Midgard
Midgard Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Game Overview
In Midgard, each player is the chieftain of a Viking clan battling to rule the kingdoms of Midgard before they are destroyed in the chaos of Ragnarok.
The game consists of three rounds. At the start of each round, the players semi-secretly draft action cards from three different decks of varying strength and versatility, crafting their game plan for the round. Then they take turns playing their selected cards, deploying their Vikings to attack and control the provinces. At the end of each round, players earn kingdom tokens for the provinces they occupy, and score points for control of provinces in each kingdom.
At the end of the third round, the players earn bonus points for each complete set of kingdom tokens they possess, and the player with the highest score wins the game.
Game Components
- 50 bronze cards
- 35 silver cards
- 15 gold cards
- 55 Viking warrior pawns (11 in each of 5 colors)
- 5 Viking leader pawns (1 in each of 5 colors)
- 5 score markers (1 in each of 5 colors)
- 10 doom tokens
- 120 kingdom tokens (40 in each of 3 colors)
- 1 game board
- 1 rulebook
Credits
Design: Eric M. Lang
Development: Eric M. Lang, Jonathan Moriarity
Rulebook text: Jonathan Moriarity
Graphic Design: George Wu
Cover Illustration: John Gravato
Publisher: Zev Shlasinger
(c) 2006 Z-Man Games. Visit www.zmangames.com
Setup
Separate the cards into three decks: one of gold cards, one of silver, and one of bronze. Shuffle each of the three decks separately, then place them face down near the board.
Each player chooses a color and takes the Viking warriors, Viking leader, and score markers for that color. Return any unused colors to the box.
Each player places their Viking leader and five of their Viking warriors on the boat on the board that matches their color. The remaining six warriors of each color are placed in front of their owners, next to the board.
Each player places their score marker on the start space of the scoring track. Sort the kingdom tokens by color and place them near the board, along with the doom tokens.
Round Sequence
The game is played in three rounds, each of which consists of the following phases:
- Doom Phase
- Draft Phase
- Actions Phase
- Score Phase
- Ragnarok Phase
Doom Phase
Shuffle the ten doom tokens face down, then reveal five of them at random. Place each of the revealed doom tokens in its province. Vikings in these provinces will die gloriously at the end of the round, scoring points for their owners. Set the remaining five doom tokens aside until round two.
Draft Phase
Each player is dealt a "draft set" of 3 bronze cards, 2 silver cards and one gold card.
Each player chooses one card from their draft set to keep and places it in their supply, where it remains until the end of the draft phase. Then each player passes the remaining five cards from their draft set to the player on their left, in turn receiving the remaining cards in the draft set from the player to their right. Then each player chooses one of the five cards in the draft set they just received and places it in their supply, and passes the remaining four to the left. Continue in this manner until each player has placed six cards in their supply.
NOTE: To make the game easier to learn for new players, we recommend that the drafting phase be simplified for the first round of your first game. Just play with the six cards you are dealt and do not pass any of them.
Actions Phase
During this phase, the players will struggle to control the lands of Midgard and the heavenly realms above it by moving their Vikings from their boats into battle. There are three colored kingdoms, each of which has three or four provinces. The provinces all contain a certain number of villages represented by huts, each of which can have only one Viking in it. The heavens and the boats can hold any number of Vikings.
Keep in mind that at the end of the round points will be awarded to the players who control each area (except Valhalla; any Vikings sent to Valhalla will be out of play for the rest of the round). A player is said to control a province or heaven if they have more Vikings in it than any other player. A leader breaks ties for control because it is stronger than a warrior.
All players reveal their gold cards. The player who holds the highest-numbered gold card is the first player, and play proceeds to the left from there. A player who has no gold cards does not reveal anything and cannot be the first player. The high-numbered gold cards are very powerful, but going first is usually a disadvantage.
The first player plays one card and carries out its instructions, leaving the card face-up in front of them. Play continues clockwise until each player has played four cards. After that, any cards left over are saved and can be used in later rounds.
See the Card Reference section below for detailed explanations of the cards.
Score Phase
Each player scores for provinces and heavens in which they have more Vikings than any opponent. A leader counts as one and a half warriors, so it can break ties unless there is another leader in the province as well. If there is a tie for most Vikings in an area, no player is considered to control it, so no player scores for it.
There are three colored kingdoms on the board: Jotunheim, Mannheim and Alfheim. You score points for controlling provinces in each kingdom as follows:
- 3 points if you control one province in a kingdom
- 7 points if you control 2 provinces in a kingdom
- 12 points if you control 3 provinces in a kingdom
- 20 points if you control 4 provinces in a kingdom (only possible in Jotunheim)
Kingdom Tokens
Each player collects one brown kingdom token for each province in Mannheim that contains at least one of their Vikings. They collect grey and blue tokens for occupied provinces in Alfheim and Jotunheim in the same manner. Tokens are kept face-down. You may look at tokens you've collected at any time, but your opponents may not.
Heavens
The player with the most Vikings in Asgard scores 5 points.
The player with the most Vikings in Vanaheim takes 2 kingdom tokens of their choice (they may be the same or different colors).
There is no benefit to having the most Vikings in Valhalla.
Scoring Example
Five players are about to begin the scoring phase. The illustration in the rulebook shows the situation on the board.
In Alfheim: The red, black and green players each have the most Vikings in one province, so they each score 3 points. The red leader breaks the tie in Gimle, but there is no tie in Andlang, so the black leader does not give the black player control of Andlang. The black player takes two grey tokens, while the red, yellow and green players each take one.
In Mannheim: The green player has the most Vikings in all three provinces, scoring 12 points. Note that the green leader breaks the tie in Myrkvior. The green player takes 3 brown tokens, the black and red players each take two, and the violet and yellow players each take one.
In Jotunheim: The violet and red players each have the most vikings in one province, so they each score 3 points. The other two provinces are both tied, so no player scores for them. The violet player takes three blue tokens, while the black, yellow and red players each take two.
In the heavens: The violet player has the most Vikings in Asgard and scores 5 points. The yellow player has the most Vikings in Vanaheim, and chooses to take one brown token and one grey token, so as to complete as many sets as possible.
Ragnarok Phase
All Vikings in provinces that contain a doom token are moved to Valhalla. All players score 2 points for each of their Vikings moved to Valhalla in this way. After that, each player scores 1 point for each Viking they have in Valhalla, including the ones just moved there.
Ragnarok example: In the five doomed provinces, five black, three violet, three green, two red and two yellow Vikings (including the red, yellow and violet leaders) are sent to Valhalla, scoring 10 points for black, 6 points for violet and green, and 4 points for red and yellow. Finally, each Viking in Valhalla scores 1 point for its owner, giving 5 points to black, 4 each for red and yellow, and 3 points each for green and violet (including the two red and two yellow Vikings that were in Valhalla before Ragnarok).
End of the Round
Remove all doom tokens from the board. In the next round, a new set of five randomly chosen provinces will be doomed.
Finally, move all Vikings from Valhalla to their respective owners' boats.
Rounds 2 and 3
The round sequence is repeated for the second and third rounds, but with a few slight changes.
In each new Draft phase, each player receives a new hand of 3 bronze, 2 silver and one gold card. These cards are drafted and passed just as in round 1, but the new cards MUST NOT be mixed in with leftover cards from previous rounds. Leftover cards are already in a player's supply, and they are not passed. However, leftover cards from earlier rounds can still be played in a new round.
In the Action phase of round 2, the players will play 5 cards each. In round 3, they will play 6 cards each. This will leave each player with 3 unplayed cards at the end of the game, which are not used.
Game End
At the conclusion of the Ragnarok phase of round 3, each player reveals all the kingdom tokens they have collected. Each player scores 5 points for every complete set of tokens (one of each color) they possess.
The player with the highest total score is the winner. In case of a tie, the tied player who has collected the most kingdom tokens in total (regardless of color) is the winner. Should that be tied as well, the tied players share the victory.
The designer would like to thank the following playtesters: Mark Schell, Mathew Tee, Amber Kennedy, John Monroe, Jennifer Lopes, Nathon Braymore, George Wu, Greg Broe, Rebecca Zamborsky, Ken Boone, Chris Ogden, Brandon Nix, Steve "Zambo" Zamborsky, Tom Pancoast, Joe Casadonte, Kevin Wood, Will Zander, Michelle Zentis, Jeff Kahan, Amy O'Neal and Gene O'Neal
Card Reference
Bronze Cards
These simple cards allow you to either move or add your Vikings to different areas of the board.
Invasion Cards — Move up to 2 of your Vikings (leader and/or warriors) to any unoccupied villages in the indicated kingdom, or Asgard or Vanaheim, in any combination you wish. These Vikings may come from anywhere on the board except Valhalla and they need not both come from the same place. Usually you will want to move them from your boat. Remember that each village can hold only one Viking.
New Warrior Cards — Take one of the warriors from your off-board supply and place it on your boat on the board, permanently increasing the size of your Viking army. Then move any one of your Vikings on the board in any unoccupied village, or Jotunheim or Asgard. The Viking thus moved does not need to be the new warrior added by this card. If you have no warriors left in your off-board supply, ignore the first instruction on the card.
Silver Cards
These aggressive cards allow you to overwhelm your opponents by displacing their Vikings or sending in your own in greater numbers.
Attack Cards — These cards are special because they allow you to move into a village already occupied by an opponent's warrior. When you do, the enemy warrior is displaced and sent to Valhalla. Take one of your Vikings (leader or warrior) from anywhere on the board except Valhalla and move it to a village in the kingdom indicated on the card, or to Asgard or Vanaheim. If you move to a village that is occupied by a warrior, move that warrior to Valhalla. You cannot attack a village occupied by a leader (leaders are tougher than warriors). If you move to a heaven, you may move one warrior (not a leader) from that heaven to Valhalla. It is usually best to attack using the Vikings from your boat, but it isn't necessary. You can even attack using a Viking already in the target province or heaven if you wish.
Viking Horde Cards — Choose a heaven or a province with at least one unoccupied village. Move up to three of your Vikings from anywhere on the board (except Valhalla) to your chosen place. The Vikings need not all come from the same place, but they must all go to the same province or heaven. If you choose a province with only one or two unoccupied villages, then obviously there will only be room enough for one or two of your Vikings. As usual, you will probably want to move the Vikings from your boats, but unless you have been adding a lot of new warriors from your supply, these cards can empty your boats out very quickly.
Gold Cards
These are the most powerful and specialized cards in the game. Each has a unique effect.
Score Kingdom (Cards 1 - 3) — Score the indicated kingdom as you would at the end of the round. Points are awarded for most Vikings, and kingdom tokens are distributed. No Ragnarok effects take place. Note that your opponents can also score points and earn tokens when you play one of these cards.
Take Province Token (Cards 4 - 6) — Simply take the kingdom tokens indicated on the card.
Draw Cards (Cards 7 - 8) — Draw the cards indicated and immediately take an additional turn. The extra turn does not count against your allotted total of actions for the round.
Destroy Kingdom (Cards 9 - 11) — Choose one province in the indicated kingdom. All Vikings (including your own) in that province are moved to Valhalla. This can do a lot of damage, so watch for these cards when players reveal them at the start of each round.
New Warriors in Kingdom (Cards 12 - 15) — Take up to two warriors from your off-board supply and add them to the board in the indicated area. You may divide your two new warriors between two different provinces in the indicated kingdom (or two different heavens in the case of card 12) if you wish. If you have no warriors left in your supply, the card has no effect.
Player Aid: Round Summary
1. Doom Phase
- Place 5 random doom tokens
2. Draft Phase
- Each player gets 3 bronze, 2 silver and 1 gold card
- Keep 1 card, pass the rest until all players have taken 6 cards
3. Actions Phase
- Player with highest-numbered gold card starts
- Players take turns playing and resolving 1 card at a time
- Play 4 cards in round 1, 5 cards in round 2, 6 cards in round 3
4. Score Phase
The player with the most Vikings (leader breaks ties):
- 3 points for 1 province in a kingdom
- 7 points for 2 provinces in a kingdom
- 12 points for 3 provinces in a kingdom
- 20 points for 4 provinces in Jotunheim
Kingdom tokens:
- Gain 1 token for each province where you have at least 1 Viking
Heavens:
- 5 points for most Vikings in Asgard
- 2 kingdom tokens for most Vikings in Vanaheim
5. Ragnarok Phase
- Score 2 points for each doomed Viking
- Move Vikings in doomed provinces to Valhalla
- Score 1 point for each Viking in Valhalla
- Move Vikings from Valhalla to boats
Game end
- 5 points for each complete set of kingdom tokens