Fish Frenzy Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Components
• Setup
• Object of the Game
• How to Play
  • Round Summary
• 1. Deal Fish & Crab Cards
• 2. Play Seagulls
  • Taking a turn
  • Challenging
  • Who Goes Next?
• 3. "Sort the Catch"
  • Collect
  • Eat
• End of the Round
• End of the Game
  • Fish Cards
  • Crab Cards
  • Tie Breakers
  • Scoring Example
• Goal and Event Cards (Optional)

Components

• 40 Little Fish Tokens (8 each of 5 player colors)
• 1 Boat Token (First Player Marker)
• 5 Seagull Tokens (1 of each player color)
• 80 Fish & Crab Cards
• 10 Goal & Event Cards
• 5 Captain Boat Boards

Note: The 8 colors of the Fish & Crab Cards do not correspond to the 5 player colors of the Seagull Tokens and Little Fish Tokens.

Setup

Place a number of Captain Boat Boards equal to the number of players in a line in the middle of the play area. Place the boats in order of the Little Fish marked on them from smallest to largest (zero-fish, one-fish, two-fish). Place any unused Captain Boat Boards back into the game box, they will not be used. Shuffle the Fish & Crab Cards and place them face down in the middle of the play area to form the Draw Deck.

Note: With 3 players, after you shuffle take the top 2 cards from the top of the Draw Deck and place them face-up in the Discard Pile.

Each player chooses a player color and takes the matching Seagull Token. Place 4 Little Fish Tokens matching the color of your Seagull Token in the general supply. Keep the 4 remaining Little Fish Tokens in front of you with your Seagull Token. Place any unused Seagull Tokens and Little Fish Tokens back in the box, they will not be used.

Give the Boat Token to the youngest player, who will be the start player in the first round.

Object of the Game

In Fish Frenzy, players take on the role of hungry Seagulls watching every boat the Captains of Rainbow Bay bring into dock. Every round players will compete to steal the Captains' catch and decide whether to eat the fish or save them for later. At the end of the game points will be awarded to the players who save the most and second most of each color of fish. Players must be careful and watch out for those pesky crabs who want in on a piece of the action as crabs score you negative points. The player with the most points wins the game!

How to Play

Each round, Fish & Crab Cards are dealt below the Captain Boat Boards, and players take turns placing their Seagull Tokens onto different boats. When all the Seagull Tokens have been played, players "Sort the Catch" on each boat. Players will either collect all the Fish & Crab Cards under each boat, or eat fish and collect some Little Fish Tokens from the general supply. The game continues over a number of rounds until the Draw Deck is depleted. At the end of the game, compare the number of Fish & Crab Cards of each color you have collected with the other players to find out who has earned the most points.

Round Summary

1. Deal Fish & Crab Cards
2. Play Seagulls
3. "Sort the Catch"

1. Deal Fish & Crab Cards

At the start of each round, deal 2 face-up Fish & Crab Cards from the Draw Deck below each boat. Always deal 2 cards below each boat, even if there are already Fish & Crab Cards left below the boat after the previous round. In later rounds some boats may have 3 or more Fish & Crab Cards below them after dealing new cards.

If a boat becomes crowded with Fish & Crab Cards make sure that the color of each Fish & Crab Card is still visible. Overlap the cards so that the players can see the colors of all the cards. Each card shows 1, 2 or 3 Little Fish, but it is only the number of Little Fish on the rightmost card that is important when it comes to eating fish. When adding new Fish & Crab Cards to the Captain Boat Boards, it is very important that the Fish & Crab Cards are ALWAYS added from left to right.

2. Play Seagulls

The player with the Boat Token begins this phase, and takes the first turn.

Taking a turn

On your turn, choose any boat and place your Seagull Token onto it.

• If the boat is unoccupied (meaning no Seagull Token is present), your turn is over.
• If the boat is occupied by another player's Seagull Token, you challenge the other player.

Challenging

When you challenge another player, you must say "Fish Frenzy!" and place one or more Little Fish Tokens beside your Seagull Token. You must play enough Little Fish Tokens so that you have played exactly 1 more Little Fish Token than the number already placed there by the player you challenged. When challenging another player, any Little Fish Tokens left by any previously challenged players are ignored.

• When challenging another player on a boat you must challenge the player with the most Little Fish Tokens on that boat.
• You may not place any Little Fish Tokens when placing your Seagull Token on an unoccupied boat.

Example: Yellow Player challenges the Red Player. Red must either fly away to a different boat or challenge Yellow by adding 1 more Little Fish token than Yellow.

The player you challenged immediately takes another turn. That player may move to an unoccupied boat, move to a different occupied boat and challenge another player, or stay on the boat they currently occupy and challenge you back.

Any Little Fish Token played on boats remain there until the end of the round. When the round ends they will be put back into the general supply.

Note: If you move to a new boat, any Little Fish Tokens you previously placed remain on the boat on which they were placed. You do not get the Little Fish Tokens back.

Who Goes Next?

Whenever a player chooses to move to an unoccupied Captain Boat Board, that player's turn is over. Play then continues clockwise from the player with the Boat Token: The next player is the first player clockwise who has not yet played their Seagull Token onto a boat.

Note: After a challenge, the challenged player must immediately take another turn, and this may begin a series of challenges. Continue until a player moves to an unoccupied boat and ends their turn.

When all the players have played their Seagull Token and all the Seagull Tokens are on different boats, it is time to move onto Phase 3, "Sort the Catch."

3. "Sort the Catch"

Move any Little Fish Tokens played onto boats during challenges into the general supply. Do not return Little Fish Tokens to the players. Then sort the catch on each boat in order, left to right, 1 boat at a time. When the catch on the boat with your Seagull Token on it is sorted, you must choose to either Collect or Eat. Then take back your Seagull Token.

Collect

Take all the Fish & Crab Cards under the boat and display them face-up in front of you. Group Fish & Crab Cards of the same color into sets in such a way where all players can identify how many you have of each color.

When you collect cards, you must take all of the cards at the boat, including any Crab Cards.

Eat

Take from the General Supply a number of Little Fish Tokens of your player color equal to the number of Little Fish pictured on the rightmost Fish & Crab Card under the boat, plus the number of extra Little Fish pictured on the boat (some boats do not have Little Fish on them meaning you do not add any extra to the number you take). Then discard the rightmost card, the one that you ate, into the discard pile. Any other cards remain in place for the next round.

Note: Crab Cards always have only 1 Little Fish on them unlike Fish Cards that have 1, 2, or 3 Little Fish on them because Crabs are very dangerous for Seagulls to eat.

For example: If your Seagull Token is on one of the boats with 1 Little Fish and the card you eat and discard has 2 Little Fish on it, you take 3 Little Fish Tokens of your player color from the general supply and put them in front of you.

If the total number of Little Fish on the card you ate and the Captain Boat Board is more than the number of Little Fish Tokens you have in the general supply, take back as many as you can. You can never have more than 8 Little Fish Tokens.

End of the Round

After players "Sort the Catch" if the Draw Deck has been depleted the game is over; otherwise, the player who currently has the Boat Token passes the Boat Token to the player on their left and a new round begins.

End of the Game

At the end of the game, all players compare the number of Fish & Crab Cards they have collected and score points as explained below. The player with the most points wins the game.

Take any 1 and only 1 of the Captain Boat Boards and flip it over to its backside to use as a Score Track (all Score Tracks are identical and on the back of every Captain Boat Board). Each player should then take their Seagull Token and place it on the "0" spot of the Score Track.

Fish Cards

Compare the number of Fish Cards of each color collected by all the players. The Crab Cards are counted separately. Compare the number of Fish Cards, NOT the number of Little Fish on the cards.

• Score 3 Points if you have the most Fish Cards of 1 color.
• Score 1 Point if you have the second most Fish Cards of 1 color.
• Score 2 Points for each player if there is a tie amongst players for the most of one fish color. If this happens then DO NOT score points for second most of that fish color.

Crab Cards

Each Crab Card scores a penalty of -1 point. Do not score any points for the most or the second-most Crab Cards.

Tie Breakers

If there is a tie after all players have scored their Fish & Crab Cards, the player with the most Little Fish Tokens breaks the tie and wins the game. In the event there is still a tie, the player with the fewest Crab Cards breaks the tie and wins the game. In the rare event there is STILL a tie players share victory!

Scoring Example

The Yellow Player scored a total of 9 points. The Yellow Player had more Mackerel (Black) and Salmon (Pink) cards than all the other players, so they scored 6 points total for these combined 2 colors. The Yellow Player tied another player for the most number of Sailfish (Blue), so they scored 2 points for that color. The Yellow Player had the second-most number of Fish Cards in Flutefish (Yellow), Lionfish (Brown) and Roughy (Orange), so scored 3 points for those colors. In addition, the Yellow Player had collected 2 Crab Cards, which each score a penalty of -1 point, for a total of -2 points taken from their final score.

Goal and Event Cards (Optional)

Once you have played a few games of Fish Frenzy you may want to add in the Goal & Event Cards for a more challenging game play experience.

There are 2 types of Variant Cards:

• Goal Cards, e.g. "Big Catch": End the game as the player with the most 3 "little Fish" Fish Cards - 3 VP.
• Event Cards, e.g. "Rainbow Route" (All Players): At the end of the game, each complete set of Fish Cards of all 7 colors - 3 VP.

To play with the Goal & Event Cards shuffle each deck separately. Reveal 1 Goal Card and 1 Event Card (place the rest of the Goal & Event Cards back in the box as they will not be needed).