pile. Whenever any effect takes your hand above 7, immediately choose and discard down to 7 before continuing. This applies after every draw or exchange, even outside your turn.

2 / Play up to two cards

For each card play, choose one card in your hand: bank it face-up in your startup for its printed valuation, or use its effect. You may play fewer than two, and you may choose the same kind of play twice. There is no payment to play a card.

Reaction cards may be used for their effects only at the printed trigger. On your turn you may bank a reaction instead. Cards such as Best Lawyers in Town and Crisis PR Team explicitly offer a normal card-play effect as well.

3 / Count your valuation

Add your Startup, your banked cards, then subtract active PR Crisis penalties. Count each card only once for your startup. Valuation never falls below $0. Check the $1B win, then pass.

One card, one use

Banking means placing the card upright in your startup. It adds its printed valuation, but its effect is unavailable. You cannot activate it later or take it back into your hand. Most attacks and defenses are worth only $10M when banked.

Using an effect adds no bank valuation. Discard the card after resolving unless it says to stay. Keep ongoing effects sideways beside the affected startup, or attached beneath their Employee, to distinguish them from banked cards.

What can Poach take?

Take 1 positive-value banked card from another startup: an Employee, Growth or Funding asset, an Investor, or a banked tactic. Never take a Startup identity, a Reference, an active alliance or an active effect marker.

Move the card; its previous owner loses its valuation and its new owner gains it. A banked card stays banked after being taken. Its effect never reactivates. Poaching an ally does not end their alliance.

Reactions are immediate

Pause before an attack or Investor resolves. The target may use one matching reaction from hand, or their current partner may defend on their behalf. Reactions do not use either player's two card plays. The target and partner get one response total.

Non-Compete cancels its listed attack automatically and is discarded. It uses that response. Offer They Can't Refuse only overrides Golden Handcuffs against Poach. It cannot override any defense against Ditch. No further response follows Offer.

Investor: a visible exchange

The target must have at least 1 card in hand. Give them the Investor face-up: it adds $50M to their startup. Take 1 random card from their hand, with card backs facing you. They may shuffle their hand before you pick.

Not For Sale cancels the entire exchange: no valuation is added and no hand card transfers. Discard the Investor and defense. If you bank Investor in your own startup instead, it adds $50M and no exchange happens.

Founder Scandal: look, choose, steal

Target a rival with at least 1 card in hand. Privately look at their complete hand, choose 1 card and take it into your own hand. Return the remaining cards to them without showing anyone else, then discard Scandal. The stolen card adds no valuation until banked. Crisis PR Team can cancel the entire attack before the hand is revealed.

Defending for a partner

Partners may use an eligible defense for one another, but never have to. For Ditch, only the partner being ditched can play Golden Handcuffs. Nobody else can intervene. A banked defense never protects anything.

Cease & Desist: back to hand

Choose 1 Growth card in a rival's startup and return it to their hand. They lose that card's valuation immediately and may replay it on their own turn. If their hand exceeds 7, they choose and discard down immediately. Best Lawyers in Town can cancel the attack before anything moves. Discard Cease & Desist after resolving.

Form a Strategic Alliance

Use Strategic Alliance as one of your two card plays. Choose an unpartnered rival who agrees; you must also be unpartnered. No Employees or other banked cards are required. Keep the alliance card between you, sideways: it adds no valuation. One partner per player.

Both keep their own startup cards, valuations, hands and turns. You can trade hand cards and use eligible defenses for each other. Only one player wins; your ally never shares your win.

Trade one card each

On your own turn, offer 1 card from your hand to your ally. They may decline, or offer 1 hand card in return. Privately show only these two cards to each other; other players do not see them. Both must agree before the swap.

If agreed, exchange the two cards and spend 1 of the offering player's two card plays. The reply uses none of the ally's card plays. Both hand sizes stay the same. Neither card is banked or activates its effect; valuations stay unchanged.

A refusal costs nothing

If an alliance invitation or trade is refused, return all offered cards to their original hands and spend no card play. Trades need a card in both hands. Partners may attack each other. The alliance ends only through a resolved Ditch, including its Golden Handcuffs reversal; other attacks do not end it.

Ditch your ally

Choose 1 banked card in your ally's startup. They must have a banked card to target. If unblocked, move that card into your startup: you gain its valuation and they lose it. End the alliance and discard its marker and Ditch. Startup identities, active effects and the active alliance cannot be taken.

Golden Handcuffs reverses Ditch

Only the ally being ditched can react. Cancel Ditch and choose 1 banked card from the attacker to take into your own startup instead. You gain that value; they lose it. If they have no banked cards, the attack is still canceled and the alliance ends, with no card taken.

Discard Ditch, Golden Handcuffs and the alliance marker. Offer They Can't Refuse cannot counter this reversal. Non-Compete does not stop Ditch or its reversal; attached defenses follow the card that moves.

The $125M betrayal

You have $725M. Your ally has $430M, including a Chief Scientist worth $125M. Successful Ditch takes the Scientist: you rise to $850M and they fall to $305M.

If they use Golden Handcuffs and choose your $100M CTO instead, you fall to $625M and they rise to $530M. Either outcome ends the alliance. Nothing is shared or counted twice.

Patent Lawsuit: skip once

A successful Lawsuit stays sideways beside the target as a reminder. At their next turn, discard it and skip that entire turn: no draw, card plays or win check. They may still react during other players' turns.

Only one pending Lawsuit per player; a second cannot target them while one is waiting. Best Lawyers in Town can cancel it immediately, or a partner can spend a card play to remove it before the skipped turn arrives.

PR Crisis: a visible -$75M

Keep PR Crisis sideways beside the affected startup. Subtract $75M while it stays; its printed +$10M bank value does not count. Each successful PR Crisis is a separate penalty and multiple copies stack.

Crisis PR Team can cancel an incoming PR Crisis or use one card play to discard an existing one from you or your partner. Removing it restores that $75M. No manual score adjustment is needed.

Attached defenses

A Non-Compete used for protection sits under its Employee and adds no valuation. It automatically cancels the next Poach against that Employee, then is discarded. It does not block Ditch.

The attachment follows its Employee to a new owner, including through Ditch. If the Employee is discarded, discard its attachment too. If Non-Compete was banked for $10M, it is just a positive-value card and protects nothing.

When the draw pile runs out

Shuffle the main discard pile into a new draw pile. Never shuffle Startups or References into it. If both piles are empty, skip draws until cards are discarded. Effects that draw multiple cards take as many as available.

A card being resolved is discarded only after its effect finishes. It cannot draw itself during a reshuffle. If a hand effect takes you above 7, discard down immediately.

Clear targets, simple ownership

A card needs a legal target before it is played. You may not use an effect that cannot resolve; bank it instead if you want its valuation. Everyone may inspect face-up cards, hand sizes and the discard pile. Hidden card faces remain private unless an effect reveals them.

No free card gifts, swaps or binding verbal deals. Investor, agreed alliance trades and printed card effects handle transfers. Table talk, promises and bluffing are encouraged. A pending effect never awards a win before its reaction window finishes.

Built for a first playtest

The draw pile contains 98 cards: 50 worth $50M-$150M and 48 tactics worth $10M when banked. Five-card opening hands, one draw and up to two card plays aim for a game of about 45 minutes.

That is a design target, not a measured result. This valuation-only edition changes the pace and needs live testing with 3, 4 and 5 players. Use the same printed rules for the first session before adjusting the card quantities.