Sea or Shore Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Game Overview
• Set Up
• Game Play
  • 1) You Win the Color
    • Earning or Stealing a Treasure
    • Activating the Action Card
  • 2) You Lose the Color
  • Sequence and End of Trick
• Addition Cards
• Action Cards
• Game End

Game Overview

In this game you aim to collect as many treasures as possible. You collect them by playing the right island card at the right time, while making the strategic decision to show either the sea (color) or the shore (number). The right choice could let your opponents guessing. If you play the highest card of a color, you could claim a treasure or even steal one from an opponent. There might not be a treasure in your color though, in which case you could activate an action card to gain an edge over your opponents. The game ends after two full rounds. The winner is the player with the most treasure points at the end of the game!

Set Up

Depending on the number of players, you create one or two draw decks out of the treasure cards. The treasure cards have a number on them, depicting the points they are worth. Please follow these instructions:

• 3 players: remove a total of twelve treasure cards from the game, being 1x two points, 1x three points and 1x four points of every color. Take the remaining 20 treasure cards to form a single draw deck.
• 4 & 5 players: use all treasure cards but separate them into two draw decks depending on their color. You create one deck of the red and blue cards and one deck of the green and purple cards.

Shuffle the treasure deck(s) and place it/them face down in the center of the table. You then take the top card(s) of the deck(s) and turn it face up. Next, you take the action cards and decide which side to use. You then place them with this side face up next to the deck(s).

Take all addition cards to form another deck that is within reach of the players. Take all island cards, shuffle them and deal them to the players. In a three and four player game, each player gets 12 island cards in hand. In a five player game, you only get nine island cards. Any island cards left over are put back in to the game box without players seeing which cards they are. Hand each player one cover card. Decide which player starts the game and hand them the starting card.

At the start of the game, each player counts the number of cards per color in their hand. They pass along the highest card of the color in which they have the most cards to the player to their right. If there are multiple colors with the same number of cards in your hand, you decide from which color you pass along the highest card.

Game Play

You are now ready to play a 'trick' (one card from each player). The starting player starts by taking their cover card and covering off (in their hand) half of the island card they want to play. They then play the island card with the cover card on it, ensuring that the other players do not see the covered part of the island card. The player covers off the Sea (color) or the shore (number) part of the island card. In a clockwise fashion, all other players now do the same. When all players have played their card, they all remove their cover cards to unveil their full island cards.

You only compete against players that played the same color, unless you're playing a three player game but more on that later. After the unveiling, there are two possible outcomes:

1) You Win the Color

You win the color by:

• Being the only player to play this color, or;
• Being the player that played the highest card in this color.

Note that there are multiple colors in the game, so different colors can be won by different players.

Earning or Stealing a Treasure

If there is a treasure on a draw deck in the color that you won, you earn this treasure if you have won this color. You take the card and place it face up in front of you, this is the start of your personal treasure pile. Every subsequent treasure that you win will be placed on top of this personal treasure pile, with the top treasure always visible to other players.

Instead of taking the treasure from the draw deck, you can steal the top treasure from another players' personal pile if all these conditions are met:

• The other player played the same color as you did but had a lower number.
• The color that you both played, was a color that had a treasure face up on a draw deck.
• The other player's top treasure on their personal pile is the same color as you both played.

Activating the Action Card

If there is no treasure to be earned in your color as there is no treasure in your color on the draw deck(s), this automatically means that you, if you win your color, activate an action card. Check the action card section for more details.

2) You Lose the Color

If you played the same color as one or more other players, but played a lower value, you lose the color. The player that loses the color and has the lowest value in that color, earns addition cards. The number of earned addition cards is equal to the number of cards in this color that were just played. Addition cards are placed in front of the player that earned them, for them to use later.

Eric wins the red color. Eric gets to take the red treasure but instead steals the top (red) 4 treasure of Stephanie. Niels and Stephanie lost the red color, with Niels being the lowest and therefore earning three addition cards. Marlou wins the green color and therefore activates the green action card. Both the draw deck treasures are discarded.

Sequence and End of Trick

The sequence in a trick is first dealing with earning/stealing treasure cards and addition cards, and only then dealing with potential action cards. Actions can impact each other and therefore have to be dealt with in a clockwise order starting with the starting player.

At the end of the trick, there might still be treasure cards on top of the draw decks due to stealing or if the color hasn't been played. You discard any face up treasure cards still on top of a draw deck and place them under their respective draw decks. Now turn the next treasure card(s) face up for the next trick. Discard all played island cards. Finally, the starting player card is handed to the next player in clockwise order and this player starts the new trick. You continue until all island cards are played from your hand.

Addition Cards

A player can earn addition cards by losing a color. The earned addition cards can be used in later tricks. When you play an island card, you can add addition cards to increase their numbered value. Each addition card adds one in numbered value, has to be clearly visible to all players when you play it and is returned to the addition card pile after the trick is completed. The maximum value of an island card is 12, you cannot raise the value beyond 12 with addition cards. For example, if a player plays a blue 7 with three addition cards, the island card counts as a blue 10. In case of a tie (in any situation in the game), the winner of the tie is the starting player or the player closest to the starting player in clockwise order. Return the played addition card(s) to their draw pile after the trick.

If there are no more addition cards left, you cannot earn new addition cards. Note that at the end of the game, you get one point per two addition cards that you own.

Action Cards

There are two double sided action cards. One is linked to the colors red and blue and one to purple and green. If a player wins a color that has no treasure card on the draw decks, they activate the action card of the color they won. The four different actions are:

1. Steal two addition cards from one other player. If this is not possible, you take two from the addition card pile.
2. Steal two random island cards from the hand of another player. Give two island cards of your choice back to that player, these can be the same cards. If players only have one card left, you only take one card and give one card back.
3. Look at the top three face down treasure cards of one draw deck and place them back onto the same deck in an order of your choice.
4. Take an island card played by a player in this trick to your hand and discard an island card of your choice from your hand.

Exception: In a three player game, it is possible that both colors of an action card do not have a treasure card on the draw deck. In this case, both these colors are considered to be one color to decide who wins the color. For example, there is a red treasure card and Eric plays a red 4, Marlou a purple 7 and Niels a green 9. Eric wins the treasure, Niels wins the action and Marlou wins two addition cards.

Game End

When all players have played their island cards, the round ends. Every player counts the points earned with their treasure cards and adds one point per two addition cards. Note the point total per player for this round. You now start the game again with the set up as described at the start of this rulebook and play a second round. At the end of the second round, the point totals of both rounds are added up and the player with the most points wins.