The six sons of the Sultan have come to you, the foremost tea merchants in land, with a request:

Provide us with the best exotic teas the world has to offer and we will reward you richly (we may even favor you with special privileges if you impress us), but only one of you can become Chief Tea Merchant of the Sultanate!

Six Sons of the Sultan is a game for two players that takes about 15-20 minutes. Players will have 10 rounds to gain prestige by supplying different kinds of tea to the Sultan’s sons. Each type of tea has different costs and prestige points associated with it as well as special actions that may help the players during the game.

There is also a solitaire play option.

The game uses only 9 cards, 3 dice and some eurocubes. It can be printed, however, as a single page game board

Phase 1 - The Dice Roll
The start player begins the round by rolling all 3 dice (Note: in consecutive rounds each player will only roll two dice, having had one die passed to them previously). Once the dice are rolled they are assigned as follows:

One die is chosen as the Order Die, the die number corresponding to 1 of the 6 Tea Card numbers.

One die is then chosen as the Wealth Die, and will increase a player’s total wealth by the amount shown on the die.

The final die is the Passing Die and is passed to the other player. This die is locked and may not be rolled during the next player’s turn unless the player uses the White Tea card’s special action.

Phase 2 - The Tea Order
The player may now place orders on the Tea Card that matches the Order Die’s number, thus pleasing one of the Sultan’s sons. A player may move their eurocube token up the card’s track as many spaces as they are able to pay for (the bottom number denotes the price), moving their token on the Wealth card accordingly. If a player has (0) wealth they may not place an order this turn.

Spaces on the track also have a Prestige Point value which is totalled up at the end of the game (the top number shown for the space).

Certain marked spaces also allow the player to use the Special Action of that card. If a player can afford to move their token up a number of spaces, passing more than one Special Action space, only the final space landed on is counted. The space must be landed on to use the Special Action. The player does not have to use the Special Action if they do not want to.

Phase 3 - Wealth Gained
The player may now move their Wealth token the number of spaces as indicated on the Wealth Die.

The player’s turn is now over and the opposing player takes the remaining two dice and rolls them to begin their turn.

Once both players have had a turn, the round is over, the round token is moved down one space on the Time Card and a new round begins.

Game End
Play continues for a total of 10 rounds. When the 10th round is finished, players add up their respective Prestige Points to determine who will be the Chief Tea Merchant of the Sultanate. If the game ends in a tie, the player with the most accrued wealth is the winner.

Released in the September 2018 Board Game of the Month Club $10+ package.

Wordsmith