Immune Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Overview
• Components
• Setup
• Gameplay
  • 1. Infect the human body
  • 2. Allocate energy
  • 3. Perform two immune actions
  • Other actions
• End of game
  • Difficulty settings
• Simplified variant
• Card list
  • Innate immunity
  • B-cell
• Disease cards

Overview

"Immune" is a medium weight, cooperative game for one to six players. Each player's turn consists of two phases: viral replication and immune response. Viral replication will gradually increase the viral presence in four major organs, sometimes triggering debilitating disease symptoms.

The immune response consists of 9 different actions that have variable strength according to the energy allocated to them. Each player must maturate the immune system, as well as deploy once-per-game abilities at the right time.

The game continues until either the virus conquers the human body or the immune system defeats the virus when the original strain is removed from the board.

Components

• 1 infection bag
• 1 rulebook
• 9 action tiles
• 20 epitope tiles
• 2 white cells
• 5 anchor tokens
• 9 energy tokens
• 108 viral tokens: 27 for each organ's color (blue, red, green, yellow)
• 5 white cell dice
• 42 cubes: 24 red (DNA), 12 green (RNA) and 6 blue (Protein)
• 22 disease cards
• 16 innate immunity cards
• 6 B-cell type cards
• 16 virus cards
• 1 organ board
• 1 cellular board

Setup

1. Fill the infection bag with all the viral tokens.
2. Pick one random virus card of the desired difficulty and place it face-up on its space. The card specifies which is the main organ. If this is the first game for all players, it is recommended to choose one of the easy virus cards.
3. Place one white cell token in each lymph node of the main organ.
4. Shuffle the disease deck and take the number of disease cards specified by the virus card, returning the rest to the box. Place the chosen cards face-up on their space on the organ board.
5. On the epitope area of the cellular board, place anchor tokens on the positions specified by the virus card. Shuffle epitope tiles and make 4 equal face-up stacks.
6. Shuffle the action tiles and then place each tile face-up in the grid area of the cellular board. Then place one energy token on each action.
7. Place 2 red cubes in the T-helper action tile.
8. Shuffle the innate immunity deck and place it face-down in its location on the cellular board.
9. Place all dice and cubes next to the organ board.
10. Give to each player 1 B-cell type card. The last person who has been sick is the starting player.

Gameplay

Players take turns in clockwise order and can share all information and plans. Each turn has three phases: 1) infect the human body, 2) allocate energy and 3) perform two immune actions.

1. Infect the human body

• The player draws two viral tokens from the infection bag and places each token on the organ of the corresponding color.
• The token must be placed in the empty space with the least number of occupied neighbors (occupied either by viral tokens or white cells).
• The first token for each organ can be placed in any empty space adjacent to a lymph node.
• When there are several viable spots, the player may choose any.
• A viral token can't be placed on a lymph node or on a space occupied by a white cell.
• When two (or more) tokens are of the same color, take the top disease card and follow its instructions.

Example: The new viral token is yellow and thus must be placed in the kidney. The viral token can be placed on any of the 3 shown spaces. (A) shows the two lymph nodes. (B) shows the trigger space: if a viral token is placed there, the players will immediately lose the game.

2. Allocate energy

• You may move one energy token one step to any orthogonally adjacent action space (not including diagonals).
• The maximum number of energy tokens that an action space can hold at any time is 3.

The player wishes to move the energy token in the center. The token can be moved orthogonally to any of the shown tiles.

3. Perform two immune actions

• The same action can be chosen twice.
• When choosing each action, it can be performed a number of times equal to the number of energy tokens in its space. For instance: If there are three energy tokens (the limit) in the Gene Regulation tile, the player gets three red cubes when the action is activated.
• If there are no energy tokens in an action, the action can't be performed.
• All game components are limited. If there are less supplies than provided by the action, take as many as possible.

The possible actions are:

• Gene regulation: Get 1 Red cube.
• Transcription: Discard 2 Red cubes and take 1 Green cube.
• Translation: Discard 2 Green cubes and take 1 Blue cube.
• Innate immunity: Discard 1 green cube and take one immunity card.
• Engage Innate unit: Use one innate card.
• T-helper: Place 1 cube to this space or take 1 cube from this space.
• Adaptive immunity: Discard 3 blue cubes and take one of the top epitope tiles. Then place the tile on the top area of the cellular board, according to the following rules:
  • The first tile must go on the central space marked with a zero.
  • All other tiles are placed on any empty space adjacent to a previously placed tile.
  • The connections must match on all shared sides.
  • The tile can be rotated as desired before placement, but once it is placed, it remains in that position.
  • A placed tile may be discarded at any time.
  • If you occupy a position with an anchor token, place the anchor token on top of the tile.
  • The players win the game immediately as soon as a continuous path of tiles connects all occupied anchor tokens.

The new epitope tile can be placed on any of the shown spaces.

• Get white cell die: Discard 1 Green cube and unlock one white cell die.
• Activate white cell: Move and/or attack with 1 white cell.

Movement: Movement is optional and can occur before or after attacking. One activated white cell can move a number of steps equal or lower to the number of unlocked white dice, with each step being any of the following options:

• To an adjacent empty space.
• To an adjacent lymph node (connected by lines).
• From a lymph node to another lymph node, in the same or different organ.

There are three unlocked dice, so the white cell can move up to three steps, to any of the spaces shown.

Attack: Each activated white cell can launch an attack to all its adjacent viral tokens.

• Roll all dice that are currently unlocked.
• Count the number of white cell hit symbols (antibody) and subtract the viral defense value.
• If there are any hits left, remove that number of adjacent viral tokens and keep them.

The player rolls the four dice that are currently unlocked, obtaining 3 hits. Given that the viral defense value is 2, the player can remove 1 viral token adjacent to the white cell that initiated the attack.

Other actions

At any moment during the game, even during the turns of other players, you can:

• Use viral tokens: Discard a set of viral tokens of four different colors (obtained in previous successful attacks) and either (a) get 1 green cube or (b) re-organize all energy tokens.
• Use your B-cell card: Follow the instructions of your B-cell card and discard.

End of game

• Defeat conditions: The virus conquers the human body and all players lose the game immediately when the infection bag is empty or when a viral token must be placed on the highlighted trigger space of any organ.
• Victory conditions: The immune system defeats the virus and the players win the game immediately as soon as all anchor tokens are occupied by tiles and a path of tiles connects them. The body's adaptive immunity learned to recognize the virus.

Difficulty settings

• If you already have defeated the highest difficulty, increase the viral defense value by one.
• In case of defeat, the group's score is 0. In case of victory, the group's score is the number of viral tokens left on the infection bag multiplied by the viral defense value.

Simplified variant

Please consider the following variant when you want to play: (1) a completely language-independent game, or (2) with people unfamiliar with strategic board games. Simply do the following during setup:

• Place only the "High fever" disease card on the board. Thus, when two viral tokens are the same color, the player loses all blue cubes. This card remains active on the board during the entire game.
• Do not give a B-cell card to each player.
• Remove from the innate immunity deck all cards except the ILs (1 to 8).

Card list

Innate immunity

• IL-1 regulation: Discard 1 blue cube and take 3 green cubes.
• IL-2 regulation: Discard 2 blue cubes and take 6 green cubes.
• IL-3 regulation: Discard 3 blue cubes and take 9 green cubes.
• IL-4 regulation: Discard 4 green cubes and take 3 Blue cubes.
• IL-5 regulation: Discard 5 green cubes and take 3 red and 3 Blue cubes.
• IL-6 regulation: Discard 6 green cubes and take 2 red and 4 Blue cubes.
• IL-7 regulation: Discard 7 red cubes and take 1 green and 2 blue cubes.
• IL-8 regulation: Discard 8 red cubes and take 3 blue cubes.
• Natural killer cells: Discard 1 green cube and remove 1 viral token adjacent to a white cell.
• Macrophages: Discard 3 viral tokens of the same color and take 1 green cube.
• Interferon: Discard 5 green cubes and place 4 viral tokens back to the infection bag.
• Basophils: Place all top epitope tiles into the bottom of their stacks.
• Dendritic cells: Discard 2 red cubes and relocate all white cells to any desired empty space.

B-cell

• Plasmablasts: Once per game, take the top 3 innate cards and choose one to keep. The others are placed back at the top.
• Plasma cells: Once per game, place 5 of your viral tokens into the infection bag.
• Memory B-cell: Once per game, take the top 4 disease cards and place them back in any desired order.
• Marginal zone B-cell: Once per game, relocate up to 3 placed epitope tiles.
• B-1 cell: Once per game, place one epitope tile for free.
• Regulatory B-cell: Once per game, don't place any viral tokens during the next infection step.

Disease cards

• Cough: The player discards all red cubes.
• Dehydration: The player discards all green cubes.
• High fever: The player discards all blue cubes.
• Diarrhea: The player discards all viral tokens.
• Organ failure: One unlocked white cell die is locked again.
• Titer increase: The next infection phase, draw 3 extra viral tokens.
• Inflammation: The player discards one innate immunity card.
• Mutation: One placed epitope tile must be discarded.
• Exhaustion: One energy token is removed from the game.
• Immunodeficiency: One white cell die is permanently removed from the game. The players can choose if the removed one is locked or unlocked.
• Hope: Nothing happens.