Tiny Epic Cthulhu Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Components
• Game Objective
• Game Difficulty
• Setup
• Gameplay Overview
  • Phase One – Translate the Necronomicon
  • Phase Two – Seal the Portals
• Accursed
• The Great Old One
• Cthulhu Dice
• On Your Turn
  • Step 1: Spin the Wheel of Madness
    • Pointer Actions
    • Draw Tentacles
    • Spawn Shambler
    • Move the Great Old One
  • Step 2: Take Player Actions
    • Move
    • Collect Tentacles
    • Banish Shamblers
    • Use a Town Action
    • Translate Pages
    • Seal the Portals
• Player Abilities
• Next Turn
• End Game
• Solo Game Mode
• Credits
• Quick Reference

Components

• 6 Player Mats and Tokens
• 4 Brain Tokens
• 25 Page Tokens
• 4 Double-Sided Great Old One Mats and Tokens
• 1 Great Old One Strength Token
• 30 Page Cards
• 1 Necronomicon Mat
• 1 Discard Mat
• 1 Shambler Mat
• 1 Tentacle Draw Bag
• 3 Cthulhu Dice
• 5 Double-Sided Town Cards
• 15 Shamblers
• 45 Madness Tentacles: 15 Fear, 15 Rage, 15 Greed
• 17 Chaos Tentacles
• 23 Eldritch Tentacles
• 1 Wheel of Madness

Game Objective

Players drawn to the town of New Arkamoore must work together to defeat the Great Old One and lock them away forever. The game is won if the Great Old One's portals are sealed before the strength of the Great Old One becomes to powerful. Sealing the portals will take cooperation from the assembled team of experts. Translate pages, collect Runes, and banish Shamblers before time runs out.

Game Difficulty

The initial setup is designed for a challenge approachable for most gamers. For additional levels of difficulty, you will add additional Eldritch Tentacles to the Tentacle Draw Bag during Setup:

• Hard Mode: 1 additional Eldritch Tentacle.
• Madness Mode: 2 additional Eldritch Tentacles.

Difficulty order of Great Old Ones – Nyarlathotep, Yog-Sothoth, Yig, then Cthulhu.

Setup

1. Place the Wheel of Madness in the middle of the table.
2. Randomly choose 5 Town Cards to place around the wheel, placing the short side of each card up against one side of the wheel. Town Cards are double-sided, so you may choose which side to use.
3. Select a Great Old One Mat to play with this game and place the remaining mats back in the box. Place your Great Old One Mat within easy reach of all players. Note: For your first game we recommend playing with Nyarlathotep.
   • 3A. Place the Great Old One Strength Token on the starting box of the Strength Track.
4. Each player chooses a Player Mat, then takes the matching Player Token and a Brain Token. Place any remaining player components back in the box.
   • 4A. Place the Brain Token at the bottom of the Delirium Track.
5. Place the Necronomicon Mat on the table, below the Great Old One Mat within reach of all players.
   • 5A. Place the Page Tokens in a pile next to the Necronomicon Mat.
6. Shuffle the Page Cards and form a face-down draw deck. Place the deck near the Necronomicon.
   • 6A. Draw 5 Page Cards, keeping them face-down, and place one card next to each Town Card as shown in the setup diagram.
7. Place the Shambler Mat on the table, within reach of all players.
   • 7A. Place the 15 Shamblers Tokens on the mat in their matching color spaces.
8. Place the Discard Mat below the Shambler Mat.
9. Place the Cthulhu Dice in easy reach of all players.
10. Place the following tokens by spinning the Wheel of Madness. Spin the wheel once for each token and place it on the Town Card where the pointer-side of the spinner stops.
    • 10A. Place the Great Old One Token on the center of the Town Card indicated.
    • 10B. One-at-a-time, place 1 Shambler per player from the Shambler Mat (color indicated by the tentacle-side / back-side of the spinner) onto the bottom most space of the Shambler Track of the Town Card(s) indicated.
    • 10C. One-at-a-time, place each of the Player Tokens on the center of the Town Card(s) indicated.
11. Prepare the Tentacles:
    • 11A. Place 3 Eldritch Tentacles into the Tentacle Draw Bag. Place the remaining Eldritch Tentacles in a general supply within easy reach.
    • 11B. Place 9 each of the Fear, Rage, and Greed Tentacles into the Tentacle Draw Bag. These are collectively known as Madness Tentacles.
    • 11C. Place 3 Fear, 3 Rage, and 3 Greed Tentacles on the Shambler Mat in the matching colored areas.
    • 11D. Place 3 Fear, 3 Rage, and 3 Greed Tentacles on the Discard Mat.
    • 11E. Place 1 Eldritch Tentacle on each Town Card, in the black square space above the Shambler Track.

Gameplay Overview

In Tiny Epic Cthulhu players will take turns in clockwise order starting with the youngest player and continuing until the game ends. The game is played in two phases:

Phase One – Translate the Necronomicon

During this phase players must collect and translate all 25 pages of the Necronomicon and collect the runes needed to attempt to close the portals. While doing this, players must also banish the Great Old One's shambling minions and manage the madness trying to overtake the town and themselves. Once the Necronomicon is translated the game will advance to Phase Two.

Phase Two – Seal the Portals

During this phase, players now may attempt to close the portals in addition to their normal actions. It will not be easy as the Great Old One is working to increase their strength to stay in this realm and the players are trying not to go mad!

A player's turn is taken in two parts:

1. Spin the Wheel of Madness and resolve.
2. Take Player Actions.

To win the game, players must seal all six portals before the Great Old One reaches their full strength. The players will lose collectively if the Great Old One reaches their full strength or if one player has gone completely mad!

Accursed

Madness is building up throughout New Arkamoore, affecting the town and the current denizens alike, and can reach moments of critical mass. There are several tracks that throughout the game can become accursed: Madness Tracks and Shambler Tracks on Town Cards, Temperament Tracks on Player Mats, and the Energy Track of the Great Old One. These tracks have an X at the end to identify them.

A track becomes accursed when the track is already full of Tentacles or Shamblers and another Tentacle or Shambler needs to be placed there. Two things will then occur:

• Relocation – All Madness/Eldritch Tentacles or Shamblers, including those on the track and the one that needed to be placed, will be cleared off the accursed track and moved someplace else based on what type they are. If there are additional Tentacles or Shamblers to be placed after the Accursed Tentacles or Shamblers have been relocated, place those onto the empty tracks after they have been cleared by the Accursed action.
• Consequence – An effect must be resolved.

The Great Old One

The Great Old One Mat has three sections that players must be mindful of:

• Energy Track – This track will have Eldritch Tentacles placed on it periodically throughout the game. Whenever this track becomes accursed, the Eldritch Tentacles are removed, and the Great Old One's strength will increase by one.
• Strength Track – The Great Old One's strength is tracked here by the Strength Token. This shows not only the current strength level, but will also determine how many Madness Tentacles are drawn when the Wheel of Madness is spun.
• Powers of the Great Old One – Each Great Old One has three powers that they can unleash onto the town. These powers are activated whenever one of a Town Card's Madness Tracks has been accursed or is triggered by the Wheel of Madness.

Cthulhu Dice

The Cthulhu Dice are rolled when Banishing a Shambler or Sealing a Portal. The symbols rolled will decide the outcome. The Cthulhu dice have symbols to represent numbers: a symbol equals 0, a symbol equals 1, and a symbol equals 2.

On Your Turn

Players will do two things on their turns - Spin the Wheel of Madness and take their Player Actions. Those will be resolved as follows:

Step 1: Spin the Wheel of Madness

The player spins the Wheel of Madness and waits for the spinner to stop. The spinner must complete at least two rotations, otherwise the player spins again. After the spinner has stopped, the player resolves where the pointer-side and tentacle-side are pointing to. If the spinner stops directly on a line, then consider it pointed to the next clockwise location. Resolve the spinner in the following order.

Pointer Actions

Resolve the icon that the pointer-side of the spinner is pointing to:

• Move one Madness Tentacle of your choice from the Shambler Mat to the Discard Mat.
• Move a Shambler (color indicated by the tentacle-side of the spinner) from the Shambler Mat to the Town Card indicated. Important: If ever a Shambler of a specific color is unavailable on the Shambler Mat, take a Shambler of the next color to the right (order: Blue, Red, Green, Blue).
• Add a Chaos Tentacle from the general supply to the Discard Mat.
• Trigger the matching-colored power of Great Old One.
• When drawing tentacles this turn, pull one additional tentacle.

Draw Tentacles

Now pull tentacles from the Tentacle Draw Bag one-at-a-time. The number of tentacles drawn is based on the strength of the Great Old One; the number to the right of the Strength Token on the Strength Track is the amount drawn. For example, you would draw four tentacles from the bag if the token was on the final number 3 space. To the right of that is the number 4.

Note: If there are not enough tentacles in the bag, draw as many as possible and continue the turn.

Draw tentacles one-at-a-time, then resolve as follows:

• Eldritch Tentacles – Place these on the Great Old One's Energy Track from the bottom to the top. If the track becomes accursed, do the following:
  1. Relocation – Take all Eldritch Tentacles, those on the Energy Track and the one just drawn, along with all Madness and Chaos Tentacles on the Discard Mat and place them in the Tentacle Draw Bag.
  2. Consequence – Advance the Strength Token one space. If this places the Strength Token on the last space of the Strength Track the game is lost!
• Chaos Tentacles – Place any Chaos Tentacles drawn on the Chaos Track of your Player Mat. A player may only have two Chaos Tentacles at a time, and this track cannot be accursed. Any Chaos Tentacles drawn that cannot be placed on the Chaos Track are instead lost to the general supply.
• Madness Tentacles – When drawn, these tentacles are placed on the Madness Tracks of their matching color on the Town Card the pointer-side of the spinner is pointing at. They are placed from left to right. If a Madness Track becomes accursed, do the following:
  1. Relocation – Take all Madness Tentacles, those on the accursed Madness Track and the one just drawn, and place them on the bottom of the Shambler Mat on the matching color areas.
  2. Consequence – Resolve the Great Old One's power of the matching color.

Spawn Shambler

To spawn a Shambler, look at where the tentacle-side of the spinner is pointing to at the top of a Town Card. Take a Shambler of the color indicated and place it onto that Town Card on the Shambler Track from bottom to top. If the Shambler Track becomes accursed, resolve as follows:

• Relocation – Take all Shamblers, those on the Shambler Track and the one just drawn, and place them on the Shambler Mat on their matching color areas.
• Consequence - Move the Eldritch Tentacle from the Town Card and place it onto the Discard Mat, then place a fresh Eldritch Tentacle onto the Town Card from the general supply.

Move the Great Old One

Move the Great Old One Token to the Town Card where you just placed the Shambler. The Great Old One enjoys watching their minions in action!

Step 2: Take Player Actions

Players may take up to three of the following actions on their turn, and they may do the same action more than once. Players may also spend Chaos Tentacles from their Chaos Track to take additional actions per turn based on the number of Chaos Tentacles they use. Example: After a player completed their three normal actions, they could take an additional action by spending a single Chaos Tentacle from their Player Mat.

During a player's action, one or more of their Temperament Tracks may become accursed. If so, resolve as follows:

• Relocation – Take all Madness Tentacles, those from the accursed Temperament Track and the one just drawn, and place them on the Shambler Mat in their matching color areas.
• Consequence – Move your Brain Token up one space on your Delirium Track.

Note: The first time one of the player's Temperament Tracks is accursed, place the Brain Token on the bottom space of the player's Delirium Track. If the Brain Token has reached the top space of the Delirium Track, the player has gone mad and the game is lost!

However, becoming delirious can have its advantages. The spaces on the Delirium Track allow the players to reroll one, two, or three Cthulhu Dice anytime they are rolled.

Move

A player may move around town in either direction, but may not move through or stop on the Great Old One's location. If the Great Old One is on your location at the start of your turn, then you must use an action to move away from them. The number of Town Cards a player may move is dependent on the number of tentacles on their Fear Track:

• No Fear Tentacles – Move 1 Town Card in either direction.
• 1 Fear Tentacle – Move 2 Town Cards in either direction.
• 2 Fear Tentacles – Move 3 Town Cards in either direction.

The player may then flip and reveal one Page Card they either moved past or stopped next to during this action.

Important: When a player stops on a Town Card with one or more Shamblers, they must draw a tentacle from the Tentacle Draw Bag for each Shambler on that Town Card. Madness tentacles and Chaos tentacles are added to the Player Mat. Eldritch tentacles go on the Energy Track of the Great Old One Mat. Resolve any tracks that become accursed.

Collect Tentacles

The player collects Madness Tentacles from the Town Card where they are currently located. They may collect Madness Tentacles based on the number of tentacles on their Greed Track:

• No Greed Tentacles – Collect 1 Madness Tentacle of any color.
• 1 Greed Tentacle – Collect 2 Madness Tentacles of any color.
• 2 Greed Tentacles – Collect 3 Madness Tentacles of any color.

Important: Players may not have more than two Madness Tentacles on each of their Temperament Tracks. Temperament Tracks cannot become accursed when collecting Madness Tentacles voluntarily, therefore, a player cannot collect more tentacles than they have spaces for on their Player Mat.

Banish Shamblers

It is time to attack a minion of the Great Old One. To do this you must be on a Town Card with one or more Shamblers, then resolve the following steps in order:

• Roll one Cthulhu Die for each Shambler present.
• Spend Madness Tentacles from your Player Mat as indicated by the tentacles on the Cthulhu Dice to banish any color Shambler from the Shambler Track.

When the Cthulhu Dice are rolled, the highest number of tentacles shown on a single die is the number of Madness Tentacles that must be spent from your Player Mat. The tentacles spent must match the color of the Shambler being banished. If the highest number is on more than one die, do not add them together. For example, if you roll two dice with single tentacles, then you only need to spend one Madness Tentacle the same color as the Shambler.

Note: A player may spend Chaos Tentacles as a wild color tentacle when banishing a Shambler. For example, if you needed two tentacles to banish a Shambler you could spend two Chaos Tentacles from your Chaos Track.

Example: Jordan gets to roll two Cthulhu Dice because they are on a Town Card with two Shamblers present. Jordan rolls a single tentacle on each die. Jordan will need to spend two Rage Tentacles, or one Rage Tentacle and one Chaos Tentacle, or two Chaos Tentacles to banish the red Shambler.

If the player does not have the right Madness Tentacles or Chaos Tentacles to spend, they cannot banish a Shambler.

If the player successfully banishes a Shambler, they must resolve the following:

• Place the banished Shambler on the Shambler Mat in the matching color area.
• Move Madness Tentacles that match the color of the banished Shambler from the Shambler Mat to the Discard Mat. How many may be moved is based on the number of Rage Tentacles that were on the player's Rage Track when the banishment started.
  1. No Rage Tentacles – Move 1 Madness Tentacle.
  2. 1 Rage Tentacle – Move 2 Madness Tentacles.
  3. 2 Rage Tentacles – Move 3 Madness Tentacles.
• Place any spent Madness Tentacles onto the Discard Mat. If any Chaos Tentacles were spent, they go to the general supply.

Example: Jordan had one Rage Tentacle on their Player Mat when they rolled the Cthulhu Dice. They succeeded in banishing a red Shambler, so they may now move two Rage Tentacles from the Shambler Mat to the Discard Mat, even though they spent one Rage Tentacle as part of the banishment cost.

Use a Town Action

Each Town Card has a special action printed at the top of the card that the player may perform as an action.

Translate Pages

A player may translate a Page Card at their current location. To translate, perform the following steps in order:

• A. Remove the matching Madness Tentacles shown on the Page Card from your Player Mat and place them on the Discard Mat. You may spend Chaos Tentacles as wild tentacles, and if spent they go to the general supply.
• B. Take the Page Tokens shown on the Page Card and place them on the Necronomicon in the left-most spaces available for the numbers indicated.
• C. If a column or row of pages is completed, remove the associated Chaos Tentacle and place it on the Discard Mat.
• D. Take the translated Page Card and place it next to your Player Mat. Start a column of Page Cards next to your Player Mat for each color rune shown on the Page Card. These runes will assist in sealing the portals once the Necronomicon has been completely translated.
• Draw a new Page Card from the deck, keeping it face-down, and replace the Page Card you just translated.
• Important: If you translated the last page of the Necronomicon, immediately flip the Great Old One Mat to its opposite side and move the Strength Token to the start of the Strength Track on the new side. Then place all tentacles on the Discard Mat into the Tentacle Draw Bag.

Note: Once all 25 pages of the Necronomicon have been translated then Phase Two immediately begins and players can attempt to seal the portals!

Seal the Portals

In Phase Two the Great Old One is weakened and players may now move through and occupy the same location as the Great Old One. To attempt to seal a portal, the player must be on the same Town Card as the Great Old One and have at least one Chaos Tentacle or Madness Tentacle of the same color as the portal they are trying to close. To close a portal, do the following:

• Choose a single portal you wish to close. You may only close one portal per action.
• Roll the Cthulhu Dice. The number of dice you can roll will depend on the number of runes, matching the color of the portal you have chosen, shown on your translated Page Cards. You may roll one Cthulhu Die for each rune you have of the matching color, up to three. For example: Casey would be allowed to roll three Cthulhu Dice when attempting to close a red portal because they have three red runes.
• Add up the tentacle symbols on all rolled Cthulhu Dice. If that number is equal to or greater than the number on the chosen portal, you have succeeded!

For Example: Casey is Attacking the Red Portal of the Great Old One and is allowed to roll 3 dice. Casey rolls tentacle values of 1, 2, 2. Adding these tentacles together Casey has a total of 5 tentacles and this exceeds the numbers 3 and 4 which are needed to close one of the locations in the Red Portal. Casey will take a Rage Tentacle from their Temperament Track and place it onto the Great Old One Mat in the portal location they attacked, covering the higher number 4.

• If you close the portal, take a Madness Tentacle matching the color of the sealed portal from your Player Mat and place it on the portal space to cover it. You may use a Chaos Tentacle as a wild in place of a Madness Tentacle.

If players close all six portals before they lose, they will banish the Great Old One back into a dark slumber and win the game!

Note: In addition to Sealing the Portals, players may still perform any of the Phase One Player Actions during Phase Two.

Player Abilities

Each character in the game has a unique ability that the player may use on their turn. This ability is located on the bottom of the Player Mat. This ability does not use an action.

Next Turn

If at the end of your turn, if the win or loss condition has not been met, pass the Tentacle Draw Bag to the next player in clockwise order and begin a new turn.

End Game

The game ends immediately when a win/loss condition has been met.

The players collectively win if all six portals have been successfully sealed before one of the loss conditions are triggered.

The players collectively lose if:

• The Great Old One's strength reaches the top of the Strength Track on either side of the Great Old One Mat.
• Any player reaches the top of their Delirium Track and has gone completely mad!

Solo Game Mode

When playing a solo game, a single player controls two player characters. The game set-up is the same as a 2-Player game.

Credits

Designer: Scott Almes

Lead Developer: Michael Coe

Illustrator: Ian Rosenthaler, Susie O'Conner

Developers: Jason Washburn, Darren Werner, Ben Shulman, Nathan Hatfield

Graphic Designer: Jon Merchant

Editors: Sarah Sharp, David Ladyman

©2024 Gamelyn Games, LLC all rights reserved. No part of this product may be reproduced without specific permission. Tiny Epic Cthulhu, Gamelyn Games, the Gamelyn Games logo, and the TEC logo are trademarks of Gamelyn Games.

Quick Reference

Pointer Actions:

• Move one Madness Tentacle of your choice from the Shambler Mat to the Discard Mat.
• Move a Shambler (color indicated by the tentacle-side of the spinner) from the Shambler Mat to the Town Card indicated. Important: If ever a Shambler of a specific color is unavailable on the Shambler Mat, take a Shambler of the next color to the right (order: Blue, Red, Green, Blue).
• Add a Chaos Tentacle from the general supply to the Discard Mat.
• Trigger the matching-colored power of Great Old One.
• When drawing tentacles this turn, pull one additional tentacle.

Tentacle Types: Fear Tentacle, Rage Tentacle, Greed Tentacle, Chaos Tentacle, Eldritch Tentacle.

Dice Faces: a symbol equals 0, a symbol equals 1, a symbol equals 2.

Temperament Tracks: Fear / Move, Rage / Banish, Greed / Collect, Chaos / Wild.

Spinner Sides: Pointer End, Tentacle End.

Player Actions:

• Move - Move player token between Town Cards.
• Collect - Pick up Madness Tentacles from town locations.
• Banish - Banish a Shambler from a town location.
• Translate - Add tokens to the Necronomicon and add Runes to your player area.
• Town Card Action - Take the action listed on the Town Card at your location.
• Seal Portals (Phase two only) - Close Portals on the Great Old One mat.