Bigfootses, The Card Game Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• What Is the Goal of Bigfootses?
• How To Play Bigfootses
• Starting the Game
• Setting Up the Common Game Board & Your Bigfoot Corral
• Player Turns: Range, Work, Rummage, Restock or Retrain!
• General Game Play Rules
• Ranging
  • Resolving an Encounter
  • Encountering creatures
  • Encountering bigfeatures
• Witches
• Winning the Game
• Additional Instructions

What Is the Goal of Bigfootses?

The game is a race among players to capture the most—and the most valuable—bigfootses! The bigger they are, they tougher they are to capture and the more they are worth!

How To Play Bigfootses

To play the game, players take turns drawing and playing cards. Players capture bigfootses by rolling dice after encountering a bigfoot while drawing cards from the Woods deck.

Players also collect equipment to make their quest more successful. Some types of equipment may be used to help the player attract or capture bigfootses. Other types of equipment may be used to make things difficult for an opponent. The strategy of what to use and when is up to each player!

Starting the Game

1. Shuffle the Thingies and Woods decks. Separate the Profession cards. Place all cards face down in the game area.

2. All players should draw one Profession card (no peeking!).

3. Each player should draw five Thingies cards to provision themselves for their first bigfoot hunt.

4. Each player must also take one six-sided die.

5. Randomly choose a player to take the first turn.

Setting Up the Common Game Board & Your Bigfoot Corral

Place the Thingies and Woods draw piles face down and the discard piles face up in the center of the gaming area where all players can reach them. Players should display their Equipment and Profession cards so that everyone can see what each player is using at any given time. As players capture bigfootses, the stack of Bigfootses cards forms their corral.

Setup components shown in the printed "Typical Game Setup" diagram: Thingies Discard, Thingies Draw, Woods Draw, Woods Discard, Profession, Up to Three Equipment Cards, Corral.

Player Turns: Range, Work, Rummage, Restock or Retrain!

Each player can do only one of four actions during a turn. Boldly announce which course of action you are about to embark on.

A. Range: Into the woods you go! Draw a Woods card and place it face up. Never put a Woods card in your hand.

B. Go to work: Each profession has the ability to go to work. You may only go to work once per turn. You may not use this ability if you have 7 or more Victory Points (VPs).

C. Rummage: You may rummage for Thingies. Draw 0-3 Thingies cards based on the number of VPs you have acquired. Put these cards in your hand without showing other players.

VPs	Thingies cards drawn
0-2	3 Cards
3-4	2 Cards
5-6	1 Card
7-9	0 Cards

D. Restock: Discard as many cards as you wish from your hand, and then draw that many Thingies cards.

E. Retrain: You may use your turn to discard your current Profession, and draw a new random Profession. You may also elect to discard one Bigfootses card from your corral and pick your next Profession, from among any of the unused Professions.

General Game Play Rules

Equipment: You may only play one Equipment card during your turn; you may play it before or after your primary turn action. The maximum amount of Equipment cards you can have in play is three, although other cards can allow you to have more. If you are at your maximum equipment level, you may voluntarily discard an Equipment to play another.

Types of Equipment: Some equipment is further categorized as weapons or gadgets. Weapons have a knife symbol in the title banner, and gadgets are signified by the compass/map/binocular symbol.

Hand Size: To end your turn, you must discard down to five Thingies cards. The only time the five-card limit is enforced is at the end of your turn. At any other time, there is no limit to hand size.

Ranging

Encountering bigfootses: To catch bigfootses, you must be more skillful than they are elusive. Players have skill points that are determined by adding the result of a die roll to any bonuses gained from equipment and experience. Due to your advanced understanding of the bigfootses, you get one skill point for every bigfoot already in your corral.

Each bigfoot has an evasiveness score (found on its footprint on the card). This score varies according to how hard the beast is to capture.

Resolving an Encounter

1. First, add your corral and equipment bonuses together to determine how many skill points you need to capture a bigfoot. The difference between your bonus points and the bigfoot's elusiveness score will be the number you must roll to capture it!
2. Announce what number you need to roll.
3. The any player can now play modifiers. These are cards that make the bigfoot harder or easier to catch.
4. After all modifiers have been played, the player rolls one die. Players always lose if they roll a one. Items and shenanigans can be played after the roll.
5. Add your die roll to your skill points. If the result is a number equal to or greater than the elusiveness score of the bigfoot, you capture the bigfoot and you may place it in your corral.

When you add a new bigfoot to your corral, announce your current VP total. Any player who has fewer VPs than you, may draw one Thingies card.

If you fail to capture a bigfoot, it runs away and does not hurt you. Bigfootses, after all, are passive creatures. When a bigfoot runs away, discard it in the Woods discard pile. The beast is considered at large.

Encountering creatures

Creature battles are similar to bigfootses captures with the following differences: The number of bigfootses you have in your corral does not help you in a battle. Since each creature encounter is unique, your experience with bigfootses doesn't help you here!

If you lose a battle, the creature not only escapes but it also breaks a piece of your equipment. Discard an Equipment card on the Thingies discard pile. If you have no Equipment cards in play, discard a Thingies card from your hand. If you have no Equipment and no Thingies cards, there is no penalty.

If you win or tie a battle with a creature, you may take their treasure. Follow the normal VP chart for rummaging to determine how many Thingies cards to draw.

Encountering bigfeatures

(Printed as "bigfeatures" in the source.)

Bigfeatures are half bigfoot, half something else. They count as VPs if you catch them, but also break equipment, and carry treasure. When in combat with a bigfeature you do not get a skill bonus from your corral. If you defeat a bigfeature, take its treasure by rummaging. If you lose to a bigfeature, you must discard one of your Equipment. You may use any item that applies to creatures or bigfootses.

Witches

Witches live in the woods with the bigfootses. The woods can be under the spell of only one witch at a time. If you draw a Witch card, put it face up in play. The ability will stay in effect until another Witch card is drawn.

Winning the Game

Count each player's captured bigfootses. Victory is achieved when any player has acquired the following number of VPs:

• 2-4 Players: 10 Victory Points
• 5 players: 8 Victory Points
• 6 players: 7 Victory Points

Additional Instructions

1. Equipment cards can only be played during your turn.
2. You may hold only one weapon at a time.
3. Modifiers can only be played during combat before the die is rolled.
4. Items and shenanigans can be played at any time.
5. Once an Equipment card is played, it stays until destroyed or discarded. Items, shenanigans, and modifiers are discarded immediately after use.
6. If the Thingies card draw pile is depleted, reshuffle the discard pile and make a new draw pile.
7. If the Woods card draw pile is depleted, place all at large bigfootses face up on the game board. Thereafter, when any player ranges, he may choose which bigfoot he wishes to encounter.
8. When a card text and a rule contradict each other, the text on the card takes precedence.