The Ravens of Thri Sahashri
The Ravens of Thri Sahashri Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Components
- 2 character cards (Ren and Feth)
- 35 memory cards in five colours (7 of each)
- 5 ravens, one of each colour
- rulebook
Game Overview
The game is played in three batches. Each batch starts with that Ren draws four memory cards at random and place them in a row face down; these represent her heart. Feths mission is to correctly guess which colours these cards are. Rens' goal is to give Feth hints.
Every round, the Feth player starts by drawing cards and putting them together in a puzzle. When he's done, Ren is to "reply" by taking one of the cards in the puzzle and place beside her "heart" in order to reach a certain number total; the heart and these added cards should form a poem. This is repeated round after round, until Ren's poem is complete, and at that point, the puzzle must contain exactly the colours in Ren's heart, and none other.
This is played in three batches, as Feth dives deeper and deeper into Ren's consciousness, and during the third batch there is an extra rule that makes it hard to beat. If the players manage to complete all three batches without losing, then Ren is saved and the players win.
But in the pile of cards Feth draws from, there are evil ravens that make things difficult. The ravens threaten to remove cards from the game, which means they destroy Ren's ability to remember, and the possibility for Feth to guess. Also if all five ravens are drawn, the players lose immediately.
Preparations
- Decide who will play Ren (the girl) and Feth (the boy). These roles will not switch during the game. Feth's role is slightly more complicated than Ren's, but both players must stay sharp. Players take the corresponding character cards.
- Shuffle the pile with memory cards. Draw the top card and place in the middle of the playfield, face up. It's on this card that Feth will build the puzzle; and this puzzle is called the Atman.
- Now Ren draws four memory cards without showing Feth, and lines them up in one vertical column in an order she chooses. These 4 cards are called Ren's heart cards, and the order matters, the top card is the first, the bottom card the last. Ren may always look at her heart cards during the game, but cannot show them to Feth unless the rules say so.
- Shuffle the rest of the memory cards together with the five ravens, to make a face down deck. Apart from the Atman, that will take up space, you will need space enough for a row of drawn cards, a small row of drawn ravens, a score pile and a discard pile.
Flow of the Game
The game is played in three batches. Each batch consists of several rounds.
Each round, Feth first takes his turn: He draws cards from the deck and builds a puzzle as much as he wants to. Then Ren takes her turn by taking one of the cards from the puzzle and place by her heart in order to make poem. This is repeated until Ren has completed all her four rows in her poem, and the colours in the puzzle correspond with Ren's heart. If that happens, the batch ends. Three batches are played, and if the players complete these, they win.
If the deck is depleted when a round starts, if all five ravens are lined up, or if Feth can't put one single card in the puzzle, the players lose. During the third batch there is also an extra rule: Ren must complete a poem row each turn. Failing to do this also causes the players to lose.
Feth's Turn 1 – Draw Cards
Feth starts with drawing any number of cards from the deck, one by one, lining them up before him in order. He does not want to draw too few, as that will lessen his abilities to put cards in the puzzle (Atman) in a way that will give him hints, but if he draws too many, the draw deck might run out.
Note: The memory cards have special effects. These effects are not applied when Feth draw the cards. Instead, only the effects of the cards that Ren has chosen may be applied – see later in the rules.
The World-Devouring Ravens
If Feth draws a raven, nothing happens right then, but when Feth has finished drawing cards, it's put aside, in the raven row. From hereon, all memory cards of that colour that should be discarded (regardless of reason), must instead be placed under this raven card (devoured or stolen by the raven), and they risk being removed from the game completely. You may not look at devoured/stolen memory cards unless the rules allow you to.
But, the more ravens revealed, the safer the players are: The first cards that Feth draws each turn, up to as many ravens that are revealed, are called the safety zone. Ravens that are drawn within the safety zone are not put in the raven row when Feth has finished drawing; instead they are discarded.
When Feth has finished drawing, and ravens have been put in the row/discarded, it's the next step:
Feth's Turn 2 – Put Cards in the Atman
From the cards he has lined up, Feth must now take at least one and put in the Atman, following the rules below. He may put in one, more, or all of them, in any order, but he must put in at least one. Failure to do so means the players have lost.
What Feth wants to achieve when building the Atman is to create as many possibilities for Ren, when she must choose one card from the Atman to remove and place by her heart cards. Hence, you want a wide range of colours and numbers. Feth also wants to create a connected "block" of same-coloured cards whose numbers add together to exactly 7. See later.
All memory cards are divided into four quadrants, each quadrant is either covered or not by a checkered pattern. This pattern represents faded, erased parts of Ren's memories. What Feth does is refreshen these faded parts by letting them cover up each other.
When Feth puts a card in the Atman, it must be put so that at least one faded quadrant of the card covers a faded quadrant of another card already in the Atman. Also, all other parts of the new card that covers cards in the Atman must also fit: faded quadrants covering faded, and clear quadrants covering clear. The card must also be placed facing up, not upside down or sideways.
Or in other words: a card cannot be placed so that it doesn't cover anything, nor may it only cover clear quadrants of the Atman, and it also cannot be put so a clear quadrant covers a faded, or vice versa.
As long as the card fits, it's perfectly legal to place a card so that it covers other cards on all four quadrants. It's also legal to put a card so that a previous card is fully covered. The only exception is that you cannot cover one card with another (quadrant-identical) card directly on top of it, without at least one other card partly lying in between.
Cards that are fully covered and thus are not visible, count as "not there", as if they weren't in the Atman at all.
When Feth has finished building, any cards in his line that he didn't use are discarded. Do remember that if there are any ravens in the raven row, cards of those colours are not discarded, but instead devoured: placed beneath their raven. And remember that you cannot look at these cards once the raven has them.
Relive Memories
If Feth manages to build a connected block of same-coloured cards that add up to exactly 7, he relives one of Ren's memories, and gazes into her heart. "Connected block" means that the cards must cover each other – each card of the block must touch and cover at least one other card of the block. Being adjacent is not enough, and no card of any other colour must lie in between any of the cards in the block. The total number must be exactly 7 and not more or less.
And to be very precise: This can only happen the moment Feth puts a card in the Atman. It does not happen if such a block is created because a card in the Atman is removed (by Ren or a card effect).
If this happens, the follow immediately happens, temporarily interrupting Feth's puzzling:
- The raven of that colour is chased away. If there's a raven of that colour in the raven row, that raven is now chased away for the remainder of the batch; turn the raven card sideways to mark this. All memory cards that were beneath it are now put in the discard pile. The raven is regarded as not being in the raven row at all (hence, the safety zone shrinks and cards of that colour are discarded as normal), but if it's the third and last batch, the raven is instead completely defeated, and the raven and all cards beneath it are instead put in the score pile.
- Ren shows a part of her heart. Ren now chooses one of her face down heart cards of that colour and turns it face up. If she doesn't have a face down heart card of that colour, nothing happens. If she has several, she just turns one of them. This heart card will become points at the end of the batch, and it's very important to collect points in order to beat the third and final batch of the game.
If there were any turned (used) poem cards by the heart card that Ren turned face up, these are now refreshed and their effects can be used again. Poem cards are the cards that Ren place by her heart cards, which is what we explain now.
Ren's Turn 1 – Form Poem Rows
Ren must now take any (visible) card from the Atman to form a poem row. The card she takes will also become a hint on what she has in her heart. She may take any card from the Atman, even a card that is partly covered. She cannot, however, take a card that is fully covered, even if she knows it's there; remember that cards that are fully covered count as not being in the Atman at all.
What Ren must achieve is to create a poem of the metre dodoitsu, a Japanese metre with the rhythm 7-7-7-5. In other words, she must make four rows of cards, so that the numbers add up to 7 in the first three rows, and 5 in the last. Ren's four heart cards are the first card in each of the four rows. So when Ren takes a card from the Atman, she places it beside the corresponding heart card. When the number total for the heart card + added cards add up to 7 (or 5 for the last row), that row is complete. When all four rows are complete, the whole poem is complete.
Ren must create the rows in order. I.e. she starts putting cards beside the topmost heart card in her vertical column, and cannot build on the next until the first row is complete.
The cards that Ren takes from the Atman and place by her heart cards are put face up. They are called poem cards (hence different from the heart cards).
If Ren places a poem card of the same colour as the heart card of that row, that heart card must be turned face up. Then she turns the heart card sideways to mark that it was not revealed due to a relived memory. However, if the heart card was already face up, she does not need to turn it sideways.
The poem must not exceed its rhythm: Ren cannot put a poem card that causes the row to me 8 or more (or 6 or more for the last row). If she takes a card that would cause the current row to become too long, she must instead discard the card (or put it beneath the raven, if the raven of that colour is present in the raven row). Ren may on purpose take a card with a too high number if she doesn't want to build on the poem, but if she takes a card that may be placed as a poem card, she must. Just remember, one row must be complete before she can build on the next, and they must be built in order.
If Ren completes a poem row, she must announce this aloud to Feth. If she completes the third row, and her fourth heart card is a 5, the fourth row is automatically completed too, and she must say so too.
When Ren has taken a card from the Atman, and put it as a poem card (or discarded, if the number was too high), and announced whether the current row is complete or not, she proceeds to the next step.
The Poem Cards' Special Powers
The power (effect) of the poem cards that Ren has put in the rows, can be used by Feth anytime during the game, with any timing. All powers are one-time use: Used poem card should be turned sideways to mark that they're used – they still count as poem cards for all other purposes, but the effect cannot be used again. The only way to refresh used poem cards is if Feth relives a memory (see the rules above); if he does, and Ren gets to turn face up one of her heart cards, all poem cards by that heart card will be refreshed, and their powers may be used anew.
If the Atman is Split or Runs Out
It may happen, by card effects, or when Ren takes a card, that the Atman is split in two or more chunks, that are not connected by overlapping chunks. If this happens, regardless of reason, Ren must immediately choose one of the chunks to remain, and the rest is discarded (don't forget the raven rule, though!)
If the Atman should out of weird reasons run out of cards, the players have immediately lost.
Ren's Turn 2 – Announce Result
Now Ren must say if the batch is finished or not. The batch is finished if:
- Ren's dodoitsu is complete (all four rows)
- The Atman corresponds to Ren's heart: The cards in the Atman contains the colours, and only the colours, that Ren's heart cards have. How many of each is irrelevant; even if Ren has 2 green heart cards, it's enough with 1 green in the Atman.
If the batch isn't finished, a new round starts, with Feth's turn (draw cards, put into the Atman). If the deck is depleted when a round starts, the players have lost.
Special Rules for the Third Batch
During the third batch, Ren must complete one poem row each round. If she fails to do so, the players have lost. However, during the third batch only, Ren may, each time she builds a poem row, take any number of cards from the score pile and also use them. She may still only build one row per turn; the only exception is if her fourth soul card is a 5, that auto-completes the last row. Thus, the third batch will only be four rounds, sometimes just three.
Also, if the Atman doesn't correspond to Ren's soul the same round as her poem is completed, the players have lost.
If the batch is finished, then this happens:
- All face up heart cards that are not turned sideways (i.e. all those who were revealed due to Feth reliving a memory), are put into a score pile. If this was the third batch, this now finishes the game, and you can proceed to final scoring.
- All cards in the Atman, all remaining heart cards, and poem cards are discarded. Remember the ravens: cards of a colour whose raven is present in the raven row are not discarded, but put beneath the ravens, unless, of course, that raven is turned sideways (chased away). Please note that the purple 3-4-5s (if you have any of these as poem cards, of course) can be used with this timing.
- All cards that are still devoured by the ravens, are completely removed from the game – the ravens destroy them for good. Put destroyed cards back in the box.
- Chased away ravens (turned sideways) now return – to plague you again.
- Next batch is prepared, in the same was as during preparations, with the difference that the roles stay – Feth remains Feth and Ren remains Ren. Also, the ravens are usually already in the deck, so if you happen to draw a raven as the first card in the Atman or as one of Ren's heart cards, just draw a new one and then shuffle the deck.
If the players complete all three batches (not forgetting the special rules for the third batch) you proceed to final score calculation.
Final Score
The final score is simply the number of cards in your score pile. Number, colour, whether the cards are ravens or not, is irrelevant. As a reminder, the only cards to end up in your score pile are heart cards that have been revealed due to reliving a memory, and the ravens (and the cards they had devoured) that were defeated during the third batch.
You still count as having completed the game regardless of your score, but you can always try to aim for a top score for a flawless victory:
- Normal Ending: 0–3 points
- Good Ending: 4–10 points
- Happy Ending: 11+ points and at least 2 ravens defeated.
The story of each separate ending can be read on Manifest Destiny's website: http://ash.jp/~md/html/game/sanzensekai_end.htm
Reminder: Loss Conditions
The players lose if:
- the deck is depleted when a new round starts.
- all 5 ravens are in the raven row.
- Feth cannot place one single card in the Atman during his turn.
- The Atman runs out of cards.
- during the third batch, Ren cannot complete a poem row during her turn.
- during the third batch, the Atman doesn't correspond to Ren's heart when her dodoitsu is complete.
Credits
- Game design: Kuro
- Cover art: Rapan
- Card art: Rapan, Romannu, Hambaagu
- English manual: Zimeon