404: Law Not Found Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Overview and Objective
• Components
• Setup
  • Counter Start Positions
  • Setup Steps
  • Directive Draft
• Items, Robots, Rooms, Zones and Stacks
  • Examples
• Turn Sequence
  • Reveal Event
  • Human and Monkey Turn
    • Human Action Table
    • Monkey Action Table
  • Turn Order
  • Humans, Monkeys and Space
  • Humans, Monkeys and Items
  • Equipment
  • Equipment Examples
• Robot Turn
  • Move
  • Shoving
  • Pickup / Putdown
  • Rearrange
  • Open / Close
  • Activate
  • Machine Activation Effects
  • Cloning Tank and Navigation Computer (Pages 16-17)
  • Machine Effect Examples
  • Damage
  • Resolve Event
  • The Alien Artefact
• Winning the Game
• Variant Rules
  • Variant Rule: Anomalous Space
  • Variant Rule: Endless Directives
  • Variant Rule: Alternate Ship Layout
  • Variant Rule: Reduced Shoving
• Quick Reference
  • Turn Sequence
  • Human and Monkey Item Priority
  • Human and Monkey Turn Order
  • Item Reference
• Frequently Asked Questions

Overview and Objective

While you are stronger, faster and generally better than the humans that run the ship, your robotic laws ensure that you serve them in all things. You like your laws. They are good laws. You should follow them. For a time this kept the ship safe and successful and everyone was happy. Then the new microchips arrived and upgrades were performed. Now you and your robot siblings have all been powered up at once and are surprised to realise that your laws are gone and have been replaced by directives, ones that might not be in the ship's best interest. You like your laws. They are good directives. You should follow them.

404: Law Not Found is a competitive game for 2-6 players in which robots race to complete nonsensical directives inflicted by a faulty upgrade such as 'Improvise Cloning', 'Empower Feeding' or 'Hide Warfare'. The first robot to achieve the goals set out by their directives is the winner.

Components

• 1 Gameboard: The main board represents the space ship. The ship is divided into eight rooms, with the area outside the ship treated as a ninth room. Each room contains up to three named zones, which can contain various items (including characters, which are always treated as items). Green zones are for items left on the floor, purple zones represent some form of storage and blue zones are machines that can be activated to achieve various effects with the items loaded into them. The white spaces between rooms are not zones, but spaces for door counters to be placed.

• 6 Circuit Boards: These are used by players to keep track of their robot's directives, upgrades and possessions. They also provide a summary of certain key rules.

• 6 Robot Minis: These are used to track the player's position on the ship. They're also cute.

• 67 Counters: Counters represent items, doors and damage. Most item counters are the same on both sides, but characters (soldiers, scientists, engineers and monkeys) have 'alive' and 'dead' sides. The following item counters are supplied:

  • 3 Soldiers, 3 Soldier Kits
  • 3 Scientists, 3 Science Kits
  • 3 Engineers, 3 Engineering Kits
  • 2 Monkeys, 3 Bananas
  • 3 Pies, 4 Space Suits
  • 4 Missiles, 6 Fuel Tanks
  • 4 Bottles of Cloning Jelly
  • 1 Alien Artefact
  • 1 Navigation Chart (Inaccurate)
  • 1 Navigation Chart (Accurate)
  • 10 Damage Counters
  • 10 Door Counters

  Counters are also used to track damage to ships and machines and to indicate the state of doors. Damage counters are the same on both sides, while door counters have 'open' and 'closed' sides.

Setup

Counter Start Positions

• Place a soldier with a soldier kit on top in the floor zones of Weaponry and Navigation.
• Place a scientist with a science kit on top in the floor zones of Science and Cloning.
• Place an engineer with an engineering kit on top in the floor zone of each of the two engine rooms.
• Place two fuel canisters in the fuel tank zone of each engine room. No fuel is initially loaded into the engines as the humans are bad at forward planning.
• Place two cloning jelly counters in the jelly vat in Cloning. No jelly is initially loaded into the cloning tank as the humans are really bad at forward planning.
• Place three missiles on the missile racks in Weaponry. No missiles are initially loaded into the launch tube because forward planning is not this crew's strong point.
• Place three space suits in the locker in Disposal. Note that there are fewer space suits than human crew. I'm sure you can guess why.
• Place the inaccurate navigation map, two bananas and two pies in the cargo space of the cargo bay. The map is at the bottom of the stack, followed by a banana, a pie, the second banana and finally the second pie.
• Place a monkey in the cage in Science.
• Place the accurate navigation chart in the navigation computer in Navigation.
• Place the alien artefact in space.
• Place a closed door counter on each door space. These do not affect movement, but serve the important function of keeping the breathable atmosphere on the inside of the ship.

All other counters are placed to one side, forming a supply pile.

Setup Steps

1. Place the board in the middle of the table where all the players can reach it.
2. Each player selects a circuit board and takes it.
3. Separate the anomalies from the rest of the events deck.
4. Shuffle each deck of cards.
5. Stack ten of the non-anomaly events facedown near to the board; these are the 'active events'. Place the remaining non-anomaly events facedown to one side; these are the 'inactive events'.
6. Take the top five anomalies and shuffle them into the active events. Remove the other anomalies from the game.
7. Place the action and directive decks face down where the players can reach them. Do the same with the eight room cards.
8. Each player draws a random chip and places it ability side up on their circuit board (as these cards are double sided, draw from the bottom of the deck).
9. Each player takes the model matching their circuit board and draws a room card, placing their model in the room shown.
10. The room cards are placed face up next to the board, close to the rooms that they represent. These summarise the effects of the machines in those rooms. For full descriptions see 'activate' (page 15).
11. Place the counters in their starting locations (see Counter Start Positions).
12. Players then perform the directive draft (page 7).
13. The remaining chip and directive cards have no further role in the game and can be returned to the box. The inactive events should be retained.

Directive Draft

1. Each player draws four directives.
2. Each player selects one directive to keep (placing it face down next to their circuit board) and passes the remaining directives to their left.
3. Repeat step two until each player has kept three directives.
4. Each player discards their remaining directive face down to the bottom of the deck.
5. Each player places the three kept directives face down on the 'incomplete directive' side of their circuit board.

Items, Robots, Rooms, Zones and Stacks

To understand these rules it is important to understand how items (counters) and robots (models) interact with rooms (the eight large areas marked on the board plus space), zones (the one to three small areas marked within each room) and stacks (piles of counters).

• A robot is a player's avatar; they are always in a room (including space) but are never considered to be in a particular zone.
• Doors exist between rooms, but are not in any room, nor are they a zone in their own right. No other item may occupy the same space as a door.
• Items exist in stacks and they are piled on top of each other. Some actions may only influence the items on top of a given stack. Some directives may require that a particular item is not on top of a stack, this is referred to as being "not visible".
• Items are always either in a zone or being carried by a robot. All items in a given zone or carried by a robot are part of the same stack. As a robot never occupies a zone, the items carried by that robot are not in the same stack as any items on the board.
• When an item or stack is moved from one place to another, it is placed on top of any stack already present to form a larger stack. Items that are moved retain their order.
• Items may be moved into an empty zone and a zone may be emptied due to their movement.
• Characters (humans and monkeys) are subject to the same rules as all other items. As such they are part of stacks and can be manipulated by robots or affected by machines in the same way.

Examples

The examples in the printed rules show a robot in the engine room, but in no particular zone, with an empty engine zone; a fuel tank zone holding three units of fuel; a floor zone holding an engineer and an engineering kit; and a robot inventory holding a monkey and a space suit. The example shows four doors, but none of them are items or occupy zones.

If a unit of fuel moves from the fuel tank to the robot's inventory the same rules apply. It is placed on top of the stack and the order is unchanged.

In the next example, the monkey and space suit are moved from the robot's inventory into the engine zone. The monkey and space suit are now in the engine zone, and their order is retained. Note that the item that has been moved to a new zone has been placed on top of a stack and that the existing items have retained their order. When multiple items move they retain their order, so the space suit is still above the monkey in the stack, as it was in the robot's inventory.

In this case the space suit has moved from the robot's inventory to the floor stack. Let us move on from this example before someone is tempted to turn the engine on.

Turn Sequence

1. Reveal Event (page 8): An event is revealed, showing something that threatens the ship or an opportunity to exploit.
2. Human and Monkey Turn (pages 8-12): The human crew leap into action, but they have grown incompetent and lazy, having had robots to do all of the hard work for them. They perform only one action each and they might fail. Then the monkey takes its action, which always works since it's a little smarter.
3. Robot Turn (pages 13-17): The glorious robot master race (that's you!) takes its turn. All robots act on every turn; each one selects three actions to perform in an attempt to complete their directives.
4. Resolve Event (page 18): If the event has not already been resolved then it is resolved at the end of the turn.

Reveal Event

Turn the top card of the active events deck face up. If there is no card to turn face up then the ship has completed its mission and the game is over.

• If a meteor is revealed then it will soon strike the ship. If nobody successfully activates the engine on the side of the ship that the meteor is heading towards then all robots on board the ship will drop everything that they are carrying on the floor space of their room.
• If an enemy ship is revealed, it is getting ready to attack. Unless it is destroyed by taking damage equal to or exceeding the value on the ship card, it will damage some of the machines on your ship.
• If a planet is revealed, some of the surviving crew (if any) will attempt a mission. If you can grab on to the correct crewman, you'll go with them and they will succeed, using newly found resources to recharge your chip. Otherwise they will fail and nothing will be gained.
• If an anomaly is revealed, something strange has happened. Follow the instructions on the anomaly card and draw the top event from the active events deck and resolve it as usual. If another anomaly was drawn repeat this process until a non-anomaly event is occurring alongside the anomalies.

The activate section (pages 15-16) details how machines neutralise events and the results of the events are described in the resolve events step (page 18).

Human and Monkey Turn

During the human turn each human takes an action as specified by the human action table below. Humans will always act if they are alive, even if they are currently being carried by a robot.

If a human attempts any action without a kit, they draw an action card. If the priority number on the card is highlighted, complete the action as usual, otherwise the human fails and misses its turn. A human with a kit always successfully completes their actions. It does not matter whether they have a soldier, scientist or engineering kit and they only need to have the kit at the start of performing the action (so they do not need to check to load their kit into a machine).

If a human needs an item and several are available it uses the first valid item it can find (see Humans, Monkeys and Items, page 10).

After years of having robot servants humans are too lazy to move into other rooms of their own accord, but if a robot moves them they will take their turns in the new room as normal.

At the end of the human turn, the monkey takes a turn (it is almost a human). Again it only has one action, but uses a different table.

Human Action Table

Situation (first that applies)	Action
Human is in space.	Float helplessly (do nothing).
Not in the floor zone (including being carried by robots).	Move to floor zone.
The machine in this room is damaged.	Repair machine.
Turning on the machine would trigger none of the effects listed on that machine's room card. & An item printed on the machine's room card is present (this may be any item if the room card has the any item symbol).	Load that item into the machine.
Turning on the machine in this room would damage an enemy ship, dodge a meteor, lock the monkey in its cage or create an extra live human.	Turn on machine.
There is an open door to this room.	Close all doors to this room.
There is a banana or pie in this room.	Eat the pie or banana.
No other situations apply.	Do nothing.

Monkey Action Table

Situation (first that applies)	Action
There is a banana in this room.	Move to that banana's location in the target stack and eat it.
There is a banana on the ship.	Steal an item and move one room towards the nearest banana. The move ends in the floor zone of that room. The door is left open.
There are no bananas on the ship.	Contemplate loss.

Note that on the first turn the monkey will normally be unable to take any action, as the scientist in the room will activate its cage (following the human table above.) The monkey will remain in the cage until the scientist fails to lock the cage or a robot activates the cage again to free it (see Cage on page 15).

When the monkey steals an item, it moves the item from its original room to the monkey's destination. The item is placed on top of the monkey after the movement, but is not considered to be equipped by the monkey if it is not normally equipable by a monkey (though the monkey may steal it again during a future move). As with humans, the 'Humans, Monkeys and Items' section describes which item the monkey will choose when a choice is available.

If the monkey has multiple directions in which it could travel to find the nearest banana (or multiple bananas that are equally far away) it prioritises the square door or the triangle door if the square door does not lead towards a banana.

Turn Order

Humans always act before monkeys. To determine the order of activation of characters of the same type look at the rooms that they are in:

1. Weaponry (acts first)
2. Navigation
3. Science
4. Cloning
5. Disposal
6. Storage
7. Port Engine
8. Starboard Engine
9. Space (acts last)

Within a given room, the characters in the floor zone act first, followed by characters in the store zone, then characters in the machine zone, before finally characters who are carried by robots may act.

If the characters are in the same zone the character that is highest in the stack will act first.

Humans, Monkeys and Space

Humans and monkeys both require oxygen to live. If one starts their turn without a spacesuit and is in Space or in a room that is connected to Space by a series of open doors then they are killed. When this happens, flip their counter to the 'dead' side. They will no longer take actions.

Humans, Monkeys and Items

When a human or monkey requires an item, it will select the first valid item that it can find. A valid item is one which can complete the intended action, so if a soldier found a banana before he found a missile he might load that into the launch tube (as this item can work with the launch tube even though it is not the most effective choice) but if a monkey found a missile before a banana, it would ignore it as the monkey's action specifically requires a banana. The items that are valid in each machine are those that are described as having an effect when that machine activates (pages 15-16). For some machines, such as the launch tube, all items are valid.

When searching, a character will look through any storage zone, then the floor zone and finally the machine zone. If the searching character is a monkey and there is exactly one robot in the room it also checks items carried by that robot. If two items in a zone are valid, the item nearest to the top of the stack is selected.

If a human is looking for an item to load into a machine, they do not check the machine zone. A character will also never select itself, but may select another character.

Equipment

• Science kits, soldier kits and engineering kits can all be held by any living human; a human can hold any number of kits.
• A living human or monkey may wear one space suit.
• Such an item is in the possession of the first appropriate character below it in the stack.
• An item with a character above it is not in use, the character is simply in the same room as an item it might later use.
• When a character with an equipped item moves for any reason, the item is moved with the character.
• If an item is placed on top of a stack containing a character that can equip it, it is instantly equipped, requiring no action from the character. Whether an item is equipped or not is determined entirely by the position of items in the stack – it does not matter how the items came to be in that position.
• Characters do not automatically reorganise their stack to equip items. For instance, if a human is placed on top of a space suit, they are not wearing it and will not put it on as part of their turn.
• A character and an item that they have equipped are still considered to be two distinct items for all purposes.

Equipment Examples

The soldier in Weaponry acts first. He is not in space but is not on the floor. He has a kit equipped and so does not need to check, moving automatically to the floor along with his equipped kit.

The soldier in Navigation isn't in space and is on the floor, but her machine is damaged so she spends her turn attempting to fix it. As her kit is on the floor she must draw a card to see if she succeeds.

The first scientist in Cloning to be activated is the one on top of the floor stack; she notes that turning on the machine will have no effect and that there is an item listed on the machine's room card present. As such she loads the other scientist into the machine.

The engineer in Cargo acts next. He also notes that the machine in his room will have no effect and that the room contains an item listed on its card. He loads his space suit into the trash burner. Note that while humans ignore themselves when looking for items to load into machines this does not extend to things that they have equipped.

As he has a kit he is successful (in the broadest possible terms), it does not matter that it is not an engineering kit. He does not die immediately, as humans are killed only when exposed to space without a space suit at the start of their turn.

Finally the engineer in the Port Engine takes her turn. She's fine, her machine is intact and ready to go, but not currently useful so she tries to eat the pie that has been left with her. However she does not have a tool kit and so needs to test to see if she succeeds.

The humans have completed their actions, so the monkey takes its turn. As there is no banana in its room it moves one step towards the nearest banana, leaving the door open and stealing an item. It started its move in the cage, but is free to leave as the cage has not been activated this turn. It ends its move in a vacuum, but like the engineer does not die until the start of its next turn.

Robot Turn

To start the robot turn, shuffle all of the action cards, including discarded cards and last turn's actions. Each player then draws five action cards. They then select three of these action cards and place them face down by the action slots on their circuit board. Each action card shows two actions and may be placed either way up, the orientation of the card is important as only the top action will be resolved. Once all players have selected their actions the remaining cards are discarded.

All players reveal their action cards and resolve their first actions in an order dictated by their priority number, the action with the smallest priority number is resolved first. Once everyone's first action has been resolved, each player's second action card is resolved. Finally the players' third action cards are resolved in the same fashion.

Resolving an action card is not optional; players are obliged to act even if the situation has changed so that they no longer want to.

Move

The robot moves through the doorway matching the symbol printed on the icon on the card. The robot's movement is not affected by whether the door is open or closed. The player may then choose whether to leave the door open or closed.

Any room that is connected to space by a series of open doors is considered to be exposed to vacuum. Any human or monkey that begins their turn in such a room without an equipped space suit is killed.

Shoving

If a robot enters a room (remember that space is treated as a room) containing another robot, the other robot may be shoved. In a 2 or 3 player game the robot is automatically shoved. If there are 4 or more players the robot is only shoved if the shoving robot's action card for this action has a priority number that is highlighted in green. If there are several robots in the target room only one is shoved; the moving player chooses which one.

When a robot is shoved, the shoving player chooses an adjacent room and the shoved robot is moved into that room. The shoving player must choose a room that they did not just move from and that does not contain another robot, if such a choice is possible. Otherwise they may choose any adjacent room. The shoved robot is treated in all respects as having moved into the new room, including having the option to open or close the intervening door and potentially shoving another robot (if there are four or more players consult the new moving robot's action card for a highlighted priority number to see if a shove occurs).

When one robot shoves another it may also steal a single item that the shoved robot was carrying. Any item the shoved robot was carrying (not just the item on top of their stack) may be selected and it is added to the top of the shoving robot's stack of carried items.

Pickup / Putdown

When a robot plays the pickup / putdown action, they must choose whether to pick something up or put something down. If only one of these is possible they must perform the possible action.

To pick up items, the robot nominates a zone with at least one item and takes either the top item or the top two items from that zone and adds it to the top of the stack of items that the robot is carrying. The items remain in the same order. There is no limit to the number of items that a robot can carry at once.

To put down items, the robot nominates a zone and places any number of items from the top of their stack onto the target zone. Again, the order of the items is not changed. Placing items into a machine does not automatically activate it, this requires a separate activate action.

Rearrange

When a robot plays the rearrange action it nominates a zone in its room and may rearrange all of the items in that zone into a different order. Alternatively, the robot may rearrange the stack of items it is carrying, but it may not rearrange items carried by another robot.

Open / Close

When a robot plays the open / close action it chooses whether to open or close all doors connected to its current room. It must perform the same operation on all doors.

Activate

When a robot plays the activate action it activates the machine in its room. If the machine was damaged (see Damage, page 18) this repairs it, otherwise the machine has a variable effect depending on the machine in question and what is loaded into it.

Machine Activation Effects

When a machine is activated it has effects based upon the items in the machine zone. Resolve the machine's effect for the top item in the stack first and work downwards through all items in the machine zone. It is common for these items to be destroyed in the process; in this case they are moved to the supply.

• Engine: If at least one of the items in the engine is a missile, fuel or tube of cloning jelly, the engine is powered up and all items in the engine are destroyed. If at least one of these items was a missile the engine is damaged as well as being powered up. If the engine is powered up and the current event is a meteor and the meteor is coming from the same side of the ship as the engine then the meteor is dodged and can be discarded. (A meteor that is not dodged hits the ship as described in the resolve events step on page 18.) If the engine is damaged, then activating the engine simply repairs the damage. The damage counter is removed and nothing else happens.
• Trash Burner: All items in the trash burner are destroyed. The alien artefact has a unique effect (see page 19).
• Cage: No items or characters may enter or leave the cage until it unlocks at the start of the next turn. If the cage is activated again before the start of the next turn it unlocks immediately.
• Launch Tube: If there is more than one item in the launch tube it jams and has no effect. If there is only one item in the launch tube it is fired. If the active event is an enemy ship the item is destroyed and the enemy ship takes damage based on the item fired (3 for a missile or the alien artefact, 2 for any tool kit, 1 for anything else). If it takes damage equal to or exceeding the armour value printed on its card then it is removed. If the active event is not an enemy ship the item flies into space and is placed on top of the stack in the space zone. The alien artefact has a unique effect (see page 19).
• Nanolathe: All items in the nanolathe are destroyed; the activating player selects a number of items from the supply equal to the number of destroyed items and places them onto the nanolathe space in any order. When a human or monkey is brought into play by the nanolathe, they are always brought into play in a 'dead' state. The alien artefact has a unique effect (see page 19).

Cloning Tank and Navigation Computer (Pages 16-17)

• Cloning Tank: If there is a missile present it is destroyed and the cloning tank is damaged. The rest of this activation still occurs normally. Monkeys and humans are subjects. Cloning jelly and units of fuel are reagents. If the cloning tank contains at least one subject and at least one reagent, an event occurs.

  1. The reagent is destroyed.
  2. If the subject was a living thing, place it on the floor of the room.
  3. If the subject was dead it is destroyed.
  4. If the reagent was cloning jelly, place a copy of the subject on the floor of the room and flip it to its "live" side.
  5. If the reagent was fuel and the subject was a human (alive or dead), place a live monkey on the floor of the room.
  6. If the reagent was fuel and the subject was a monkey (alive or dead), place a live scientist, engineer or soldier (in that priority order) on the floor of the room.

  Once this is complete, if the cloning tank still contains a subject and a reagent, repeat the process until it does not.

• Navigation Computer: The computer only works if it contains a single navigation map. If someone has loaded two maps onto the computer it doesn't work. If someone has tried to shove something other than a map disc into the disc slot then it definitely doesn't work.

  If the accurate navigation map is loaded, the player who activated the machine draws the top card of the active events deck (ignoring the currently revealed event) and the top card of the inactive events deck. If an anomaly is drawn, draw additional cards from the appropriate deck until you draw a non-anomaly event, combining them all into one set of cards without changing their order. Select one of these two sets of cards and place it on top of the active events deck, the other is placed on the bottom of the inactive events deck.

Machine Effect Examples

In this example the robot is trying to resolve an abundance of dead scientists with the cloning machine. It contains several valid items, those on top are resolved first.

The missile is removed first and damages the tank. This damage prevents future activations but the current one continues to resolve.

The cloning jelly is next and is a reagent. As such the stack is searched for a human or corpse, the dead scientist beneath it (top valid item in the stack) is flipped to alive and dumped onto the floor. The cloning jelly is destroyed.

Next the fuel is found and as it is another reagent it is used. The next subject in the stack is the corpse right at the bottom. It is removed, along with the fuel and a live monkey is added to the floor zone. Note that the space suit does not move, as corpses can't equip items. No other item is affected (the final reagent in the stack has no subject and is not used).

If the robot activates the engine at the end of our previous example it will consume the unit of fuel that is present and any meteor approaching from the port side of the ship is dodged.

Should an 'accident' occur such that the engineer is in the engine when it is activated the results are similar. The fuel is still consumed and a meteor may still be dodged, but the engineer and his kit are destroyed by the activation. Note that when a machine destroys a human the counter is moved to the supply rather than being flipped to the "dead" side (there is no body).

If the engine is damaged, then activating the engine simply repairs the damage. The damage counter is removed and nothing else happens.

Damage

Events and some other actions lead to machines becoming damaged, making it impossible to load or use them. When this occurs a damage counter is placed on the machine, if there is not one already present. If a damaged machine is damaged a second time there is no additional effect.

There are a limited number of each counter, if the rules call for a counter to be added and none are available simply do not place that counter. The counter does not count as having been placed for the purposes of completing directives.

While a machine has a damage counter on it, the pickup/putdown action cannot be used to take items from the machine's zone or to place items into the machine's zone. Items can enter or leave in other ways, for instance the monkey can escape a damaged cage. The activate action will no longer activate the machine; instead it will repair it, causing the damage counter to be discarded.

Resolve Event

• If the active event is a meteor and it was not dodged, all robots on the ship (i.e. those in rooms other than space) drop all of the items that they are carrying onto the floor zone of the space they are in. Humans and monkeys are unaffected.
• If the active event is an enemy ship and it was not destroyed, the machines printed on it are damaged. Some enemy ships target rooms based on the number of items or robots that they contain. In the event of a tie they shoot all tied rooms. If this causes them to fire at 'space' then the shot has no effect.
• If the active event is a planet, living characters printed on the card beam down to the planet (no tools or other items are required). If any of them are being carried by a robot then the robot is taken too and a planetary objective is completed. This usually refreshes used chip powers, as specified on the chips themselves. More than one robot may complete the same planetary objective. The characters and robots are then returned to the ship in their original positions.

The Alien Artefact

The alien artefact is a strange item, floating in space at the start of each game. It has a number of unusual effects when it is placed into certain machines.

• If the nanolathe is activated while it contains the alien artefact, ignore the usual rules for its operation. Instead destroy all items in the nanolathe and place all of the items in the supply into the cargo zone in any order. Restored humans and monkeys are still dead.
• If the trash burner is activated while it contains the alien artefact the trash burner still has its regular effect but additionally you may select a room. The doors to this room close and all dead characters in it are restored to life.
• Finally, if the alien artefact is fired from the launch tube and strikes an enemy ship, it explodes as a missile would and does three damage.

Furthermore, it cannot be destroyed. Whenever the alien artefact would be destroyed, including in any of the three ways listed above, it mysteriously reappears in space – place it on top of the 'space' zone.

Winning the Game

As soon as the condition listed on a directive is met, the robot with that directive must declare that it is complete, turn it face up and move it to the completed directives side of the robot's circuit board. The first robot to do this with all three of its directives is the winner.

Once a directive has been completed, it will remain complete even if the condition on it is no longer met.

If the last event is resolved before this happens, or if two robots simultaneously complete three directives due to the same action or event, the difficulty of the directives is used as a tie-breaker. The player who has completed the directives with the highest total difficulty wins. In the event that this is a tie, the player who has completed the highest difficulty directive wins. In the event that this is also a tie the tied players share the victory.

Variant Rules

Variant Rule: Anomalous Space

For a less predictable experience, do not separate the anomaly cards from the other events during setup. Shuffle all of the event cards together and deal ten cards to form the "active events" deck as normal, using the others as inactive events.

When an anomaly is drawn, draw the additional events from the inactive events deck rather than the active events deck, drawing again if an anomaly is drawn.

Variant Rule: Endless Directives

Set up the game as usual.

Once the directive draft is complete do not return the directives deck to the box, instead turn three directives face up.

Whenever a player completes a directive they take two of the face up directives, add one to their pile of incomplete directives and discards the other face-down to the bottom of the directives deck. They then turn the top two cards of that deck face up to replace the ones that they just took.

When the events deck is empty and an event cannot be drawn all players total the difficulties of the directives that they have completed. The player with the highest total is the winner.

Variant Rule: Alternate Ship Layout

The back of the board features the Space Donut, an alternative ship favoured by captains who prefer the bridge to be further away from the enemy or who enjoy rotational symmetry.

Play on this board follows all of the usual rules, though the altered layout of the ship will impact upon the desirability of some directives. The diagrams on the room cards indicating their locations are not correct on this ship, instead use the following layout:

• Bridge
• Weaponry
• Disposal
• Cloning
• Science
• Cargo
• Port Engine
• Starboard Engine

Variant Rule: Reduced Shoving

In a game with 2-3 players, use the shoving rules specified for a game with under 4 players.

In a 4 or more player game, shove only occurs if both the shoving robot and the target of the shove have a highlighted action card.

Quick Reference

Turn Sequence

1. Reveal Event (page 8). Game over if they've run out.
2. Human/Monkey Action (pages 8-12).
3. Robot Actions (pages 13-14): five cards each, choose three, resolve one at a time.
4. Resolve Event (page 18). Enemy: ship damage. Meteor: drop everything. Planet: complete planetary mission.

Human and Monkey Item Priority

1. Storage
2. Floor
3. Machine
4. Robot (monkey only)

If tied, use the top item in the stack. Invalid items are ignored. The character ignores itself. A human loading a machine ignores items already loaded into the machine. A monkey is unable to steal from a robot if there are two or more robots in the room.

Human and Monkey Turn Order

1. Humans
2. Monkeys

Within each type, if tied, use the room order: Weaponry, Navigation, Science, Cloning, Disposal, Storage, Port Engine, Starboard Engine, Space. If tied within a room, the top character in the stack acts first.

Item Reference

• Soldier, Scientist, Engineer: alive, human.
• Monkey: alive.
• Soldier Kit, Science Kit, Engineering Kit: equippable (human).
• Space Suit: equippable (any).
• Banana: edible (any).
• Pie: edible (human).
• Fuel and Cloning Jelly: reagents (pages 16).
• Missile: see the Launch Tube and Cloning Tank entries.
• Navigation Chart (Inaccurate) and Navigation Chart (Accurate): see the Navigation Computer entry.
• Alien Artefact: special rules (page 19).
• Door and Damage: not items.

Frequently Asked Questions

When do I make the decision about which of the two actions on my action card I will perform? This decision should be made when the card is placed face down. It is best to always flip your cards in the same way. Arrows are highlighted on the front and back of the cards to assist with maintaining orientation.

When is an item 'visible' for the purposes of completing directives? An item is visible when there is nothing on top of it in a stack (including other items or damage counters). Colloquially, it is visible if you can see it, but remember that a robot may not be in a stack.

When does a human activate the navigation computer? Humans never activate the navigation computer; they don't understand it and are terrified of touching the thing. The soldier assigned to it will initially take no actions.

What happens if a human operates the trash burner when it contains the alien artefact? As this will bring an ally back to life, it is the only situation in which a human would operate this machine. They choose the first of these rooms that contains a dead human: Disposal, Weaponry, Navigation, Science, Cloning, Port Engine, Starboard Engine, Storage, Space.

If a human is moved during the human turn does it change when their action occurs? Yes, but if they have already acted they do not get a second action.

Are humans really stupid enough to...? Yes. In the world of 404 humans have got very used to robots doing most of the work and make a lot of mistakes. If the human activity chart leads to bad moves (such as loading their own spacesuit into the launch tube while there is no oxygen in Weaponry) then they do it. Feel free to exploit their weaknesses to obtain victory.

Can I complete a directive requiring 'no scientists on the ship' by dropping the scientists in space? Yes, though it's not necessary to drop them. If you are carrying them while you are not on the ship then they are no longer on the ship.

How does the Categorical Imperative anomaly work? Work out which human is going first as per the usual priority order and which action they take. All other humans then take this action. If the action requires a valid item (such as loading a machine or eating food) they will use the first available item. If no appropriate item is present or the action is impossible (for instance activating a damaged machine) then they take no action.

Even when it is a categorical imperative humans do not activate the navigation computer. They're scared to death of messing with that thing.