Cerberus Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Contents
• Game Concept
• Setup
• Card Anatomy
  • Action Cards
  • Survival Cards
  • Betrayal Cards
• Goal of the Game
• Player Turns
  • Mandatory Action
  • Optional Action
  • At the End of Your Turn
• Playing an Action Card
• Playing a Survival or Betrayal Card
• End of Your Turn
• Explanations of the Effects
  • The Target Symbols
  • Targeted Effects
  • General Effects
• The Rage Track
• The Hunt
• Capturing an Adventurer
  • Example
• Captured!
  • If You Become a Cerberus Player
• Saved!
• End of the Game
  • Victory for the Adventurers
  • Victory for Cerberus
• 3-Player Game
• Credits
• Details of the Boards
  • Special Spaces
  • Special Locations
• Adventurer Action Card Effects
• Cerberus Action Card Effects
• Clarifications About the Effects
• Clarifications About the Survival and Betrayal Cards
• Survival Card Effects
• Betrayal Card Effects

Contents

• 5 double-sided boards:
  • 1 Start board
  • 3 intermediate boards
  • 1 Finish board
• 28 Action cards (4 cards per player)
• 28 Survival cards
• 18 Betrayal cards
• 7 Adventurer pawns
• 1 Cerberus pawn
• 1 Speed die numbered 3 – 8
• 3 Barques (with 1, 2, and 3 seats)
• 7 player aid cards
• 1 sheet of "Masterful Success" stickers

Game Concept

In this semi-cooperative game, you must traverse the board to reach the Barque without Cerberus catching you. Your cards enable you to advance or retreat your Adventurer or others' Adventurers. It is always more beneficial to help others, so those who help one another will move faster. But the Barque does not have enough seats for everyone! Sooner or later, some must be sacrificed. Players that Cerberus captures then switch sides, and try to earn his mercy by preventing the escape of their former companions.

Setup

1. Assemble the gameboard. It must comprise:
   • the Start board.
   • any 2 intermediate boards.
   • the Finish board (where the Barques can be found).
2. Place the Cerberus pawn on the first space of the board, in Cerberus' Den.
3. Shuffle the 3 Barques and place them face down on the Barque spaces of the Finish board.
4. Each player chooses an Adventurer, places the pawn on the GATES OF HELL space, and takes the 4 Action cards of the corresponding color as a hand.
5. Place the Speed die on the space of the Rage track corresponding to the number of players, showing face 3, 4, 5, or 6, depending on how much difficulty you wish to face.
6. Place the unused Adventurer pawns on the empty spaces on the Rage track, to the left of the Speed die.
7. Shuffle the Survival cards to form a face-down deck beside the board. Do the same with the Betrayal cards.
8. The kindest player starts then game plays in clockwise order.

BOARD DIFFICULTY: Certain boards are more difficult to traverse than others. When you build your gameboard, count the number of skulls depicted in the upper-left corner of the board. The more skulls, the harder it is.

You can also increase the difficulty of the game by increasing the minimum value of the die. Add 1 skull for each value beyond 3 on the Speed die to calculate your difficulty (Example: If you start the Speed die at 5, you have increased the difficulty by 2 skulls).

We recommend that you use a difficulty of 10 skulls for your first game, with the Speed die set to 3. Thereafter, you can adjust the difficulty according to your preferences.

Card Anatomy

Action Cards

The 4 Action cards are double-sided. One side depicts the Adventurer, and the other side depicts Cerberus. Each player starts with their cards on the Adventurer side. Each side of the card offers two different effects. When you play a card, you must choose which effect to use.

Each card shows:

• Cost required to use the 1st effect, and the 1st effect of the card.
• The inset portrait and the background color, which indicate whose card it is.
• The 2nd effect of the card, and the cost required to use the 2nd effect.
• Certain effects have no cost.

The Adventurer side and the Cerberus side of a card each carry their own pair of effects and costs in the same layout.

Survival Cards

Adventurers can pick up Survival cards until they are caught by Cerberus. They allow you to change your destiny… or not.

Each Survival card shows:

• A simple effect, which has no cost.
• An advanced effect, with a cost required to use it.

(Example shown: "Arrogance.")

Betrayal Cards

Adventurers can pick up Betrayal cards once they have been caught by Cerberus, and they have switched sides. Use them to settle your grudges!

Each Betrayal card shows:

• A simple effect, which has no cost.
• An advanced effect, with a cost required to use it.

(Example shown: "Grudge.")

Goal of the Game

There are two ways to win the game Cerberus.

ESCAPE:

The best way for an Adventurer to win is to escape by grabbing a seat in the Barque. But beware, there are not enough seats for everyone! Moreover, in order to cast off and leave hell, the Barque must be full. If there are not enough Adventurers to fill the available seats, nobody leaves!

OR EARN CERBERUS' MERCY:

Players that are caught by Cerberus early in the game can hope to earn his mercy by impeding the escape of the other Adventurers. They now play using the Cerberus side of their cards, and they win if no one manages to escape with a Barque!

Player Turns

Mandatory Action

• You must play an Action card from your hand to trigger one of its two effects.

Optional Action

If you have Survival or Betrayal cards, you can also play one and only one of these before or after you play your Action card. You can even play a Survival or Betrayal card on the same turn in which you acquired it.

At the End of Your Turn

• If the Barque is full, the game is over. The players whose Adventurers are aboard the Barque escape and win the game.
• Otherwise, see if Cerberus is on the Hunt. Then, the player to your left takes their turn.

Playing an Action Card

Each card has two effects. You choose which one to use when you play the card.

At the beginning of the game, you are all Adventurers who are trying to escape. You only play with the Adventurer side of your cards.

Each player starts with 4 cards. These cards are the same for each player. Each card offers two different effects. When you play an Action card, you must declare which effect you wish to activate, and pay its cost.

Attention: You cannot use an effect for which you cannot pay the cost; for example, if the effect's cost requires you to increase the Speed die by 1 when it is already at its maximum.

Action cards you play remain face up on the table in front of you. You cannot pick them up until you play a card whose effect allows you to pick up your cards.

Playing a Survival or Betrayal Card

Each card has two effects. You choose which one to use when you play the card.

You are never required to play your Survival or Betrayal cards; however, you also cannot play more than one per turn.

Drawing or playing Survival or Betrayal cards depends on your status:

• If you are a free Adventurer, you can only draw and play Survival cards.
• If you have been caught by Cerberus and you have thus switched side, you can only draw and play Betrayal cards.

End of Your Turn

• If the Barque is full, skip to the End of the Game.
• Check to see if Cerberus is on the Hunt (the Speed die is on the last space of the Rage track).
• Otherwise, it is the next player's turn.

Explanations of the Effects

The Target Symbols

These icons indicate that the effect that follows applies to a targeted player or to Cerberus.

• You (on team Adventurer)
• You (on team Cerberus)
• Another Adventurer player of your choice
• Another Cerberus player of your choice
• All Adventurers
• Cerberus pawn

Targeted Effects

• Draw 1 Survival card / Draw 2 Survival cards
• Draw 1 Betrayal card / Draw 2 Betrayal cards
• Discard 1 Survival card / Discard 1 Betrayal card
• Advance 1 space / Advance 2 spaces / Advance 3 spaces
• Retreat 1 space / Retreat 2 spaces
• Trigger 1 Hunt

General Effects

• Advance the die 1 space on the Rage track
• Advance the die 2 spaces on the Rage track
• Retreat the die 1 space on the Rage track
• Retreat the die 2 spaces on the Rage track
• Increase the value of the Speed die by 1 / by 2
• Decrease the value of the Speed die by 1 / by 2
• Peek at 1 Barque without showing the other players, or swap the locations of 2 Barques without looking at them.
• Take all of your Action cards (including this one) back into your hand.

The Rage Track

This gauge measures Cerberus' anger as the Adventurers take actions to escape.

THE SPEED DIE serves both to track Cerberus' Rage on the track, and to remind you of Cerberus' current Speed. Its value ranges from 3 (slowest) to 8 (fastest).

When Cerberus gains or loses Speed, change the value of the Speed die, without changing its location on the track.

The Hunt

A hunt never starts in the middle of a player's turn; rather, always at the end of it.

If at the end of your turn, the Speed die has reached the Hunt space at the far right of the Rage track, the Hunt is triggered automatically. Several things can happen during a Hunt:

• Cerberus advances (mandatory) a number of spaces equal to the value indicated by the Speed die.
• If Cerberus does not catch any Adventurers, he becomes increasingly furious, and the value of his Speed die increases by 1 (maximum 8), and returns to the first empty space at the beginning of the Rage track.
• If Cerberus reaches a space occupied by one or more Adventurers, he immediately stops on this space without finishing his movement, and captures all of the Adventurers on this space.

Capturing an Adventurer

Cerberus captures all of the Adventurers he catches, or who retreat to his space. This can happen when Cerberus advances during a Hunt, or when a card makes an Adventurer retreat. The result is the same either way.

• Place the captured Adventurers on the Rage track. Move the captured Adventurer pawns to the first empty spaces leftmost on the Rage track.

  Note: If several Adventurers are captured at the same time, the active player decides the order in which they are captured. This will be important when it comes time to determine who can gain Cerberus' mercy, should no Adventurers manage to escape.

• Cerberus must escort them there, which means he retreats to the last space on the board bearing his mark that he has passed. If he is already on a space bearing his mark, he retreats to the previous one.

• Return the Speed die to the space on the Rage track that corresponds to the number of Adventurers still in play, and reset its Speed to its minimum value (3, or more if you chose a higher difficulty level during setup).

  Note: Unused Adventurer pawns and those captured by Cerberus occupy the leftmost spaces of the Rage track, rendering it shorter and shorter over the course of the game.

  Clarification: If an Adventurer is captured when the die is already on the leftmost empty space, the Adventurer will take the die's space, and the Speed die moves to the next space.

The captured Adventurers can now switch sides and exact their revenge on those who abandoned them.

Example

(Illustrated example spanning three board states, with Cerberus advancing space by space.)

At the end of Pink's turn, the Speed die is on the Hunt space. Cerberus must move 5 spaces, but on his 3rd step encounters an Adventurer. He immediately stops his move there. The Adventurer is captured; Pink's pawn is placed to the right of the other pawns on the Rage track, the die is reset to space 4 of the Rage track, because there are still 4 Adventurers to catch, and Cerberus retreats to the last space with his mark symbol that he passed.

Captured!

At the beginning of the game, Cerberus is controlled only by the game system, while all the players try to escape him. Players captured by Cerberus can hope for special treatment if they help him catch the other Adventurers; however, Cerberus' patience has its limits, and only the first ones to join him will be entitled to his mercy.

Only the first players to be captured can become Cerberus players. The final 2 Adventurers in play cannot gain Cerberus' mercy, and simply must do everything they can to escape.

• Only the players whose Adventurer pawns are on the dark spaces on the Rage track become Cerberus players.

Once all of the dark spaces are occupied, there can be no more Cerberus players. The next two Adventurers captured immediately lose the game.

If You Become a Cerberus Player

• Discard all of your Survival cards. It is too late to use them.
• Collect all of your Action cards back into your hand. From now on, you can only use the Cerberus side of your cards:
  • Draw 2 bonus Betrayal cards if you were captured on or before the Gates of Hell space.
  • Draw 1 bonus Betrayal card if you were captured after the Gates of Hell, but before or on the last space of the Start board.
• Your goal from now on is to catch the remaining survivors.

Exception: If you are captured on one of the spaces of the Finish board (before the Barque spaces), the time for mercy has passed, and you lose the game immediately. Your pawn is still placed on the Rage track, but you stop playing.

Saved!

The first time an Adventurer reaches a space of the Finish board, you must reveal the active Barque (the one on the first space). Discard the other Barques.

You can no longer change the Barque once it has been revealed.

At the beginning of the game, no one knows how many Adventurers the Barque can seat. There are 3 different Barques: one with 1 seat, one with 2 seats, and one with 3 seats.

Remember: When you play this effect on one of your cards, you choose either:

• To secretly peek at one of the face-down Barques, and return it face-down to its space. You can keep this information to yourself, share it with the other players, or lie.

OR

• Swap the locations of any 2 face-down Barques, without peeking at them.

This effect can no longer be used once the Barque is revealed.

• At the end of a player's turn, if all the seats of the Barque are occupied (even if the current player is not among them), the Adventurers aboard the Barque win.
• Your Adventurer boards the Barque if your pawn reaches or exceeds the Barque's space, and there is still an empty seat. If the Barque is already full, your pawn must stop on the space before it.
• Once your Adventurer is aboard the Barque, you continue to play normally. You cannot advance beyond the Barque (nor can you be targeted by an effect that would make you advance), but you continue to play cards from your hand on your turn. If a card effect makes you retreat, you must leave the Barque and return to the path on the board.

End of the Game

Victory for the Adventurers

When all seats of the Barque are occupied by Adventurer pawns at the end of a player's turn, those lucky Adventurers are victorious.

All the players aboard the Barque win the game.

All players left behind or caught by Cerberus have lost, and are doomed to an eternity of torment.

Victory for Cerberus

Cerberus triumphs if he manages to capture all of the Adventurers, or if not enough remain to fill the Barque.

All the Cerberus players win the game, and everyone else loses.

The player or players whose capture triggered the end of the game do not become Cerberus players; they lose the game with the other Adventurers.

3-Player Game

In a 3-player game, the minimum value of the Speed die is 5, rather than 3; however, this does not add any skulls to the difficulty. Add 1 skull to the difficulty for each value beyond 5 on the Speed die at the beginning of the game.

Credits

Designer: Pierre Buty · Illustrators: Pierre Ples & Jules Dubost · Publishers: La Boite de Jeu and Origames · Project Leads: Benoit Bannier & Rodolphe Gilbart · Artistic Director and layout: Igor Polouchine · Rules: Guillaume Gille-Naves · Packager: Origames

La Boite de jeu – 8 grande rue, 21310 Belleneuve, France Origames – 52 avenue Pierre Sémard, 94200 Ivry sur Seine, France

www.laboitedejeu.fr – [email protected] www.origames.fr – [email protected] Made in China by Whatz Games

©2018 La Boite de Jeu. ©2018 Origames

Details of the Boards

Special Spaces

The Circles of Hell: When a player is captured on the Start board, that Adventurer's rather quick return to Cerberus earns the Adventurer an infernal favor. That player draws one or two Betrayal cards, depending on the area in which the player was captured. (Illustrated: "Draw 2 cards" and "Draw 1 card" spaces.)

The spaces with symbols: Certain spaces bear a symbol corresponding to a card effect. This effect is triggered as soon as an Adventurer stops on this space. An Adventurer that passes through this space without stopping does not trigger the effect.

Cerberus does not trigger the effects of these spaces by stopping on them.

Special Locations

The intermediate boards contain a variety of spaces with particular rules.

The Platforms: Each of these two very narrow spaces can hold only one Adventurer at a time. Any Adventurer who wishes to enter or pass through an occupied platform space must stop its movement on the previous space.

The Promontory: Each Adventurer who stops on the Promontory can either peek at a Barque or swap any two Barques without peeking.

The Gondola: When both of the Gondola spaces are occupied by Adventurers, the active player can swap the positions of one Adventurer from each of these spaces by using an effect that moves one of the two Adventurers: Do this by spending either 1 of the rear Adventurer's advancing moves, or 1 of the fore Adventurer's retreating moves. Either way, the Adventurer then finishes the rest of its moves in the appropriate direction.

The Funicular: When you make an Adventurer at the foot of the Funicular advance, you may choose whether to advance the Adventurer along the Funicular or the footpath.

The Rope Bridge: The two spaces at the ends of the Rope Bridge are considered to be adjacent. If an Adventurer chooses to use the Rope Bridge, the Adventurer can cross the gap in a single move; however, the Rope Bridge collapses after one use, and no one can use it for the rest of the game.

The Infernal Portal: The Infernal Portal is closed by default. While an Adventurer is standing on the Actuator space, this opens the Infernal Portal for other Adventurers (but not for Cerberus), and all the other Adventurers can travel from one Portal to the other as if the two spaces were adjacent. The Portal closes as soon as there are no Adventurers on the Actuator space.

Adventurer Action Card Effects

Each of the 4 Action cards offers two effects (shown here on its Adventurer side):

1. Cost: Advance the Speed die 1 space on the Rage track. Effect: Draw 2 Survival cards. OR Cost: Advance the Speed die 1 space on the Rage track. Effect: Draw 1 Survival card, and 2 Adventurers of your choice each draw 1 Survival card.

2. Cost: Advance the Speed die 1 space on the Rage track. Effect: Advance 2 spaces. OR Cost: Advance the Speed die 1 space on the Rage track. Effect: 2 Adventurers of your choice advance: one 3 spaces; the other, 1 space.

3. Cost: Increase the value of the Speed die by 1. Effect: Advance 2 spaces, and 1 Adventurer of your choice advances 1 space. OR Cost: Discard 1 of your Survival cards. Effect: Advance 1 space, and 1 Adventurer of your choice advances 2 spaces.

4. Cost: Advance the Speed die 1 space on the Rage track. Effect: Draw 1 Survival card, and take all of your Action cards back into your hand. OR Cost: Advance the Speed die 1 space on the Rage track. Effect: Take all of your Action cards back into your hand. Then secretly peek at a face-down Barque OR swap the locations of 2 face-down Barques without peeking.

Cerberus Action Card Effects

Each of the 4 Action cards offers two effects (shown here on its Cerberus side):

1. Cost: None. Effect: Increase the value of the Speed die by 1. OR Cost: Decrease the value of the Speed die by 1. Effect: Draw 2 Betrayal cards, then 1 other Cerberus player of your choice draws 1 Betrayal card.

2. Cost: 1 Adventurer of your choice advances 1 space. Effect: 3 other Adventurers of your choice retreat 1 space. OR Cost: None. Effect: Advance the Speed die 1 space on the Rage track.

3. Cost: None. Effect: Advance the Cerberus pawn 1 space. OR Cost: None. Effect: Draw 1 Betrayal card.

4. Cost: None. Effect: Take all of your Action cards back into your hand. OR Cost: 1 Adventurer of your choice advances 2 spaces. Effect: Draw 1 Betrayal card, and take all of your Action cards back into your hand.

Clarifications About the Effects

• You cannot choose an effect whose cost you cannot pay. If a minimum value greater than 3 has been chosen for the Speed die, you may exceptionally decrease the value of the Speed die under its minimum value to pay the cost of a card. It is however still impossible to go under 3.
• If an effect has several effects (such as advancing several Adventurers), you can resolve them in any order you wish.
• If a part of an effect is no longer possible do as much of it as you can. For example, if you play the Action card that makes 3 Adventurers retreat, but there are only 2 remaining, you must advance one of them for the cost, and the second one will retreat due to the effect.
• The "other Adventurer" icon always indicates another Adventurer (not you). If an effect indicates several of that icon, it must be different Adventurers.

For example, the effect above permits you to advance 2 different Adventurers, but not yourself.

• Moves must be made in full; you cannot decide to move an Adventurer pawn fewer spaces than indicated by the effect, with the sole exception of boarding the Barque, which stops the pawn's movement.

Clarifications About the Survival and Betrayal Cards

Survival or Betrayal cards can be played in two different ways:

• For a simple effect without cost.
• For an advanced effect with a cost.

The cost of the advanced effect of a Survival or Betrayal card usually (but not always) consists of discarding one or more other Survival or Betrayal cards. The discarded cards can come from the active player's hand and/or from other players who want the advanced effect to be applied.

As the active player, you can promise whatever you want to get this help, but you are under no requirement to keep your promise once the cost of the card has been paid!

Survival Card Effects

SACRIFICE Simple effect: Retreat the Speed die 1 space on the Rage track, and 1 Adventurer of your choice retreats 1 space. OR Cost: Discard 1 Survival card. Advanced effect: Retreat the Speed die 2 spaces on the Rage track, and 1 Adventurer of your choice retreats 2 spaces.

FAVORITISM Simple effect: Advance 1 space, and 1 Adventurer of your choice advances 1 space. OR Cost: Discard 3 Survival cards. Advanced effect: Advance 3 spaces, and 2 Adventurers of your choice advance: one 2 spaces; the other, 1 space.

OPPORTUNISM Simple effect: Advance 1 space, and 1 Adventurer of your choice advances 1 space. OR Cost: Discard 1 Survival card. Advanced effect: Advance 1 space, and 1 Adventurer of your choice advances OR retreats 2 spaces (the active player decides).

FATALISM Simple effect: Retreat 2 spaces. OR Cost: Retreat 1 space. Advanced effect: 1 Adventurer of your choice advances 3 spaces.

EGOTISM Simple effect: Retreat 2 spaces. OR Cost: Discard 1 Survival card. Advanced effect: Advance 2 spaces.

COWARDICE Simple effect: Secretly peek at 1 face-down Barque, then return it to its place — OR — Swap 2 Barques without peeking at them. OR Cost: Discard 1 Survival card. Advanced effect: Advance 1 space for each Adventurer ahead of you. You can advance a maximum of only 3 spaces with this effect.

ARROGANCE Simple effect: 2 Adventurers advance 1 space each. OR Cost: Discard 1 Survival card. Advanced effect: 1 Adventurer of your choice advances 3 spaces, and retreat the Speed die 1 space on the Rage track.

Betrayal Card Effects

AMBUSH Simple effect: Advance the Cerberus pawn 1 space. OR Cost: Discard 1 Betrayal card. Advanced effect: Advance the Cerberus pawn 2 spaces.

TREACHERY Simple effect: Increase the value of the Speed die by 1. OR Cost: Discard 1 Betrayal card. Advanced effect: Advance the Speed die 2 spaces on the Rage track.

VIOLENCE Simple effect: Advance the Speed die 1 space on the Rage track. OR Cost: Discard 2 Betrayal cards. Advanced effect: Increase the value of the Speed die by 2.

SABOTAGE Simple effect: 2 Adventurers of your choice each discard 1 Survival card. OR Cost: Discard 1 Betrayal card. Advanced effect: Each Adventurer chooses to discard 1 Survival card OR to retreat 2 spaces.

GRUDGE Simple effect: 1 Adventurer of your choice retreats 2 spaces. OR Cost: Discard 2 Betrayal cards. Advanced effect: Every Adventurer retreats 2 spaces.

DECEIT Simple effect: Secretly peek at 1 face-down Barque, then return it to its place — OR — Swap 2 Barques without peeking at them. OR Cost: 1 Adventurer of your choice advances 1 space. Advanced effect: 1 other Adventurer of your choice retreats 3 spaces.