In the kingdom of Emara: During the reign of King Thedorius the Wise, wars, uprisings, and other inconveniences became a thing of the past. Thedorius cared for the well-being of his subjects over power or wealth. With this in mind, only the nobleman who can care for Emara's citizens as well as Thedorius himself did will become Thedorius' successor and wear the Crown of Emara.

To test the skills of the aspirants, Thedorius and his counselors bring a challenge of practical use: Whoever can convince the majority of the newly arrived citizens in the capital to support their claim will become the future king of Emara. To become king, players have to cater to the citizens' needs and have proper housing for everyone. Therefore promoting building activities in town will be one of the major tasks of candidates.

Crown of Emara cleverly combines card actions with worker movement actions, letting players plan their turns during downtime. The two counselors available to every player move in two separate roundabouts, needing players to optimize each move. Plus, two scoring tracks bring a multidimensional style as only the lower score counts towards victory and therefore both tracks have to be advanced equally.