Atelier
Atelier Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Content
- 40 Blank Canvas Cards
- 30 Drawing Canvas Cards
- 25 Painted Canvas Cards
- 10 Joker Cards (printed "Carte Jolly")
- 5 Objective Cards
Purpose of the Game
In Atelier you will transform into skilled painters ready to paint eccentric masterpieces! Each artist will try to create as many paintings as possible before the others, so that they can be considered "original". In the game there are three types of cards: blank canvases, drawn canvases and painted canvases, each card can also be used as a "color". Players will collect the right colors to prepare blank canvases, draw them and finally paint them; as the paintings are created the player will also create his own palette. In the game there are objectives that the player will try to achieve during the game. The aim of the game is to create a good number of possibly original paintings and to achieve as many objectives as possible.
Preparation
Take the cards in the box and put the 5 Objective cards aside. Put all the other cards together to form a single deck and shuffle it. Place the deck face down on the table (1 in the next image), so that all players can reach it. Choose the first player, i.e. the one who last visited an art exhibition or a museum, and starting from him each player draws a number of cards according to the following scheme (regardless of the number of players):
- 1st Player --> Draw 5 Cards
- 2nd Player --> Draw 6 Cards
- 3rd Player --> Draw 6 Cards
- 4th Player --> Draw 7 Cards
- 5th Player --> Draw 7 Cards
After everyone has drawn, reveal the first 8 cards of the deck on the table and arrange them in a circle face up (2), finally place the 5 objective cards so that everyone can see them (3) together with the table of secondary colors present on the last page of the regulation (4).
How to Play
The game takes place in clockwise turns, starting from the first player and proceeding clockwise. On your turn, you can decide whether to DRAW OR PLAY CARDS. After choosing, the player whose turn it is takes the action and passes to the next player.
Fish
If you have chosen to fish you can:
- Draw 2 face-up cards adjacent (close) to each other from the circle of face-up cards. After drawing the two cards, the cards must be replaced with other cards from the deck.
- Draw 2 cards face down from the top of the deck.
- Draw any 1 face-up card and a card from the top of the deck (or vice versa). After drawing both cards, the face-up card is replaced with a card from the deck.
A player cannot have more than 10 cards in his hand. If after drawing he has more than 10 cards, he discards until he reaches 10 before moving on.
Example: Simona decides in her own turn to fish. Looking at the exposed cards, she sees a canvas she needs and decides to draw it (card A). Now he must draw his second card. He can decide to draw either a card between B and C or draw from the face-down deck of cards. Simona decides to draw card C. Once her drawings are finished, Simona takes two cards from the deck and places them, face up, in place of the A and C cards she has just drawn.
How a Canvas Paper Is Made
Diagram key:
- Color: the color that is obtained by discarding this card or rotating it if present in your palette.
- Canvas Type: indicates the type of canvas: White Canvas (blank), Drawn Canvas, or Painted Canvas.
- Cost: indicates the colors (to discard or rotate) needed to add this card to your palette.
Playing Cards
To play a card from your hand you must pay the color cost shown on the side of the card. The cost is shown on the card twice, both on the right and on the left, for the convenience of the player, who can orient the cards in his hand as he prefers, but it will only have to be paid once.
The cost can be paid:
- by discarding cards from your hand that show the brushstroke of the requested color at the top, or
- by drawing from the colors of the cards that we have already brought into play, which form our "palette". To draw a color from the palette, simply rotate the paper with the required color present in the palette slightly. By doing so you will satisfy the cost of the color.
After you have paid the cost, place the card face up in front of you vertically: that card is now part of your palette. Newly played cards can be used in the same turn to produce color (by rotating them slightly). At the end of the turn, before passing, return all your cards slightly rotated vertically.
Example: It is Federico's turn and B decides to play cards from his hand. Federico wants to play the drawn card marked A. To do so he must pay a cost of 1 white, 1 magenta and 2 blacks. Before discarding cards from his hand, Federico checks his palette: 1 white, 1 magenta and 1 black are there! Federico then draws the colors from the three cards (B). Unfortunately he doesn't have a second black in his palette and therefore decides to discard a black from his hand (C) to complete the drawing.
Types of Cards and How to Play Them
The cards are divided into 4 types and each can be played in a different way.
- Blank Canvas: Blank canvases are the basis of our paintings. They can be played freely during the turn by paying the cost in colors. You can play up to a maximum of 3 Blank Canvases in your turn.
- Drawn Canvas: Designed canvases can only be played on a Blank Canvas and, as with blank canvases, we must pay the cost in colors. You can play up to a maximum of 2 Drawn Canvases in your turn.
- Painted Canvas: Painted Canvases can only be played on top of a Painted Canvas of the same type. As in the case of blank canvases and drawn ones we have to pay the cost in colors. In these canvases, however, we not only find primary colors, but secondary colors are also required (see secondary colors). You can play up to a maximum of 1 Canvas Painted in your turn.
- Wild Color Cards: Wild color cards cannot be placed on your palette, but can only be used to pay the cost of other cards by discarding them from your hand. The Joker provides a primary color of your choice. Warning: you cannot use it to create secondary colors.
Warning: In the turn it is possible to play more than one card but only one type at a time. For example, it is possible to play 3 Blank Canvas in the same turn or 2 Painted Canvas, but it is not possible to play, for example, a Canvas White and a Drawn Canvas.
Primary Colors and Secondary Colors
Looking at the cards you will realize that the Painted Canvases require, as a cost, some colors that are not normally present on the cards. This is because they need to be paid with Secondary Colors. All the cards have one of the three primary colors (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow), White or Black at the top of the brushstroke. By mixing these colors, as indicated in the scheme on the last page of the regulation, it will be possible to obtain the Secondary Colours.
Secondary Colors can be generated by discarding from your hand the two primary colors required by the scheme or can be generated by rotating two cards with the primary colors required by our palette. We can also create a secondary color by discarding one color from our hand and rotating the other from our palette.
Warning: Jokers cannot be used to create secondary colors.
Example: To obtain the secondary color red we must combine the magenta to yellow. To do this we can:
- discard one card with a magenta color and one with a yellow color.
- discard a card with a magenta color and draw the yellow color from a card in the palette.
- discard a yellow card and draw magenta from a card in the palette.
- draw the yellow color from a card in the palette and the magenta color from a card in the palette.
Fake Paintings and Original Paintings
When a player drops a painted canvas, if he was the first to complete that work, he creates an Original work. Players who create the same painting later will be considered Forgers and the work will be "a fake". To remind you which paintings are fake, turn the fake card upside down.
Objective Cards
The first player to meet the requirements for an objective card during the game takes it. At the end of the game he will earn the points shown on the card.
- Objective Drawn Canvases: The first player to have 3 drawn canvases in his palette will get 3 additional points at the end of the game.
- More Colors Goal: The first player to have all 5 colors in his palette will get 2 additional points at the end of the game.
- One Color Objective: The first player to have only one color repeated on 5 cards in his palette will get 2 additional points at the end of the game.
- Blank Canvas Lens: The first player to have 7 blank canvases in his palette will get 1 additional point at the end of the game.
- Painted Target: The first player to have 1 painted canvas in his palette will get 4 additional points at the end of the game.
Note on the photo: the printed page is folded and partly overlapped by the card illustrations, so some letters of the objective headings and of the points text are obscured. The headings above are completed from the body text, and the point values follow the star numbers printed on the cards (3, 2, 2, 1 and 4).
End of the Game
The game ends when the right number of paintings has been reached (original and fake) by adding those of all the participants in the game. Based on the number of players:
- In 2 players when 7 Paintings have been created.
- In 3 players when 8 Paintings have been created.
- In 4 players when 9 Paintings have been created.
- In 5 players when 10 Paintings have been created.
When the end-of-game conditions occur, the game continues until the player to the right of the first player is reached, so that everyone has played the same number of turns.
Calculation of Points
At the end of the game each player adds up their points as follows:
- 4 Points for each Original Painted Canvas in its palette
- 3 Points for each Fake Painted Canvas in its palette
- 1 Point for each Canvas Drawn
- 1 Point for each Blank Canvas
- Points given by objective cards obtained during the game.
The player with the most points is the winner. In case of a tie, the person with the most original canvases wins. If the tie persists, whoever has the most false canvases. If he still persists, who has more drawings. If he still persists, the victory is shared.
Attention: only visible cards are counted; cards under drawings or paintings are not counted.
Variant for Experts
If you want to try your hand at a more complex game, you can change the rule for creating secondary colors. In this type of game the secondary colors can only be generated by rotating the necessary colors on your palette and only if the two colors are in a drawn canvas/blank canvas pair, i.e. overlapping one another.
Furthermore, you can also decide to change the fishing method. In this case, you will play with only two possibilities: draw two adjacent cards from the circle of exposed cards or draw two cards from the deck. The "mixed" fishing option is no longer available.
Secondary Colors Scheme
The scheme on the last page of the printed booklet shows which primary colors are mixed to obtain each secondary color. Read from the picture, each row pairs a color with the color it is combined with, giving the result underneath:
| Color 1 | + | Color 2 | = | Secondary color |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| White | + | Black | = | Grey |
| Yellow | + | Magenta | = | Red |
| Cyan (light blue) | + | Magenta | = | Blue |
| Cyan (light blue) | + | Yellow | = | Green |