Rocket Ranchers: Herding Cats in Space!
Rocket Ranchers: Herding Cats in Space! Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Rocket Manifest
Components as listed in the manual (page 2).
- Wildlife Cards (150): each card shows a species, a biome (color), and the quantity of that species in that biome, shown as dots.
- Space Cat Cards (21).
- Tractor Beam Tokens (20): four per player, in five player colors.
- Dogship Tokens (5): one per player.
- Scoring Cards (3): Abundance, Variety, and Space Cats.
- First Player Token (1).
- Scorepad (1).
Game Setup
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Wildlife Deck: If you are playing with less than five players, return all Wildlife Cards with a 5+ player icon to the box. If you are playing with less than four players, return all Wildlife Cards with a 4+ player icon and all Wildlife Cards with a 5+ player icon to the box.
Shuffle the remaining Wildlife Cards with the Space Cat Cards according to your player count to form a face-down Wildlife Deck:
Players Space Cats 2 Players 11 Space Cats 3 Players 13 Space Cats 4 Players 17 Space Cats 5 Players 21 Space Cats -
Wildlife Display: Reveal SIXTEEN cards from the Wildlife Deck and place them, face-up, at random in a four-by-four grid in the center of the table.
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Scoring Cards: Place the three Scoring Cards (Abundance, Variety, Space Cats) face-up nearby.
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Player Tokens: Give each player a matching-color set of one Dogship Token and four Tractor Beam Tokens. All Dogship and Tractor Beam Tokens start the game face-up (colorful side up). Return any unused tokens to the box.
How To Play
A game of Rocket Ranchers is played over a series of rounds. Each round, you will take turns using (or rebooting) your player tokens to grab wildlife and fill your corrals.
On Your Turn
On your turn you MUST either A Use A Tractor Beam OR B Manual Reboot.
A. Use A Tractor Beam
Flip one of your face-up Tractor Beam Tokens face-down and collect cards from the display in the pattern shown on that token. A tractor beam pattern may be rotated in 90° increments but may not be extended outside of the four-by-four grid.
Examples A and B: The cards collected match the pattern shown on the used Tractor Beam Token.
Example C: The pattern shown on the used Tractor Beam token can NOT be extended outside of the grid of cards.
Space Cats
Whenever your tractor beam collects a group of cards that is orthogonally adjacent to one or more Space Cat Cards, you MUST also collect the adjacent Space Cat Cards.
Example: This Space Cat Card is adjacent to the cards collected and MUST also be collected.
Dogship Tokens
At any time on your turn, you MAY flip your face-up Dogship Token face-down to swap any two Wildlife Cards of the same biome/color (Desert, Grassland, Jungle, Mountains, Tundra). You may NOT use your Dogship Token to swap Space Cats.
Examples A, B, and C show Dogship swaps.
Collected Wildlife Cards
Each Wildlife Card collected must be used in one of two ways:
- Form A Corral: Place the card face-down in front of you to form a new corral.
- Occupy A Corral: Place the card face-up in an empty corral or in a corral already occupied by one or more cards with the same species of animal (Bako, Canis, Capiwata, Chicken, Eleplant, Flama, Kelk, Kow, Plushie, Woolbee).
Illustrated: 1 Form A Corral; 2 Occupy A Corral.
Collected Space Cat Cards
IMPORTANT: Space Cat Cards can NOT be used to form a corral and can NOT be placed in a corral.
All Space Cats Cards collected MUST be placed in their own face-up pile ("Floof Pile") in front of you.
Automatic Reboot
After using a tractor beam to collect cards, check to see if you automatically reboot. If all four of your Tractor Beam Tokens are face-down, flip them all face-up AND flip your Dogship Token face-up (if it isn't already).
Refilling the Display
After using a tractor beam to collect cards, refill the display with cards from top to bottom, left to right with cards from the top of the deck. (You may choose to use your Dogship Token after refilling the display.) Then, the next player takes their turn.
B. Manual Reboot
If you have at least one Tractor Beam Token face-down, you may instead use your turn to manually reboot. Flip all of your Tractor Beam Tokens and your Dogship Token face-up. Then, the next player takes their turn.
Ending the Game
The end of the game is triggered when the Wildlife Deck runs out of cards. Continue playing until all players have taken the same number of turns (ending just before the player with the First Player Token). Then, use the Scorepad to calculate each player's score.
Note: After the deck runs out of cards, players will no longer refill the display at the end of their turns. Any empty spaces stay empty, and players collect nothing from those spaces when a tractor beam pattern includes them.
End Game Scoring
Each player MUST choose to score each of their corrals for either A Abundance OR B Variety to gain points. Each corral may be scored differently, but no corrals can be scored for both. Then, they gain or lose points for their collected C Space Cats.
A. Abundance Scoring
If you choose to score a corral for Abundance, gain points equal to the number of face-up animal cards in that corral.
| Cards in Corral | Points |
|---|---|
| <5 Cards | 0 |
| 5-6 Cards | 12 |
| 7-8 Cards | 18 |
| 9+ Cards | 24 |
Source inconsistency: the Abundance scoring card shown in the setup (manual pages 3 and 5) prints "Quantity per corral" as 5-6 = 10, 7-8 = 15, 9+ = 22. This End Game Scoring table (page 10) prints 12, 18 and 24. Both are transcribed as printed; the manual does not say which applies, so check the physical card against this table before relying on either.
B. Variety Scoring
If you choose to score a corral for Variety, gain points equal to the number of unique biomes (colors) in that corral.
| Biomes in Corral | Points |
|---|---|
| <3 Biomes | 0 |
| 3 Biomes | 8 |
| 4 Biomes | 12 |
| 5 Biomes | 18 |
C. Abundance Scoring
Source note: the heading of this section is printed as "C. ABUNDANCE SCORING", but the section scores Space Cats (its icon is the Space Cats letter, and the Scoring Card is "Space Cats"). The heading is transcribed as printed.
If you have the MOST space cats, lose 5. If multiple players are tied for having the most, all tied players lose 5. All other players gain 2 for each space cat they have.
| Space Cats | Points |
|---|---|
| Most | -5 |
| Else | 2 each |
Determining the Winner
The player with the most points wins! In the case of a tie, the tied player with the most Space Cats wins. If still tied, the tied player located later in turn order wins.