6 cards, of 20
The intergalactic layer: one of these is voted in at the start of the day and applies to every table at once. Complexity is the wiki's own 1–3 rating.
At the end of setup, all players other than the Embers of Muaat player gain the War Sun unit upgrade technology. The Embers of Muaat player purges their faction-specific promissory note, unlocks their commander, and places 1 additional War Sun in their home system.
Players do not have to be neighbors to perform transactions with each other. Players do not have a maximum number of commodities; when they refresh commodities, they gain a number of commodities equal to their commodities value instead. Players can share non-faction technology with other players as part of a transaction. When sharing technology, the receiving player gains that technology from their own deck; the sharing player does not lose the technology.
Relics only require 2 matching fragments be purged instead of 3. The Naaz-Rokha Alliance's Fabrication faction ability and Black Market Forgery promissory note do not require purged fragments to match. All players can perform the following action: ACTION: Exhaust Dark Energy Tap and choose a non-home edge system that contains your ships to roll a 1 die. On a result of 1 - 4, draw a random unused red tile; on a result of 5 - 10, draw an random unused blue tile. Place that tile adjacent to the chosen system so that it is touching 2 non-home systems. Place a frontier token in the system if it does not contain any planets.
After you move 1 or more units into the active system, if that system is in The Fracture, gain 1 command token. When you activate a system in The Fracture, apply +1 to the move values of each of your ships.
During setup, place neutral infantry on each hazardous planet equal to that planet's resource value. At the end of each round, for each hazardous planet that is not controlled, replenish any neutral units that were destroyed during the game round. When a player gains control of a hazardous planet from the planet deck, they may research 1 technology; they may ignore a number of that technology's prerequisites equal to that planet's resource value.
After setup, put the Fracture into play. Then, each player simultaneously resolves the following effects in order. # Place 1 infantry onto each planet adjacent to your home system (or the Creuss Gate/The Sorrow, if playing those factions); gain control of and ready those planets but do not explore them. # Place 1 space dock on any planet you control and place your flagship and 3 fighters in its system. # Gain your breakthrough. # Research 1 technology; if you are the Nomad player, research 1 additional technology.