Honigtöpfchen
Honigtöpfchen Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
The Idea of the Game
Working together, move the four bees around the meadow. Each flower must have the matching bees land on it. If you manage to get the right bees on a flower, turn it over to reveal the honey side. However, if you roll a leaf on the die, the autumn leaf starts to fall: If it touches the ground before you have turned over all the flowers, you lose the game. If you're faster than the leaf, you have helped the bees finish their job successfully and everybody wins!
Game Components
- 16 leaves (numbered 0, 1 and 2 on their backs)
- 4 bees (yellow, green, blue and pink)
- 1 autumn leaf (see the "Autumn leaf assembly" illustration on the rules sheet)
- 1 beehive
- 1 die
- 14 flowers
- 1 fall track (in two parts)
Setting Up the Game
- Place the beehive and the 14 flowers randomly in a circle. Make sure all flowers are flower-side up. We call this the "meadow".
- No matter how many players there are, put all four bees on the beehive.
- Shuffle the 16 leaves gently and place them inside the circle, face down.
- Put the two parts of the fall track together and place it next to the flower circle. Assemble the autumn leaf and put it in the top space on the track (up in the tree).
- The last player to have tasted honey goes first and takes the die.
Playing the Game
On your turn, roll the die. Depending on the result, you either move one of the four bees or reveal a leaf inside the circle. Then give the die to the player on your left.
a. Moving a Bee
If you rolled a number (1–5 on the die), pick any one bee and move it the exact number of flowers you have rolled around the meadow in a clockwise direction. The beehive and each flower counts as one step—it does not matter if it's flower- or honey-side up.
Note: The bees do not belong to specific players: all of you may move any bee. It's okay to confer, but in the end it's the active player who decides which bee to move.
Collecting Nectar and Filling Honey Pots
Your most important job is to move the bees to the matching flowers. Each flower has a flower side showing one or two honey pots. These honey pots either match a bee's color or are "wild":
- Flower with green pot = green bee.
- Flower with blue pot and wild pot = blue bee plus any other bee.
As soon as all the bees matching the colors of the honey pots have landed on a flower, they gather the nectar. Turn the flower over to reveal its honey side and put the bees back on it.
Note: You can have more bees than required on the same flower.
Example #1: Selenia rolls a 4. She moves the blue bee four flowers around the meadow. She lands on a flower that requires the blue bee and any other bee. Selenia flips the flower over to its honey side and puts both bees back on the flower.
b. Turning Over a Leaf
If you roll a leaf, you can't move a bee. Instead, you must choose one of the face-down leaves inside the circle and reveal it. There is a number on the back of each leaf: 0, 1 or 2. You must move the autumn leaf down the fall track that number of spaces, then put the leaf you chose back in the box.
Example #2: Arthur rolls a leaf. He reveals one of the leaves in the circle and finds a 2 on the back. The autumn leaf moves two spaces closer to the ground.
Next Player, Please!
When your turn is over, give the die to the player on your left. That player then rolls the die and takes their turn.
The End of the Game
The game ends and you all win as soon as you have flipped all of the flowers to the honey side.
However, the game also ends if the autumn leaf reaches the bottom space of the fall track: In this case, you all lose together.
Variants
You can make Honigtöpfchen a little easier or harder to win by making these small changes:
- For an easier game, take out one or two leaves with 2s on them when you set up the game and put them back in the box.
- For a harder game, take out one or two leaves with 0s on them when you set up the game and put them back in the box.