Blank White Dice Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Overview of Play
  • Components
  • Quick Overview of the Most Important Rules
  • Goal
• Setup
  • Basic
  • Intermediate
  • Experienced
• Tagging
• Play
  • Everyone Rolls Phase
  • First Phase
• Main Phase
• Scoring Points
• Additional Rules
• Last Phase
• Check For Winner Phase
• Variants
  • Longer Game
• Icon Guide
  • Core Card Icons
    • TAG (CORE)
    • ERASE (CORE)
    • RE-ROLL (CORE)
    • POINTS (CORE)
    • THE WINDOW (CORE)
  • Keywords

Overview of Play

Components

• 8 blank dice
• 1 large blank common die
• 4 wet erase markers
• 4 sets of discs, with 2 discs each
• 1 score track
• 1 starting player marker
• 5 core cards
• 49 icon cards

Quick Overview of the Most Important Rules

• When the instructions on an icon card conflict with these rules, the instructions on the icon card take precedence.
• When you resolve a blank face, remember: "Nature abhors a vacuum." A blank face wants you to tag it—tag that face. Refrain from resolving the icon you just tagged this way. Tagging the icon on the face was how you resolved that blank face.
• You cannot go below 0 points. When you have to lose points, lose as many as you can. If you have one point and you have to lose two points, you go to 0.
• If an icon resolves and does not affect the game at all, it erases itself.
  • Example 1: If you have 0 points and have to resolve a -2, nothing will happen and the -2 will erase itself.
  • Example 2: If you resolve a Tag, but all die faces have icons on them, the Tag has no effect and must be erased.
• If a card makes you tag multiple icons (like 3 and -2) with one tag, they want to stay as close to each other as possible. Tag them on the same die, then on dice controlled by the same player, then on any dice in the game. If there's nowhere to tag "excess" icons, do not tag them.
• You may tag multiple icons from one card in any order you choose.
• When you re-roll a die that's already been resolved, refrain from resolving it again. A re-roll is just a re-roll—nothing more.
  • NOTE: A Re-roll affected the game so it does not erase itself.
• If you get an extra turn, you must resolve all of your dice again. Do not re-roll your dice unless explicitly instructed to do so.

Goal

Have the most points at the end of the game. The game ends when one player has at least 13 points at the end of a round and more points than any other player.

NOTE ON USING THE WET ERASE MARKER: This marker applies wet so give it a few seconds to dry. You will need a wet cloth to wipe it off. If you wish you can use dry erase markers but note they will smudge easier.

Setup

Put the score track and the five core cards where everyone can see them.

The following instructions apply to each player:

• Select a matched set of discs, two blank dice, and a marker.
• Put one of your discs on the score track at 3. This is your score disc. Keep your remaining disc in front of you to indicate your color. This is your player disc.

Put any unclaimed dice and discs in the box, out of play.

Pick a player to go first. Give that player the starting player marker.

Collaboratively decide what level of complexity you wish to play:

Basic

A good choice if this is your first game of Blank White Dice.

Pick one of the sets below and put the listed icon cards in play face-up where everyone can read them. These cards—along with the core cards—create the tableau. Put all other icon cards back in the box, out of play.

• V1: Junk Food, Multitag, Investment, Split Strategy, and Wheels In Wheels
• V2: Parasite, Knowledge Swap, Predator and Prey, Time Warp, Eradicate

Intermediate

When you're ready to explore icon combos and synergies.

Pick one of the following sets of icon cards and shuffle them:

• 6 through 29
• 30 through 54

Deal 12 icon cards evenly among the players. Put all un-dealt icon cards in the box—out of play. Read the cards you're dealt.

Add one (or two if you're playing with two players) of your icon cards to the tableau, face-down. When every player has added his or her card(s) to the tableau, turn them all face-up. Take the unused icon cards from each player and set them aside in a stack within easy reach of all players. These cards are the reserve. If there are fewer than 9 active cards in the tableau, add randomly selected cards from the reserve to the tableau until there are 9 cards in the tableau.

Each time you add a card with overwrite to the tableau during setup, place it on top of the indicated card, then randomly select a card from the reserve to add to the tableau.

Core cards are active cards unless they are overwritten. Like normal icon cards, the generic core cards are not considered active when they're overwritten.

Experienced

When you want to explore advanced icon combos and synergies.

Shuffle all of the icon cards together. The rest of setup is identical to Intermediate setup, except each player adds two (four if you're playing with two players) icon cards to the tableau, and the tableau must have at least 13 active cards in it.

Put the common die on its core card, or on any card overwriting its core card.

Review how the icon cards in the tableau work. Make sure that everyone understands and agrees on how the icon cards work.

Each player should tag his or her dice four times.

Tagging

Each time you tag, select an icon card in the tableau and a die. Draw each icon on the card you selected on a blank face of the die you selected. If it's hard for you to draw the icon, write the initials of the icon's card instead.

Most cards have just one icon on them, but some cards (like the Points core card with 3 and -2 on it) explicitly state that they are separate icons. You must draw the omitted icon(s) on another one of your dice. (If you have the common die, it counts as one of your dice.) If all of your dice are full and you still have icons to draw, you may draw them on any blank face of any die in play. If there are no blank faces in play, do not draw the leftover icon(s).

During setup, you may tag icons from the same card four times, pick different cards, or any combination thereof. Any combination of cards is valid.

You may distribute your tags among your dice any way you wish. You may tag one die four times and leave one die blank, you may tag one die three times and one die once, or you may tag each die twice.

When all players are done tagging their dice, take turns telling the other players what you tagged on your dice.

Starting with the starting player, each player must tag the common die one time. Let the other players know what you're tagging on the common die. If the common die runs out of empty faces, stop tagging it. When the common die is done being tagged, roll it and put it on its card.

Now you're ready to play!

[Figure in the printed rulebook: blank face and active face diagram.]

[Figure in the printed rulebook: the starting setup for a two-player Basic game with set V1.]

Play

Once the game has started, play takes place in a series of rounds. Each round has five phases (although you might skip some of them):

• Everyone Rolls Phase
• First Phase (if an icon has a First effect)
• Main Phase
• Last Phase (if an icon has a Last effect)
• Check For Winner Phase

Everyone Rolls Phase

Everyone rolls their dice.

First Phase

This phase only takes place if at least one active icon on a die has a First effect. If you're playing a Basic game, you'll skip this phase.

See Main Phase for details on resolving dice.

Main Phase

NOTE: If a phase is not listed on an icon card, it takes place during the Main Phase.

NOTE: Before you start resolving icons in the Main Phase, check for icons that resolve First. If you spot any that were not resolved in the First Phase, resolve them now if you can do so fairly.

Take turns, starting with the starting player. On your turn, resolve your dice one at a time. You may resolve your dice in any order you choose. You must resolve every die you have before you can end your Main Phase.

ACTIVE FACE: The top face on a die, i.e. the face you read after rolling the die. If there's an icon there, that icon counts as an active icon.

A blank face means you must tag that face. (A memory aid: Nature abhors a vacuum; you must fill this void.) Do not resolve the icon you tagged as a result of resolving a blank face. Tagging the icon is your resolution for that die.

Example: Flexibility and Opportunity are in the tableau. On your first turn, you roll and get two blank faces. You activate the first blank face and tag Flexibility on it. You activate the second blank face and tag Opportunity on it. You don't resolve either one because tagging them used up their activations.

On your next turn, you roll and get Flexibility and a blank face. You choose to resolve Flexibility first. You can erase or tag. You choose to tag your blank face with a 3 / -2, drawing the 3 on the blank active face and the -2 on a blank face that was not active. Flexibility gives you the option to spend a point to erase a face, and you do so, erasing the -2 you just tagged. Next you resolve your newly tagged 3 and gain three points. It's okay for you to do so because it has not resolved yet; when Flexibility put the 3 there, it did not use up the activation for the formerly blank face.

To resolve a die during your Main Phase, obey the instructions on the icon card for the icon on its active face. Ignore effects preceded by First, Last, or contingencies (like "When you tag this icon...").

As noted above, if a die gains an icon on its active face before you resolve that die, you'll do what's on that die's active face when you resolve that die.

Example: You resolve a die that lets you tag any die. Your opponent has a die with a blank active face. You tag that die with 3 / -2, putting the -2 on the blank active face. If that die resolves with that -2 there, your opponent will lose two points.

Similarly, if a die loses the icon on its active face before you resolve it, you'll resolve the blank face instead of the icon that was there.

Example: It's your opponent's turn. Their other die has an icon that lets them erase one face on any die. They erase the -2 you put on their formerly blank active face, then resolve that newly blank face by tagging it with an icon of their choice.

Also note that if you gain a die during your turn (like the common die or a swapped die), you do not change the face on the die and you must resolve that die in any of the remaining phases for that round.

Unless an icon specifically tells you otherwise, each player may not resolve any given die more than once per phase. This comes up most often with re-roll effects. Re-rolling a die does not let you resolve the die you re-roll. If you've already resolved the re-rolled die, it does not resolve again for you in the same phase. However, one die can resolve multiple times in a round under the control of different players. This happens most often with the common die.

[The following two bullets appear, without a heading, in the printed rulebook's right-hand column beside the Icon Guide, after the Variants section. They are placed here because they concern the common die's resolution.]

• If you have not resolved the common die, you do not have to resolve it immediately after rolling it—you may resolve other dice before it.
• You'll keep the common die and roll it as one of your dice until someone else claims the common die.

NOTE: Putting The Window on the common die is a silly thing to do. When it resolves, it functionally wastes the common die's action, using up its activation by re-rolling it.

Keep in mind that icon effects with the First and Last keywords resolve during the First Phase (before the Main Phase of play) and the Last Phase (after the Main Phase) respectively. Unless otherwise specified, each player must resolve each die they control once (and only once) during each phase (First, Main, and Last). An active icon with First, Main, and Last effects resolves once during each phase.

If you have to resolve an icon but it does not affect the game at all, resolve the icon by erasing the icon. This applies to cards that are face down, neutralized, overwritten or not in the tableau. There is one simple exception to this rule. Icons that are only numbers always cause you to gain or lose the number of points indicated, whether their cards are neutralized or active, or even in play at all. However, 0 is not part of this rule since it is neither a point gain nor a point loss, and effects that modify gains and losses do not apply to it. So if a 0 needs to be resolved, it will resolve by erasing itself.

Scoring Points

When you gain points, advance your disc that many spaces on the score track. When you lose points, move your disc back that many spaces. You cannot go below zero points.

When you steal points from a player, that player loses that many points and you gain as many points as that player lost. If you're stealing three points from an opponent and they only have one point, they lose one point and you gain one point. When you pay points, you lose that many points. Paying points differs from losing points because the points you pay are a mandatory prerequisite for something else. Typically they're a cost for the privilege of tagging an icon or triggering an effect.

If you cannot (or choose not to) pay the full cost, you do not have to pay any of the cost, but the effect does not trigger.

Compare/Contrast Example: Opportunity says, "If you do not have the common die, claim it. Pay two points or re-roll the common die." You must re-roll the common die unless you pay two points. You can choose to not pay two points and re-roll the common die instead. Cocoon says, "Lose 2 points. Replace this icon with a 3." If you have no points, you'll still replace the icon with a 3.

Additional Rules

• Blank faces are not icons.
• If a card tells you to tag or replace a face with an icon card that's overwritten, use the active icon card at the top of the overwrite stack.
• What's on your dice is public knowledge.
• Targeting: An effect that requires you to pick a specific die or face "targets" that die. An effect that requires you to pick a specific player "targets" that player. An effect that targets "all opponents" does not target each specific player.

Example 1: The Window targets the common die twice. Once when it tells you to take it if you don't have it, and once when it tells you to re-roll it.

Example 2: Teleport reads, "Tag an icon from any die to any blank face. Erase the icon from the die you took it from. Opponent loses three points." The erase in the second sentence targets the Teleport icon, but the point loss does not target any specific player. This means that you could not use the Camouflage ward effect ("Ward: If someone targets you or your dice, you may dot this face to fizzle the effect") to prevent the point loss. However, you could use Medkit's ward effect ("Ward: You may erase this icon to fizzle any effect that causes a loss in points") to prevent the point loss.

When you have finished resolving all of your dice that have Main Phase effects, play passes to the left. When everyone has gone, the Main Phase is over. If there are any Last effects, resolve those effects as described in the Last Phase section. Otherwise, skip to the Check For Winner phase.

Last Phase

This phase only takes place if at least one active icon on a die has a Last effect. If you're playing a Basic game, you'll skip this phase.

The Last Phase is just like the First Phase, except you're resolving dice with Last effects.

Check For Winner Phase

If any player has 13 or more points at this phase, the game ends. The player with the most points wins. If there's a tie, the game continues.

NOTE: If the game is not over, the player with the starting player marker must pass it to the left and a new round starts.

Variants

Longer Game

For a longer game, play to 20 points instead of 13. A 20-point game usually takes about twice as long as a 13-point game and gives you more time to craft and develop your dice.

Icon Guide

Core Card Icons

TAG (CORE)

• Pick any die and any card. Tag the icon(s) from that card on blank faces on that die.
• You may pick any die in play.
• You may write on any blank face on the die you pick.
• If that face is active and has not resolved this turn, the icon you tag it with will be the icon that resolves (unless something like erase, re-roll, etc., intervenes to make a different face active).

ERASE (CORE)

• Pick any face of any die. Erase all markings on that face.
• You may pick any die in play.
• You may erase any face on that die, but you must pick a face with icons on it. (You cannot erase a blank face.)
• If that face is active and has not resolved this turn, it will resolve as a blank face (unless something intervenes like tag, re-roll, etc., to make a face with an icon active before the die resolves).

RE-ROLL (CORE)

• Pick any die in play. Roll that die.
• If that die has not resolved yet this turn, it will resolve with its newly rolled face. If that die has resolved this turn, it will not resolve again unless something forces it to resolve again.

POINTS (CORE)

• This card has two separate icons. Tag them on different faces.
• 3: Gain three points.
• -2: Lose two points.

THE WINDOW (CORE)

• Roll the common die, whether you control it or not. If you do not have the common die, add it to your die pool (it's your die now), keeping the same active face.

Keywords

NOTE: The rules on an icon card can overrule these definitions.

Blank White Dice uses keywords to minimize the text on the icon cards. Following is a list of all of the keywords and what they mean (except for First, Main, and Last, which are described in the rules above).

• ALWAYS: You may activate the always effect of your icons even when they're not active. You may only activate an always effect when it says you can. Doing so does not count as that die's activation for that phase.
• COPY: Target an active face. Treat the copying icon exactly like the face you targeted until the end of the current phase (First, Main, or Last). You may not copy an icon that would generate a copy effect. If the face you're copying changes (erased, re-rolled, etc.), your copy stops copying it.
• DASH: Draw a short line on the indicated face. Doing this does not count as tagging. Dashes typically indicate an increasing bad effect for the die's controller. Effects that erase a face or icon also erase the dashes that were on that face.
• DOT: Draw a dot on the indicated face. Doing this does not count as tagging. Dots typically indicate progress toward something good for the die's controller. Effects that erase a face or icon also erase the dots that were on that face.
• ERASE: Remove all markings from the specified die face. If a die face isn't specified, you may erase any one die face in play. You cannot erase a blank face.
• FIZZLE: When an effect fizzles, it does not happen. Any following resolution steps for that effect in that phase also do not take place. That effect's icon still counts as being activated.
• MARK: To mark something, place your player disc (the one you keep in front of you) on it. Typically you'll mark an icon card or a specific icon on a card, but you could mark your score. Keep your player disc there until something explicitly tells you to move it.
  • If you have to mark something and your player disc is already marking something, you must move it to a new valid location.
• NEUTRALIZE: Pick a card in the tableau and flip it face-down. That card is neutralized now. You may not tag neutralized icons. When an icon on a neutralized card tries to resolve, it'll erase itself instead.
• ONE-SHOT: Erase this icon when you finish resolving it.
• OVERWRITE: When you add this card to the tableau, place it on top of the indicated card. Even though the covered card is not actually neutralized, it is functionally neutralized. You may not tag overwritten (covered) icons. If an overwritten icon tries to resolve, it erases itself instead.