Aztekz Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Before the First Game
• Setting Up the Game
• Playing the Game
  • 1. Draw
  • 2. Move a Hero
  • 3. Place a Pyramid Card
• End of the Game

Before the First Game

Apply the supplied stickers to the game pieces as follows:

• The stickers for the chiefs and the slaves go on each side of the black pieces, i.e. the same sticker on both sides of one piece. You will thus have one chief and two slaves of each colour.
• The soul stickers go on one side of the light-coloured pieces. This produces 48 soul pieces, with six different symbols, eight pieces of each.

Setting Up the Game

• Shuffle the pyramid cards and place them face down as a draw pile next to the play area.

• Also shuffle the soul pieces and place them face down next to the play area.

• Each player takes one chief and two slaves of the same colour.

• The oldest player starts the game. Or the one who has the most Spanish or Mexican look. An illegal immigrant is not allowed to be the first player.

• Players take turns in clockwise order.

• The first player draws a pyramid card and places it in the middle of the play area. He places his three heroes on it. Each other player does the same, but the cards must be placed according to the rules (see below). Depending on the number of players, there are now two to four pyramid cards, each with three heroes on it, in the middle of the play area.

Example of a start with 3 players.

Playing the Game

A player's turn always consists of three phases.

1. Draw

The player draws a pyramid card and a soul piece. He places them face up in front of him, with the soul piece on the pyramid card.

2. Move a Hero

• The player may move one of his three heroes: either the chief or one of the slaves.
• Each hero may only move along the paths inside the labyrinth. It may not cross a wall, even if there is a passage on the other side.
• Up to four heroes (or heroes carrying soul pieces underneath them) may stand on one pyramid card.

The chief

• May only move one step (up to the next pyramid card).
• Before or after his move, he may steal souls. To do so, he must stand on a pyramid card with a slave (of another colour) whose chief is elsewhere (i.e. not on the same pyramid card), and which carries at least two souls.

Stealing souls means taking the souls from the other slave and freeing them, i.e. placing them in front of you in a pile (not under your hero). Piles may not be merged, even if the same type of soul is collected later. Why? Two piles of 2 souls score less than one pile of 4 souls. See the scoring at the end of the game.

A slave

• May move up to three steps, but may move fewer if desired.
• At the start, during, or at the end of its move, it may take souls, drop souls, scare souls away, or give souls to its chief.

Taking souls: If the slave is not yet carrying any soul, it may take the soul piece on this pyramid card (placing it under itself and moving with it). If it wants to carry more than one piece, they must be of the same type: it may choose the first type of soul and then take other souls of the same type.

Dropping souls: The slave simply leaves the entire pile of souls on the pyramid card and moves on. Useful for taking another type of soul, or for protecting the pile against the "scare away" action.

Scaring souls away: Remove all souls on this pyramid card, even the souls you are carrying. Turn them face down with the others. Yes, all of them. This is only allowed when you continue your move to another pyramid card and then place a new pyramid card on the one from which you removed the souls. Useful for changing the labyrinth and for creating paths where no path existed.

Giving souls to your chief: When your chief stands on the same pyramid card as your slave, you may give him your pile of souls (see the explanation above). You must obviously be carrying at least two soul pieces (a pile of a single piece scores no points, a lost soul).

3. Place a Pyramid Card

After moving a hero, you must place the pyramid card and the soul piece drawn earlier (see 1). When placing a pyramid card, at least one of its paths must connect to an adjacent card.

Important: The complete pyramid area may not exceed 5 x 5 cards. If there are already 5 cards in one direction (horizontally or vertically), you may not place another card outside of them.

You may, of course, place a card so that one of its paths leads nowhere (i.e. beyond the 5 x 5 grid), as long as another path of that card is connected to the labyrinth.

You may place a pyramid card on top of another card provided that it is empty, i.e. it contains no souls and no heroes. This is useful for changing the labyrinth, naturally to your advantage.

When placing a pyramid card, you may not cut a chief off from its two slaves. At least one path must lead each chief to at least one of its slaves.

When placing the pyramid card, you place the soul piece you drew on it.

If the pyramid card cannot be placed, it is returned face down to the bottom of the draw pile. The same goes for the soul piece.

Important: Once the 5 x 5 pyramid grid is complete, i.e. when there are 25 pyramid cards visible, you are no longer obliged to place the pyramid card. You may also return a pyramid card to the bottom of the draw pile if you do not wish to place it, or if you do not wish to place the soul piece. Placing cards is only mandatory as long as the 5 x 5 grid is not complete.

This is useful for delaying the end of the game in order to collect more souls. But be careful: the other players may still place pyramid cards.

End of the Game

The game ends as soon as the last pyramid card is placed. Immediately.

Count the points as follows:

• A pile of two identical soul pieces scores 1 point.
• A pile of three identical soul pieces scores 2 points.
• A pile of four identical soul pieces scores 3 points.
• And so on: the number of soul pieces minus one.

The player with the most points wins the game. In case of a tie, the tied player with the most soul pieces collected wins.