Ticket to Ride Gameplay Overview

Turn Structure

1. On your turn, you must perform exactly one of three actions: Draw Train Car Cards, Claim a Route, or Draw Destination Tickets.
2. Play then passes clockwise to the next player.

Draw Train Car Cards

Draw 2 Train Car Cards to add to your hand. You may draw from the 5 face-up cards or from the top of the draw pile, in any combination.

1. Draw your first card: either take one of the 5 face-up cards, or draw the top card from the draw pile.
2. If you took a face-up card, immediately replace it with a new card from the top of the draw pile.
3. Draw your second card: again, take a face-up card or draw from the draw pile.
4. If you took a face-up card, replace it from the draw pile.

• If you take a face-up Locomotive as your first draw, you may NOT draw a second card. The Locomotive counts as both draws.
• You may draw a Locomotive from the top of the draw pile (blind draw) as either of your two draws without penalty.
• If you draw a non-Locomotive face-up card first, you may NOT then take a face-up Locomotive as your second draw. You may still blind-draw from the deck.
• If at any time 3 or more of the 5 face-up cards are Locomotives, discard all 5 face-up cards and deal 5 new face-up cards from the draw pile.
• If the draw pile runs out, shuffle the discards to form a new draw pile. If there are no discards left either, you cannot draw cards (only face-up cards remain).
• There is no hand limit for Train Car Cards.

Claim a Route

Play a set of Train Car Cards from your hand to claim one open route on the board between two adjacent cities.

1. Choose an unclaimed route on the board. You must have enough Train Car Cards matching the route's color and equal to its length.
2. For colored routes, play cards of the matching color. Locomotive cards are wild and may substitute for any color.
3. For gray routes, play cards of any single color (all the same). Locomotives may substitute for any of the chosen color.
4. Discard the played cards to the discard pile.
5. Place one of your Plastic Train Cars on each space of the claimed route.
6. Advance your Scoring Marker on the scoring track by the points earned for the route length.

• You may only claim one route per turn.
• You may not claim a route that is already occupied by another player's trains.
• Route scoring: 1 space = 1 point, 2 spaces = 2 points, 3 spaces = 4 points, 4 spaces = 7 points, 5 spaces = 10 points, 6 spaces = 15 points.
• A single player may never claim both routes of a Double Route (two parallel routes between the same cities).
• Double Routes: only one of the two parallel routes connecting the same cities may be claimed. Once one is claimed, the other is closed to all players. (2-3 players)

Draw Destination Tickets

Draw additional Destination Tickets to try to score more points by connecting distant cities.

1. Draw 3 Destination Tickets from the top of the Destination Ticket deck.
2. You must keep at least 1 of the drawn tickets, but may keep 2 or all 3.
3. Return any unwanted tickets face-down to the bottom of the Destination Ticket deck.

• Destination Tickets are kept secret from other players until the end of the game.
• Once you keep a Destination Ticket, you may not discard it later. You are committed to it for the rest of the game.
• If fewer than 3 Destination Tickets remain in the deck, draw only what is available. You must still keep at least 1.