Ruling — Fresco

You asked

How do I play?

Answered counted as answered

Asked with: Frescobg-66188-en-1e

The game of Fresko proceeds in rounds, with each round divided into phases:

1. Choosing get up time and adjusting mood

1. The player holding the last position on the victory point track goes first.[1]

2. The first player takes their master painter from the space above the hostel and places it on a chosen get up space in the left column.[1]

3. Other players place their master painters on any free get up space in order from second last position to first position.[1]

4. Immediately after choosing their get up time, a player adjusts their mood by moving their painter up or down the mood display column.[2]

5. The chosen get up time determines the price a player must pay at the market for one market tile.[3]

6. The chosen get up time also determines the player order for the actions in phase 2, with the player who chose the earliest get up time going first, followed by others in ascending order of their chosen time.[1][3]

2. Planning and performing actions

1. All players simultaneously plan their forthcoming actions behind a small screen.[3]

2. Players deploy available apprentices to the 15 spaces of their action sheet, with only one apprentice allowed per space to activate an action.[3]

3. After planning, players remove their screens and visit the five locations on the game board one after the other.[3]

4. At each location, attending players perform actions in order of their previously chosen get up time.[3]

5. An active player performs all their actions at a specific location before the next player performs theirs at that same location.[3]

6. If a player did not deploy an apprentice to a location, they are skipped for that location.[3]

7. Players may forfeit chosen actions, and must forfeit an action if they lack sufficient money or paint pieces.[3]

3. Ending the round and preparing the next round

1. After all players finish their actions, the next round begins.[4]

2. To prepare for the next round, players reveal their market booths face up.[4]

3. Players place their face down fresco tiles in front of them (if they have restored at least one segment).[4]

4. Players return their apprentices to their sleeping places at the top of the hostel.[4]

5. The player in the last position on the victory point track starts the next round by selecting their get up time.[4]

Game End

The game ends after a round if there are 6 or less fresco tiles remaining on the board at the start of a round.[4] Alternatively, in the expansion module, the game ends if the last two portrait cards have been revealed.[5] The game ends after the final round even if the fresco is not completely restored.[4]

[1] RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook · p.4 · Playing the game · 1. Choosing get up time and adjusting mood

[2] RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook · p.4 · Change of mood · Example:

[3] RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook · p.5 · 4HYRL[ WYPJLZ · Player order · Planning actions · Performing actions · Locations and actions: · Important:

[4] RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook · p.8 · Theater: Improve one's mood · End of the game and final scoring

[5] RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook · p.9 · The portraits · Changes in set up · Changes in game play · Additional game components · Preparing the next round: · Changes for 'End of the game'

Now you know — make it count.

🔧 debug — where this ruling came from

outcome: ANSWERED — Answered
corpus profile: live,vps
answerer pin (deploy-frozen, attribution only): gemma4:26b think:false 5571076f3d70
timings: search 103 ms · ask 7315 ms · total 7420 ms
single-flight (PR-5): queued 0 ms · generation 7420 ms
retrieval refs (raw) — what the PASSAGE SEARCH returned, not what the answerer read: [{"page": 12, "score": 0.048139, "snippet": "Use the same side of the game board as in a 3 player game, using rules (set up) for three players. An imaginary third player is introduced - his name is Leonardo. Leonardo does not receive any paint pieces and is not paid any income , but is awarded victory points. During set up Leonardo is given: r", "headingPath": "Rules for 2 players (basic game) · 1 . Choosing get up time · Market: Close down market booth", "sharpsignalDocId": 525}, {"page": 4, "score": 0.047123, "snippet": "Fresco lasts for several rounds; each round is split into WOHZLZ! Choosing get up time and adjusting mood Planning and performing actions )V[O WOHZLZ HYL UV^ L_WSHPULK PU KL[HPS! The player holding last position on the victory point track goes first. They take their master painter from his space abo", "headingPath": "Playing the game · 1. Choosing get up time and adjusting mood", "sharpsignalDocId": 525}, {"page": 5, "score": 0.032787, "snippet": "Depending on the get up time they choose, the column to the right shows the price a player has to pay at the market for 1 market tile. After all players choose their get up time the player order for this round is fixed. The player having chosen the earliest get up time will be first player during ph", "headingPath": "4HYRL[ WYPJLZ · Player order · Planning actions · Performing actions · Locations and actions: · Important:", "sharpsignalDocId": 525}, {"page": 8, "score": 0.032258, "snippet": "For each of their apprentices deployed at the 'theater' column a player may move their master painter 2 spaces upwards on the mood display. Please note: Any change of mood by visiting the theater will be effective on the next round after selecting the get up time. Only after this any apprentices are", "headingPath": "Theater: Improve one's mood · End of the game and final scoring", "sharpsignalDocId": 525}, {"page": 3, "score": 0.030769, "snippet": "2 3 Set up for a 3 or 4 player game Any distinctive features for a 3 player game are highlighted by a blue background \u0015\u0007\u0007The cathedral with fresco and altar Take one of the 25 fresco tiles va- lued 11 and place it face up in the center space of the fresco. Shuffle the remai- ning tiles and randomly ", "headingPath": "", "sharpsignalDocId": 525}, {"page": 1, "score": 0.030415, "snippet": "A game by Marco Ruskowski and Marcel Süßelbeck for 2-4 players aged 10 years and above The bishop awaits very high-ranking visitors, but unfortunately the large fresco - the painting at the ceiling of the cathedral - is in urgent need of being restored. 'Fresco' is an exquisite family game for 2-4 p", "headingPath": "Overview · Object of the game", "sharpsignalDocId": 525}, {"page": 2, "score": 0.030303, "snippet": "r KV\\ISL ZPKLK NHTL IVHYK r THYRL[ [PSLZ r MYLZJV [PSLZ with values from 3 to 11. r 60 coins (Thalers) with values of 1 (36x), 5 (16 x), and 10 (8x) r 78 paint pieces, 17 each of red, yellow, blue; 9 each of green, purple, orange r HWWYLU[PJLZ , 5 each in 4 colors r THZ[LY WHPU[LYZ 3 each in 4 color", "headingPath": "Game components · Gaming material per player · 1. The double-sided game board ... · 9. The bishop · 8. The theater · 7. ;OL ^VYRZOVW · …", "sharpsignalDocId": 525}, {"page": 9, "score": 0.030118, "snippet": "Renowned personalities want their portraits painted at the studio of the painters. This will be advantageous during the game! Who will benefit most from these privileges? This module will have an impact on Studio: Paint portraits and 'End of the Game'. Place all coins beside the game board. Sort the", "headingPath": "The portraits · Changes in set up · Changes in game play · Additional game components · Preparing the next round: · Changes for 'End of the game'", "sharpsignalDocId": 525}]
citations (raw) — what the answer cited, chosen from a retrieval this page cannot show: [{"page": 4, "quote": null, "headingPath": "Playing the game · 1. Choosing get up time and adjusting mood", "sharpsignalDocId": 525}, {"page": 4, "quote": null, "headingPath": "Change of mood · Example:", "sharpsignalDocId": 525}, {"page": 5, "quote": null, "headingPath": "4HYRL[ WYPJLZ · Player order · Planning actions · Performing actions · Locations and actions: · Important:", "sharpsignalDocId": 525}, {"page": 8, "quote": null, "headingPath": "Theater: Improve one's mood · End of the game and final scoring", "sharpsignalDocId": 525}, {"page": 9, "quote": null, "headingPath": "The portraits · Changes in set up · Changes in game play · Additional game components · Preparing the next round: · Changes for 'End of the game'", "sharpsignalDocId": 525}]
boost provenance — errata + base rulebook (E2/E3): no registered errata card matched this query; base rulebook doc 525 boosted; rulesage.errata.boost-enabled=true, rulesage.errata.supersedence-enabled=true
base rulebook doc 525 boosted
answered-before recall: this ruling was answered, so past rulings were not offered
similarity threshold in force: 0.55 (rulesage.answered-before.similarity-threshold; the exact-question tier is not gated by it)
answer fence: passed — letter density 0.92417 of 2176 non-space chars (floor 0.45); 0 glyph-index tokens (max 2)
debug row recorded: Aug 25, 2026 16:58 UTC

retrieval — what the passage search returned

what this block IS: the PASSAGE SEARCH's own results — the same search that fills this page's closest-passages list — and NOT the passages the answerer read. Answering runs its OWN retrieval: a far wider candidate pool, re-ranked down to a final handful, plus floors this search never applies — the base rulebook, surviving errata corrections, and one slot per book on a multi-book read. Each of those armed only if THIS ask sent what it needs: the boost block names the ids it forwarded, and the scope line names the books it read. A document the answer CITES that no row here names is therefore EXPECTED, not a defect: two searches, two candidate pools, two orders. The answerer's own final rows are shown in their own block below, beside these and never mixed into them.

score = the fused retrieval score (reciprocal-rank fusion over the search arms) — NOT a cosine similarity. This ruling ran the THREE-ARM fuse (full-text + vector + the doc-priority boost arm, which carried the base rulebook and/or the errata corrections this query matched), whose arithmetic ceiling is 0.04918 — all three arms ranking the same chunk #1 (ceiling = arms/(k+1) at k=60). The measured healthy band 0.016–0.033 was measured on TWO-arm asks and does not bound this one: its high end is the two-arm ceiling, and a third arm has room above it. A chunk only one arm ranked highly lands near 0.016 (that one arm's #1 vote), so 0.03 here is an excellent hit, not a 3% match.

per-arm ranks (the rank each search arm gave a chunk): NOT DISCLOSED by the gateway. Fusion happens gateway-side and only the FUSED score crosses the wire, so rulesage cannot show them without a gateway change. The rank column below is the FUSED rank (position in the returned list), which is real.

token count per chunk: NOT DISCLOSED — chunk token counts are not reported on the ask path. The character counts below are of the bounded snippet/quote rulesage actually received — a real measurement of what we hold, never an estimate of the chunk.

fused rank	document	heading	page	fused RRF score	snippet chars
#1	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	Rules for 2 players (basic game) · 1 . Choosing get up time · Market: Close down market booth	p.12	0.048139 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#2	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	Playing the game · 1. Choosing get up time and adjusting mood	p.4	0.047123 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#3	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	4HYRL[ WYPJLZ · Player order · Planning actions · Performing actions · Locations and actions: · Important:	p.5	0.032787 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#4	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	Theater: Improve one's mood · End of the game and final scoring	p.8	0.032258 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#5	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)		p.3	0.030769 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#6	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	Overview · Object of the game	p.1	0.030415 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#7	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	Game components · Gaming material per player · 1. The double-sided game board ... · 9. The bishop · 8. The theater · 7. ;OL ^VYRZOVW · …	p.2	0.030303 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#8	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	The portraits · Changes in set up · Changes in game play · Additional game components · Preparing the next round: · Changes for 'End of the game'	p.9	0.030118 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300

what the answerer read — the passages it actually had in front of it

what this block IS: the passages the ANSWERING read put in front of the answerer, in the order it read them — the other half of the two reads described above, and the one that decides what the answer could possibly say. Each row names the book it came from and where in that book it sits, what it scored when the search arms were fused, which arm carried it there, and whether the re-ranker chose it or a floor guaranteed it a slot. A row here that no passage-search row names is EXPECTED: a far wider pool, re-ranked, with floors the passage search never applies.

candidate pool: the answering read scored 21 passages, out of a ceiling of 80 set gateway-side. Both figures are reported by the gateway for THIS ask — measurements of what actually happened, not constants read out of anyone's source and printed here on faith.

floors armed for this ask: the base rulebook — armed · surviving errata corrections — not armed · one slot per book on a multi-book read — not armed. Every floor is stated on every ask, armed or not, so a floor that did not apply here is never mistaken for one this app does not know about.

arms fused for this ask: vector + full-text + the doc-priority boost arm. Stated separately from the rows because an arm that ran and carried nothing is a different fact from an arm that never ran.

read at	document	heading	page	fused rank	fused RRF score	carried by	how it got its slot
#1	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	Playing the game · 1. Choosing get up time and adjusting mood	p.4	#2	0.047123 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	vector + full-text + the doc-priority boost arm	the re-ranker chose it
#2	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	The bishop's bonus points:	p.7	#21	0.0125 (below 0.016, the low end of the measured band — a weak fuse (that band was taken on two-arm asks; only its low end, one arm's #1 vote, carries over to a 3-arm one))	vector	the re-ranker chose it
#3	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	4HYRL[ WYPJLZ · Player order · Planning actions · Performing actions · Locations and actions: · Important:	p.5	#3	0.032787 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	vector + the doc-priority boost arm	the re-ranker chose it
#4	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	Theater: Improve one's mood · End of the game and final scoring	p.8	#4	0.032258 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	vector + the doc-priority boost arm	the re-ranker chose it
#5	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	The portraits · Changes in set up · Changes in game play · Additional game components · Preparing the next round: · Changes for 'End of the game'	p.9	#8	0.030118 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	vector + full-text	the re-ranker chose it
#6	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	Change of mood · Example:	p.4	#9	0.029851 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	vector + the doc-priority boost arm	the re-ranker chose it
#7	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	Rules for 2 players (basic game) · 1 . Choosing get up time · Market: Close down market booth	p.12	#1	0.048139 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	vector + full-text + the doc-priority boost arm	the re-ranker chose it
#8	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)		p.3	#5	0.030769 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	vector + the doc-priority boost arm	the re-ranker chose it

chosen chunks — what the answer actually cited

#	document	heading	page	quote chars
[1]	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	Playing the game · 1. Choosing get up time and adjusting mood	p.4	no quote on the wire
[2]	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	Change of mood · Example:	p.4	no quote on the wire
[3]	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	4HYRL[ WYPJLZ · Player order · Planning actions · Performing actions · Locations and actions: · Important:	p.5	no quote on the wire
[4]	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	Theater: Improve one's mood · End of the game and final scoring	p.8	no quote on the wire
[5]	RULEBOOK Fresco — Rulebook (corpus doc 525)	The portraits · Changes in set up · Changes in game play · Additional game components · Preparing the next round: · Changes for 'End of the game'	p.9	no quote on the wire

generation — timing and the path taken

timing split: retrieval 103 ms · first delta 2857 ms · total 7420 ms (retrieval and first-delta both measured from the START of gateway work, so first-delta INCLUDES retrieval — do not subtract)
full breakdown: queued 0 ms · retrieval 103 ms · ask 7315 ms · gateway work 7420 ms · total 7420 ms
tokens in (the prompt the answerer read): 3553
tokens out (what the answerer generated): 593
tok/sec: 132.1 tok/sec — 593 output tokens in 4.488 s of generation
live seat (read from the running child): answering — gemma4:26b think:false · num_ctx 32768 (live-verified 47s ago)
answerer host (measured by rulesage): reachable (for 22h, checked 6s ago)
answerer node (the seat proxy's own header — this probe, not this ask): node1
stream path: streamed — the gateway pushed at least one accumulated draft
watchdog: first-token watchdog: 30s per arming window (rulesage.table.first-token-watchdog-seconds), re-armed once by the passages frame — so the worst case before a reader falls back to polling is 60s. Whether it actually fired is a BROWSER-side decision that never reaches the server, so it is not recorded here. The stream path above is the server's half of that story: whether a delta was emitted at all.
num_ctx · think posture: both are the CHILD's settings, not rulesage's, and no ask reply carries them — an answer never states which context window or think posture produced it. The live-seat line above reads them from the running child instead, where the gateway can answer for itself; it describes the child NOW, not this ask.

disposition

outcome: ANSWERED — Answered
abstain rationale (n/a — this ruling answered): answered — no abstain rationale applies

setup-shape — why the checklist band did or didn't render

decision: NOT_SETUP_SHAPED — no setup-shape pattern matched this question

errata registry — what the gate above had to match against

this game registers NO errata cards (edition 456), so "no registered errata card matched" above could never have matched one

Errata scope: the gate above matched this ruling's own edition only. When an ask also reads an expansion, that expansion's own registered errata cards stay outside the match — a stated phase-1 limitation, not a failed lookup.