King of Con Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Goal of the Game
• Contents of the Box
• Characteristics
• Setup
• Collection
• How to Play
  • Phase 1. Hype Intensifies
  • Phase 2. Impulse Buying
  • Phase 3. Looting
  • Phase 4. Supreme Show Off
• End of the Game
• Scenario (optional, stretch goal)

Goal of the Game

Become the King of Con by buying, at the expense of your opponents, as many items as possible, even better the ones related to your passions. You might be able to complete the collection you've been building for years!

Contents of the Box

• This unfailing rulebook.
• The colorful game board, provided with a big orange area divided into 4 Booths and 1 Stall, the gray indicator where you place the Items deck, a blue area for optional Scenario cards and a green area where the Round-tracker and the Phase-tracker are placed.
• 2 punched cardboards containing: the Phase-counter, the Round-counter, the Dominance-tracker, 5 Trash tiles (one for each player) in five different colors (blue, yellow, black, red and green) and 100 precious grey tokens.
• 45 priceless cards: 25 Items (gray vertical cards, each one with 3 characteristics: Genres, Category and Edition); 15 Passions (gray, horizontal) and 5 Monkeys (red, horizontal).
• 10 memorable Scenario cards and sheets, only if they have been unlocked by the stretch goal.
• 5 special main screens in five different colors (blue, yellow, black, red and green) and 5 minor screens.

Characteristics

The nerd is a fascinating creature. Collecting is the main activity that shows off his passion. His objects of desire are related to specific genres, different by type and support category, and are available on the market in many editions. For this game we've identified 15 characteristics for Items and Passions, showing the following hashtags:

Genre

• #Sci-Fi: interstellar wars, deep space explorations, aliens, spaceships...
• #SuperHeroes: heroes in tights, superpowers, mutations, secret identities...
• #Fantasy: dragons, elves, thrones, swords, mages and powerful spells...
• #MangAnime: martial arts, giant robots, superhits, supertits...
• #Horror: monsters, serial killer, blood, extreme terror, paranormal...

Category

• #ComicsBooks: comic strips, timeless sagas on paper or digital...
• #HomeVideo: movie and tv shows in different format (Blu-ray, DVD, Laserdisc, VHS...)
• #ActionFigures: authentic reproductions of movie and comic characters...
• #Games: digital and paper games dedicated to your favorite heroes.
• #Gadgets: licensed objects, from t-shirt to toilet paper...

Edition

• #Vintage: nowhere to be found, out of stock, from '80s or even before...
• #SignedEdition: signed edition from the author...
• #LimitedEdition: exclusive and limited, with a serial number...
• #DeluxeEdition: extended, bonus, collector's edition, director's cut...
• #Mint: preserved in perfect conditions, still in the original cellophane...

Setup

1. Place the game board at the center of the table. The 4 numbered orange areas, along all the left half, represent the Booths of the convention. Each Booth is characterized by colored markers referred to the 5 nerds: blue for @Dirk, green for @Lulu, yellow for @Greg, red for @Todd, black for @Zak. The orange zone in the right bottom of the board is an additional area called Stall. Put the squared Phase-counter in the green area of the board on the slot 1 (showing @Zak, the black nerd, at the pc) and the rounded Phase-counter on the slot with roman number I. Put the Dominance-tracker on characteristic 1 (#Sci-Fi).
2. Each player chooses 1 color between blue, yellow, black, red or green (matching themself with the corresponding nerd). He gets the main screen of his color and a minor screen (anyone, they are all identical); each one receives also the Trash of his color, putting it in front of him on the table, visible to all the opponents: on this rounded tile each player collects the tokens wasted during the phases of the game, before they are moved on the common pool at the end of the round.
3. Each player receives a starting budget of 10 tokens. During the game it is important to hide to the opponents the number of tokens of the personal supply. Each player hides his tokens behind his minor screen. Create a common pool with all the other tokens and keep them close to all players.
4. Take as many Monkey cards as the number of players, starting from Monkey 1 and proceeding in ascending order (e.g. in a 4-players game, ignore Monkey card 5) and put back into the box those that aren't used (they will not be used in this game). Shuffle them and give a Monkey card to each player, who has to reveal it in front of him: the number on the card indicates the ascending order of priority for the players (when it's necessary to respect a precise order) and it's used to solve all the tie-breaks happening during the game (unless otherwise specified), favouring the player with the lower number.
5. Shuffle the Passion cards: each player, in ascending Monkey order, draws 3 cards and chooses the 2 cards he wants to keep, storing them face down on the table in front of him. The third one is discarded (without revealing it); all the cards discarded in this way are put back into the box (without revealing them) because they will not be used in this game. Passions are important for your strategy, they state how to gain extra Victory points at the end of the game. Warning: for your first game as inexperienced players we suggest you to draw just 2 Passion cards (instead of 3), keeping both of them (without discarding any).
6. Shuffle the Items deck and place them near Booth 1, adjacent to the grey reference area. By purchasing these cards the players compete for the victory.

The convention will start soon!

Collection

The Collection consists of Items that each player has exposed in front of his main screen on the table.

The final value of a Collection (which gives the Victory points) is calculated by the number of Items which compose it and by the match of their characteristics with the secret Passions:

• 1 Victory point for each Item;
• 1 Victory point for each characteristic matching a secret Passion;
• 1 Victory point for each 3 unspent tokens.

In addition, a Collection with at least 4 Items sharing the same characteristic grants to the player the Epic Collection bonus: the game ends at the end of the current phase and that player scores 1 additional Victory point.

How to Play

A game is divided into 6 rounds, each one composed by 4 phases where all the players play their turn.

• Phase 1. Hype Intensifies: regardless of the number of players, all Booths expose new Items.
• Phase 2. Impulse Buying: all the players must compete with opponents to purchase the exposed Items through intense secret auctions.
• Phase 3. Looting: all the players can improve their reputation of collectors, buying other Items from the Stall or looting them from opponent's Collections.
• Phase 4. Glorious Show Off: players strut around, showing their purchases to opponents, receiving the benefit from their dominant Collections.

Phase 1. Hype Intensifies

Put on each Booth on the board, in ascending order (1 to 4), one revealed Item drawn from the top of the Items deck. Move the Phase-counter to slot 'I' and proceed with the next phase.

Example: from the Items deck are revealed: the signed Japanese giant robot on Booth 1, the wonderful fantasy broadsword on Booth 2, the rare sci-fi book on Booth 3 and, at the end, the signed Cthulhu board game on Booth 4. Then the Phase-counter is moved to the next slot, the one showing @Dirk and the roman number I.

Phase 2. Impulse Buying

Tokens. During the game, Items improve and decrease their values, represented by tokens, managed by players during the rounds. Each player, during the setup, receives a starting budget of 10 tokens.

Waste. Waste is a keyword used to indicate the temporary positioning of the tokens on the Trash tile of their owner (tokens wrongly placed on the Quadrant or insufficient offers to purchase an Item). At the end of the round they may be recovered or moved into the common pool.

Whip-Round. Whenever the availability of tokens into the common pool is not enough to solve any game effect, each player must return 1 token to the general supply (if possible).

Bluff. All the tokens wrongly offered by players are wasted and moved to Trash. Nevertheless you can bluff, by faking to put tokens on the Quadrant: thanks to the main screen, no one can exactly see your actions!

The first part of the second phase is formed by 3 consecutive Hid-bids, in which each player must take any number of tokens (even zero) from his personal supply to secretly put them on the Quadrant of his minor screen, in the slot corresponding to one (just one) of the four Items exposed on the Booths of the board, in order to acquire it.

Warning: during the Hid-bids players CAN'T perform multiple offers. If it happens, all the tokens offered are wasted. Tokens placed incorrectly on the Quadrant are wasted.

Example: Items are exposed on the Booths and it's possible to offer tokens for them. @Dirk (blue nerd) wants 2 cards, the big robot and the board game, both with signed edition (his secret Passion), but he has to decide how to perform his offers, since in each Hid-bid he can offer for just 1 card. This fact doesn't prohibit to perform different offers into 2 different Hid-bids of the same phase: @Dirk must play intelligently to acquire both cards he wants!

When all players have done their offer on Quadrants, they reveal them at the same time, temporarily removing their main screens to show the slot with the offered tokens. Each one moves all these tokens on his colored marker on the Booth related to the card he have offered for.

When a Hid-bid ends, the players restore their main screens; the Phase-counter moves on the next slot and they perform other Hid-bid rounds until it reaches slot 2.

Important: if nobody performs an offer during a Hid-bid, the Phase-counter immediately moves to slot 2 (skipping eventually remaining auctions) and Items are assigned to the players with the highest offer.

Warning: If an Item has NO offer, no one purchases it and the card is moved on the Stall zone on the board.

At the end of the Hid-bids, Items are distributed starting from Booth 1. Each card is purchased by the player who offered more tokens.

Example: the big robot on Booth 1 is purchased by @Dirk (blue nerd) with 5 tokens. All tokens offered for the action figure MangAnime by the other players are wasted and moved to their owner's Trashes. The fantasy broadsword on Booth 2 is purchased by @Lulu (green nerd) with 4 tokens while the rare book on Booth 3 is disputed in a tie-break between @Greg (yellow nerd) and @Todd (red nerd) because both have offered 3 tokens. @Greg wins the situation thanks to his Monkey card. In Booth 4, @Zak (black nerd) has predicted the offers of the opponents and he offered 5 tokens during the last Hid-bid, successfully purchasing the board game.

When players purchase Items they put them revealed in their Collections: players keep their Collection on the table in front of them, with offered tokens on the card to represent the value of that Item. Tokens offered by other players for that Item are wasted and moved to their Trashes. Move the Phase-counter on slot 3 and proceed with the next phase.

Stall (in-depth information). All Items exposed on the Booths which have NOT received any offer at the end of the Hid-bids are moved on the Stall during phase 2. Impulse Buying.

There is no limit to Items that can be on this area.

Items exposed here have a value of 2 tokens.

To purchase an Item from the Stall (during phase 3. Looting), a player must perform a secret offer of at least 3 tokens, putting them on the corresponding slot of the Quadrant of his minor screen.

Example: @Greg (yellow nerd) wants to add an Item exposed on the Stall to his Collection. During phase 3. Looting he offers 3 tokens on his Quadrant, on the slot corresponding to this card, hoping no one else will offer for that. All Items on the Stall have a value of 2 tokens, so Greg has to offer at least 3 to purchase it. If there will be tie-breaks, they will be resolved by using Monkey cards.

Phase 3. Looting

In the third phase players can purchase Items from the Stall, steal Items from opponents' Collections and/or increase the value of an Item they own.

Each player takes secretly any number of tokens (even zero) from their personal supply and put them on the slots of the Quadrant of his minor screen corresponding to Items in play (in their own Collection, in opponents' Collections or on the Stall).

Warning: During this phase it's possible to perform MULTIPLE offers on the Quadrant, unlike what happens during the Hid-bids. Anyway, remember that wrong offers (for Items not in play) are wasted and moved to their Trashes, without any effect.

When all players have done their offer on Quadrants, they reveal them at the same time by removing their main screen. All the offers on Items of their own Collection are immediately moved on the relative cards to increase their values (defending them from opponents' offers). Then, check the other offers: to purchase an opponent's Item, a player must have offered more tokens than the actual value of the card, and his offer must be higher than any other offer for the same Item.

Example: the 5 tokens offer doesn't overcome the Item's value and it's wasted to Trash. The value is increased, but not enough to defend the Item. With 6 tokens he "loots" the Item.

Example: @Lulu (green nerd) fears that one opponent can loot the wonderful fantasy broadsword she has just put in her Collection. She decides to increase its actual value (4) by offering 1 token. When the offers will be revealed the value of this card will be 5. @Lulu has been cautious, but not enough: @Greg (yellow nerd) offered 5 tokens but now this offer is not sufficient to overcome the card value, but @Todd (red nerd) offered 6 tokens, so he takes that card from @Lulu's collection.

The tokens offered by the player "looting" the Item are given to the previous owner. The value of that Item must be updated to its new value (by taking the missing tokens from the common pool) while changing owner and Collection (and owner). Offers equal or lower than an Item's value are ignored and tokens are wasted and moved to the Trash of that player.

Disputed Items receiving more offers of the same value are purchased by the player who wins the tie-break with the best Monkey.

Example: tokens offered by @Todd (red nerd) for the broadsword are directly moved in @Lulu's personal supply, her sole consolation for losing the Item of her Collection in favor of @Todd. The tokens on the broadsword must be updated the new value of 6, taking them from the common pool. Tokens offered by @Greg (yellow nerd) are wasted and moved to his Trash.

Now all Items in Collections must lose 1 token, which is wasted. Don't worry: Items can also be without tokens, they will remain in Collection with value 0, but then they will be easy to "loot" by your opponents.

Devaluation: each Item in Collection loses 1 token (tokens lost in this way are wasted).

Example: now all Items in Collections must lose 1 token, which is wasted (and moved temporarily to their owner's Trash). @Dirk's big robot drops to value 4, @Todd's broadsword to 5, @Greg's rare book has now 2 tokens and @Zak's board game goes down to 4.

Move the Phase-counter on slot 4 and proceed with the next phase.

Monkeys (in-depth information). Unless otherwise specified, whenever it is necessary to resolve a tie-break, players involved check the value reported on their Monkey card: the one who has the Monkey with the lower number wins.

In case of multiple tie-breaks (for example, 2 players who have offered the same number of tokens on 2 different Items during phase 3. Looting), they are resolved one by one: who owns the Monkey with the lowest number chooses an Item on which he wants to exercise his priority and he adds it to his Collection.

Then, he swaps the Monkey with the player involved in the tie-break and they proceed to resolve the next tie-break, considering the new Monkeys. If the swap of Monkey cards involves more than 2 players, the winner has to take the worst Monkey (higher number) and the others has to follow the actual order of priority to take the best Monkeys (lower number).

Example: @Greg, @Lulu and @Todd have to resolve a tie-break: they have respectively Monkeys 5, 3 and 2. @Todd wins the tie-break because he has the Monkey with lowest number. Then, they have to exchange the Monkeys involved in this tie-break: @Todd gets Monkey 5 from @Greg, @Lulu Monkey 2 from @Todd and she gives Monkey 3 to @Greg.

Monkey Control (optional rule). If you are very experienced players you can introduce this optional rule allowing players to control their Monkey cards, allowing who has the best card to lose voluntarily a tie-break to keep his actual Monkey card.

Example: during phase 4. Supreme Show Off, @Greg (yellow nerd) and @Zak (black nerd) are resolving a tie-break for a dominance that can be resolved only by using Monkeys. @Greg prefers not to swap his Monkey 1 with @Zak's Monkey 5 to gain just 1 token, so he decides to let @Zak win the tie-break without losing his actual Monkey card.

Phase 4. Supreme Show Off

Perform the next steps of this last phase in order:

1. Each player returns tokens (if available) from his Trash to the personal supply equal to:

   Recovery: 5 tokens minus the number of Items in Collection (eventual tokens left must be moved in the common pool).

   Example: @Lulu (green nerd) has no Items in her Collection, so she can recover 5 tokens from her Trash. Since @Lulu has only 2 tokens on her tile, she takes all of them. @Dirk (blue nerd), @Greg (yellow nerd), @Todd (red nerd) and @Zak (black nerd) have all 1 Item in Collection and so they can return up to 4 tokens from their Trashes. @Dirk returns 1 token; the others three will return 4 and @Greg and @Zak put the excess tokens back in the common pool. Everybody adds to his personal supply the tokens returned in this way.

2. Put the Dominance-tracker on the first characteristic (#Sci-Fi) and move it to proceed with the numerical order indicated on the board, verifying the player who has the dominance on each of the 15 characteristics (5 Genre, 5 Categories, 5 Editions), attributed to the player who owns the most number of Items with that characteristic in Collection; for each dominance a player has, he gets:

   Dominance: 1 token from the common pool.

   Eventual tie-breaks are resolved by confronting the value of the cards with that characteristic, the highest total wins; if the tie persists, resolve it by using Monkeys.

3. If a player has no Items in Collection, he gets:

   Consolation: 1 token from the common pool.

   Example: @Lulu (green nerd) has no Item in her Collection, after @Todd (red nerd) has looted her fantasy broadsword: she gets 1 token from the common pool and adds it in her personal supply.

Dominance (in-depth information). A player dominates a characteristic when he owns a Collection with the most number of Items sharing it. In case of a tie, the player who has more tokens on these Items wins. If the tie persists, resolve it by using Monkey cards. Each dominance, during phase 4. Supreme Show Off, allows a player to gain 1 token, taken from the common pool, to put it in his personal supply.

Example: the dominance of the Genre #Sci-Fi (1) belongs to @Greg (yellow nerd), who receives 1 token from the common pool, as @Todd (red nerd) for #Fantasy (3), @Dirk (blue nerd) for #MangAnime (4) and @Zak (black nerd) for #Horror (5). Then @Greg for #ComicsBooks (6), @Dirk for #ActionFigures (8), @Zak for #Games (9) and @Todd for #Gadgets (10). In the Editions, @Greg in #Vintage (11), @Dirk in #SignedEdition (12) because his robot has 1 more token than @Zak's board game, while @Todd with his unique #DeluxeEdition (14) take the last token at stake for this step.

End of the round: move the Phase-counter on slot 1 and move the Phase-counter on the next slot to start another round, repeating all the phases. If the Phase-counter cannot move further because it's on slot VI, the game ends proceeding with the final scoring.

End of the Game

The game ends at the end of round VI; the game can finish earlier, at the end of the phase in which a player completes an Epic Collection (by having at least 4 Items sharing the same characteristic).

Epic Collection: 4 Items in Collection with the same characteristic.

Example: @Dirk (blue nerd), during phase 3. Looting takes the #Horror board game from @Zak (black nerd), triggering the end of the game condition (at round V) by completing an Epic Collection of signed Items with 4 cards in Collection sharing the Edition #SignedEdition.

In both cases the winner is the one who scores most Victory points. Each player scores:

• 1 Victory point for each Item in Collection (ignore their value in tokens);
• 1 Victory point for each characteristic on Items in Collection matching one of his secret Passion;
• 1 Victory point for each Epic Collection completed (at least 4 Items in Collection sharing the same characteristic);
• 1 Victory point for each 3 tokens in his personal supply.

Example: the game ends and the players score their points by revealing their Passions to draw up the ranking: @Greg (yellow nerd) with 3 Items in Collection having 4 matches with his Passions scores 7 points; @Todd (red nerd) and @Lulu (green nerd) scores both 8 points: @Lulu with 4 items, 3 matchings and 1 point from tokens in her personal supply, while @Todd with 4 Items in Collection but 4 matchings; @Zak (black nerd) is one step away from victory with 10 points (4 items with 5 matchings and 2 points from tokens in his personal supply); @Dirk (blue nerd) wins with 11 points, 1 of which for the Epic collection bonus, allowing him to score more points than @Zak.

Tie-break: between 2 or more players, resolve it by counting the number of tokens on the Items of their Collections; the player with the highest total value wins. If the tie persists, resolve it by using Monkey cards.

Example: @Lulu (green nerd) and @Todd (red nerd) resolve the tie-break for the final scoring: @Lulu wins the tie because she has 7 tokens in Collections, while @Todd has 5. If the tie persisted, @Todd would win because he has Monkey 1. Too bad for him: all is postponed to the next Convention! Meanwhile, @Dirk is the King! Long live the nerd!

Thank you for playing with us!

Scenario (optional, stretch goal)

If you are experienced players you can introduce the optional rules of a Scenario by using the relative cards and sheets.

Perform the point 7 of the Setup and for the whole duration of the game keep close the Scenario sheet introducing all the special rules modification.

Always keep in mind that the Scenario rules prevail in contradiction with the rules.

The Scenario cards and sheets (only if unlocked by the stretch goal) are not part of this transcription.