futuRisiKo! Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Components
• Objective of the Game
• The Board
• Game Setup
• How to Play
  • The 4 Phases
  • Sequence Determination Phase
  • Card Distribution Phase
  • Production Phase
  • Positioning the Units
  • Use of Special Cards
• Operations Phase
  • Movement
  • Combat
• Limit on the Number of Armies
• End of the Game
• Final Notes and Tips

Components

• 6 armies of different colours, each made up of:
  • 50 tanks (land armies)
  • 20 aircraft (air armies)
  • 10 submarines (naval armies)
  • 20 flags (garrisons)
• 10 special dice (marked with explosion symbols)
• 1 deck of 60 cards, divided as follows:
  • 12 "Secret Weapon" cards
  • 12 "Killer Torpedo" cards
  • 12 "Super Production" cards
  • 6 "Ballistic Missile" cards
  • 6 "Space Shield" cards
  • 6 "Truce" cards
  • 6 "Betrayal" cards
• 1 summary sheet
• 1 rulebook

Objective of the Game

Be the first to occupy 20 territories.

The Board

The game board is divided into 36 territories and 8 sea areas. The territories are separated from one another by a border and are identified by a name.

Japan, Borneo, New Guinea, Baffin Island, Victoria Island and Great Britain are islands, but they are considered adjacent by land to other territories, through the special connecting lines provided.

Borneo, moreover, although made up of a group of 6 islands, constitutes a single territory bordering both Indochina and New Guinea.

Greenland and Madagascar, on the other hand, are true islands, with no land connection to other territories.

The 8 sea areas (North Pacific, South Pacific, Atlantic, North Atlantic, South Atlantic, Arctic Ocean, Mediterranean and Indian Ocean) are divided from one another by dashed lines.

The board shows a planisphere, so the two sides, left and right, are ideally connected to each other. This means that the North Pacific and the South Pacific wash both the American coasts and those of Asia and Oceania.

Game Setup

• Before starting, give each player an army.
• Shuffle the card deck thoroughly and draw one card at random. The coloured circle on the card shows who will play first; the others follow in clockwise order. If the drawn colour does not correspond to any colour in play (which can happen when playing with fewer than 6 players), repeat the operation as necessary. The cards drawn during this phase must then be returned to the deck, and the deck shuffled again.
• At the end, place the deck beside the game board. From now on, all cards played or discarded during the game are placed at the bottom of the deck, face down (illustrated side downwards).

NOTE: during the whole game, the card deck is never shuffled again.

• Take the 10 dice and keep them within reach.
• Now, starting with the first player and proceeding clockwise, each player in turn takes one of their flags (garrisons) and places it on a free territory of their choice, occupying it. This is repeated until all territories are occupied. If playing with 5 players, it is necessary to "eliminate" a territory that, during the game, will turn out not to be occupiable by anyone. We recommend Madagascar or Greenland.

IMPORTANT: at the start of the game, the flags are the only pieces present on the board.

You are now ready to start.

How to Play

The game is divided into turns, each of which is divided into 4 distinct phases. At the end of each phase, play passes to the next, in the exact order indicated. At the end of the fourth and last phase of a turn, play resumes with the first phase of the next turn, and so on until one of the players has reached the objective of the game.

The 4 Phases

1. Sequence determination phase
2. Card distribution phase
3. Production phase
4. Operations phase

Sequence Determination Phase

Draw the first card from the deck. Its colour indicates who will play first; the others follow clockwise.

As already happened at the start of the game, if the colour does not correspond to that of any player, repeat the operation.

Any cards drawn during this phase must be placed at the bottom of the deck.

The sequence determination must be repeated at the start of each turn and carried out only once per turn.

Card Distribution Phase

Take the deck and distribute the cards according to these rules:

1. At the start of each turn, each player must have in hand a number of cards proportional to the number of territories in their possession, at the rate of one card per 3 territories. For example, if you control 9 territories you are entitled to have 3 cards in hand, but if you possess only 8 or 7 you may have 2.
2. If a player has more cards than they should, they must discard the excess, choosing which ones (obviously this situation cannot occur in the first turn of the game).
3. If the player has fewer cards than they should, draw from the deck as many cards as necessary to restore their hand.
4. A player is always free to discard a card already in their possession that they consider useless, but must do so before drawing from the deck.

Production Phase

During the production phase, all players, following the order established in the first phase of the turn, may build new military units to place on the game board. Armies are built using Production Points (from now on simply referred to as PP) available to each player.

Each player has 1 PP for every territory in their possession, and these points may be used to build new units. PP do not carry over from turn to turn: any PP not used in this phase cannot be used later.

Production costs

• A land army costs 1 PP
• An air army costs 2 PP
• A naval army costs 5 PP

Example: a player controls 9 territories, so has 9 PP, which they could use to build one naval army (5 PP), one air army (2 PP) and two land armies (1 PP each), for a total of 9 PP. Another player, also with 9 PP, could instead opt to build 5 land armies (1 PP each) and two air armies (2 PP each). Any combination is acceptable, provided the total does not exceed the PP available.

Positioning the Units

After deciding how to use their PP, the active player must deploy their reinforcements. Land and air units may be placed on any territory under the player's control, without any limitation (all on the same territory or divided as the player wishes). Naval units, instead, must be placed inside a sea area provided that this is adjacent to a territory under the control of the active player.

NOTE: unlike the 36 territories, the 8 sea areas are never under the control of a single player. This means that several submarines of different colours may be present in the same sea area.

Use of Special Cards

During this phase of the game it is possible to use the "Super Production" cards, to increase the number of PP available; the "Ballistic Missile" cards, to reduce the PP available to an opponent; and the "Space Shield" card, to protect yourself from Ballistic Missiles.

The way each card is used is specified in more detail on the summary sheet.

Operations Phase

After all players have completed the production phase, the last phase of the turn, the operations phase, begins. The operations phase of the active player consists of MOVEMENT and COMBAT.

Movement

Movement serves to carry out all the troop movements considered strategically necessary. Each individual piece on the game board may be moved according to its characteristics:

1. Tanks may move from the territory they occupy to an adjacent territory (friendly or enemy).
2. Aircraft may move from the territory they occupy to a territory or sea area adjacent to it, and from there to another territory (but not a sea area), friendly or enemy, adjacent to the latter. In practice, an aircraft may fly over a territory or a sea area, but may not end its movement at sea.
3. Submarines may move from the sea area they occupy to another adjacent sea area, regardless of whether there are fewer or more friendly territories bordering the latter. Each submarine has the special property of making "adjacent" all the territories that border the sea area it occupies. This makes possible an "amphibious" movement of tanks. In practice, the presence of a submarine is as if the sea between two distant territories were entirely eliminated, regardless of whether there are more or fewer submarines of other players in the same sea area.

To use this special connection, however, the submarine must not have moved during the current turn. Tanks moved across an "amphibious" connection must also not have made any further movements during the current turn.

ATTENTION: as already stated, the game board is a planisphere, so it is possible to move from east to west and vice versa. Movement from north to south and vice versa, on the other hand, is not possible. Example: an air army present in Japan could be moved to California, flying over the North Pacific.

NOTE: to better understand the different types of movement, follow the examples given on the summary sheet.

Combat

After carrying out all of their troop movements, the active player must fight in all the territories invaded with their air or land armies, deciding the order in which to resolve the individual combats.

There are no retreats or second thoughts, so all combats must be concluded.

NOTE: invasions and combats are the strategic heart of the game, but they are not compulsory. On your turn you may decide not to move at all, or to carry out only some strategic movements within your own territories, without invading any enemy territory.

Each combat takes place as follows:

• Count how many air armies the attacker (the player who invaded the territory) and the defender (the player who controls the invaded territory) have in the territory where the combat is about to take place.
• Whoever has more air armies (regardless of the number of land armies) has the right to roll the dice first. In case of a tie, the right to the first roll always belongs to the defender (in practice, the attacker may roll the dice first only if they have at least one more air army than the defender).

NOTE: only air armies count when deciding who rolls the dice first. If you invade a territory defended by 10 land armies with just a single aircraft, and that is enough, the right to the first roll of the dice is yours, and this advantage may also be exploited to use some special cards.

• The player who has the right to roll the dice first counts how many air and land armies they have in the territory and takes a corresponding number of dice. If the defender is the one rolling, they must add 2 dice for the garrison (the flag), whereas the attacker may add one die for each of their naval armies adjacent to the territory (that is, placed in a sea area bordering the territory attacked).
• The player who rolls the dice may also use one of the cards in their possession (see summary sheet). Using the card is in addition to, and not in place of, rolling the dice.
• Once the dice are rolled, the player is entitled to immediately eliminate from their opponent as many air or land armies of their choice as the number of "explosions" obtained. At the end of each roll, the dice pass to the opponent.

NOTE: once it has been determined who rolls the dice first, the combat continues with alternating rolls, regardless of who has more air armies. In practice, air superiority is determined at the start of the combat and applies for its entire duration.

• A combat ends at the moment the defender loses all their armies and their garrison (the flag), or at the moment the attacker loses all their air and land armies (naval armies, by themselves, cannot continue the attack).
• To eliminate the defender's garrison it is sufficient to score a single explosion, but the garrison must be the last piece of the defender to be eliminated.
• The attacker's naval armies cannot be eliminated by the defender.
• Naval armies cannot be used in defence.
• Naval armies may take part in several combats during the same turn.
• The defender's garrison defends itself even if there are no other friendly armies in the territory, and always does so by rolling two dice.
• If the attacker wins, they place on the occupied territory one of their own garrisons (a flag) taken from their supply.

When the operations phase of one player is over (which happens after all combats have been resolved), play passes to the next player, who in turn carries out movements and combats.

When all players have completed their operations phase, the game continues with a new turn, which begins with the new "Determination of the game sequence".

Limit on the Number of Armies

The available supply constitutes a limit that may not be exceeded. A player therefore cannot build more armies than are available.

End of the Game

The game ends the moment a player comes into possession of the 20th territory.

The end of the game is instantaneous, so the other players have no right to complete their operations phase.

Alternatively, you may always decide, before starting the game, to reduce the number of territories to be reached to 18 or 16, so as to shorten the duration of the game. This decision must in any case be made before the start, because it may change the entire game strategy.

Final Notes and Tips

FutuRisiko! lets you develop fairly complex strategies, but only after having fully learned the rules of the game.

To practise, we advise you to start playing without using the special card deck, except to determine the sequence of play each turn.

Always remember that to conquer a territory you must invade it by moving your air and/or land armies before you can proceed to the actual combat.

This aspect of the game is an essential element of strategy and clearly distinguishes FutuRisiko! from Risiko!

Only by carefully planning your invasion movements is it possible to keep the right balance between the armies you send into attack and those you leave in defence of your territories.

Remember, in fact, that all movements must be carried out before the combats, and that at the end of the operations phase no further strategic movements are possible, as happens when playing Risiko!

At the start of the game it may therefore be advisable to limit yourself to reinforcing your territories with the most economical land armies, but if you are the last player of the turn you may also try to take advantage of the situation for an apparently risky attack.

After you, in fact, no one else will play, and you will be able to use the following production phase to reinforce territories left partially undefended.

Try also to exploit the geographic features of the game board in a strategically shrewd way.

Islands, for example, in the early phases of the game are difficult to attack until someone begins to develop naval or air units.

Always pay close attention to air superiority, especially when playing with special cards.

The best players are capable of launching deadly attacks by skilfully exploiting certain combinations.

Naval armies, too, can be fundamental, even if their high production cost makes them inadvisable in the very first turns.

Never forget that eliminating an enemy naval army is rather difficult, because the only available way is through the use of a special card.