Crabs!
Crabs! Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Components
- 60 Crab Cards
- 18 Objective Cards
- 4 Gear Cards
- 5 Player Aids
- 5 Crab Tokens
Card Details
Objective Card
A. The Victory Points (VP) you get when you gain this card.
B. The score cards you must discard to gain this card. You can only discard vertical score cards from your score zone.
Gear Card
A. The bonus points added during the "Bind Crabs" action when your crab token is on this card.
B. The upgrade cost. This is the amount of cards you must discard in order to upgrade to this card.
C. The VP you get when your token is on this card. Each star icon (★) is worth 1 VP.
Crab Card
A. The point value of this card, and also the VP given when this card is placed vertical as a score card in your score zone.
B. The VP given when this card is placed horizontal as a score card in your score zone.
C. Premium crab icon, cards with this ★ icon is worth 1 extra VP when placed in your score zone. (Regardless of direction)
D. Crab illustration. Note that premium crabs are in golden color.
Game Setup
- Each player takes a player aid card and a crab token of the corresponding color.
- Shuffle all crab cards together and deal 6 cards to each player as their starting hand. Put the rest face down in the center of the table as a crab card pile, and then reveal 10 cards from the card pile as the starting crab pool.
- Shuffle all objective cards together and reveal 4 cards to form an objective card display. Keep the objective card pile face down nearby for later use.
- Place the gear cards from left to right in ascending order. All players place their crab token to the left of the lowest gear card.
- The person who has most recently eaten crabs will be the starting player. You may now start playing!
Turn Overview
Beginning clockwise from the starting player, each player will take a turn to perform 1 action of their choice; there are 6 different actions in this game:
- Catch Crabs
- Raise Crabs
- Trade Crabs
- Upgrade Gear
- Bind Crabs
- Relax Crabs
After you have taken an action, you may choose to trade in score cards for a single objective card.
At the end of the turn you discard down to a hand limit of 8 cards, and then the player to your left takes a turn.
Catch Crabs
Take a total of 2 crab cards from the card pile or from the pool. You may freely choose the order which you take from.
Example: Bubbles take a [5] card from the pool, then she draws 1 card from the top of the crab pile.
Raise Crabs
Play any amount of crab cards from your hand to the crab pool, and then you choose and take back the same amount of cards from the pool.
Example: Blossom plays 3 cards from her hand, and takes back any 3 cards of her choice from the pool.
Trade Crabs
Play any amount of crab cards from your hand to the crab pool, add the total point of all cards you played, then choose and take back any amount of cards from the pool that has the same total value.
Example: Buttercup plays 3 cards: [3] [3] [4] from her hand with a total of 10 points, and then she takes back 6 cards: [1] [1] [1] [1] [1] [5] worth a total of 10 points from the pool.
Relax Crabs
Choose up to 3 horizontal score cards in your score zone, and turn them vertical.
Example: Buttercup wants to relax crabs for this turn, she chooses a horizontal [5] ([4▲]) and turns it vertical.
Upgrade Gear
Gear cards will give you bonus points when you are binding crabs, and will make it easier for you to score crabs of higher value.
Discard an amount of cards equal to the cost listed on the next level you are upgrading to, and then you move your crab token to the next gear card to the right.
Discarded cards will go into the crab pool.
Example: Blossom discards 1 card to move her crab token from gear Lv1 to Lv2.
Bind Crabs
First you play one card face down as a rope card, then you play at least 1 crab card from your hand to score VP. Add bonus points given by the gear card your token is on to the total value of the face up crabs you just played, then check the following chart to keep a corresponding vertical or horizontal card as a single score card in your score zone.
Discard the rope card and all other unused crab cards face up to the crab pool.
Be careful not to mix your score zone with cards from the pool!
- 5~9 → 1 / 1▲
- 10~14 → 2 / 2▲
- 15~19 → 3 / 3▲
- 20~24 → 4 / 4▲
- 25+ → 5
Example: Buttercup wishes to score crabs, first she plays one card face down, then plays [2] [2] [4] [4] [5] from your hand. Her Gear Lv gives +3 so she has a total value of 20 points. She decides to keep [5] horizontally as [4▲] for her score card.
You MUST keep a score card from the cards you just played, if you don't have a corresponding card to the total you just played, then you cannot score this set of cards.
Example: Bubbles has [1] [2] [5] [5] [5] in her hand. First she plays [1] as the rope, then tries to play [2] [5] [5] [5] for a total of 17 points, however she doesn't have [3] or [4] to use as a score card, so she can't play this set of card. Instead, she plays [2] [5] [5] for a total of 12 points, then keeps a vertical [2] as her score card.
Objectives
After you have taken an action, you may choose to claim a single objective card by discarding the corresponding vertical score cards listed as the requirement from your score zone, and place the objective card in your score zone.
At the end of your turn, refill the objective card display back to 4 cards.
The extra VP gained by the objective cards is immediately added to your total, and may immediately trigger the end game conditions.
End of Turn
Hand limit: Choose and discard cards from your hand down to a limit of 8 cards.
Then the next clockwise player gets a turn.
Remember to check your total score at the end of the turn, if you reach 25 or more the game will end soon!
End of Game
When any player has a total of 25 or more VP, then the game ends after the player to the right of the starting player finishes their turn, so that all players have taken an equal amount of turns.
VP will come from 3 sources:
- Score cards in your score zone. Note that golden crabs are worth an extra VP.
- Objective cards in your score zone.
- Gear card your token is on. VP given is equal to the amount of star icons (★) on the card.
At the end of the game, player with the highest VP wins.
In case of a tie, the player with more cards left in their hand wins.
If there is another tie, the player with a higher total in their hand wins.
If there is still a tie, then the players share a combined victory.
Example: Buttercup is the starting player. At the end of her turn she reaches a total of 27 VP: 18 VP from score cards ([4▲] [4★] [4] [5]), 6 VP from objective cards, and 3 VP from the Lv3 gear card, thus her total is 27 VP. Blossom and Bubbles will both take one more turn, then the game ends and they compare their final scores.
FAQ
Q1 Can I keep [2] & [3] two cards in place of a [5] card when scoring?
A1 No. You can only keep a single card as a score card each time you take the "Bind Crabs" action.
Q2 What happens when the crab card pile is empty?
A2 Nothing. When the crab card pile is empty, that means you can only take cards from the pool when you take the "Catch Crabs" action.