Andrew Lieffring

The worst part of Puerto Rico is counting out all the “colonists” and victory points you’ll need before you start the game. Here’s a way to get playing right away:

You’ll need 3 plastic bags or small containers (the boxes a set of Chessex dice come in work nicely) and a way to label them.

Label the first “3 Players: 58 colonists, 75 victory points”
Label the second “4 Players: 21 colonists, 25 victory points”
Label the third “5 Players: 21 colonists, 22 victory points”

If the numbers of colonists seem too high, remember that these are all the colonists you’ll need for the game, not the number in the supply at the start of the game. 1 colonist per player is going to start on the colonist ship!

When you’re playing with 3 players, just use the 3 player bag.
When you’re playing with 4 players, use the 3 & 4 player bags. When you’re done, fill the 4 player bag first, so that you can just dump the rest in the 3 player bag. It saves counting!
When you’re playing with 4 players, use the 3, 4 & 5 player bags. Again, when you’re done, fill the 4 & 5 first.

And there you go, you can now get to playing Puerto Rico in less time than it takes to say “Triangle Trade.”

The Alchemy rulebook suggests that you use 3-5 cards from Alchemy or none at all, but it’s just a suggestion and not a very good one! Donald X. put effort into making each card with a Potion in its cost worth buying even if it’s the only card that makes potions relevant. If the supply is full of cards that require potions you’ll get tired of them before long.