Under the Mango Tree Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Object of the Game
• Components
• Setup
• Playing the Game
  • Phase 1: Deal Cards
  • Phase 2: Play Cards
  • Phase 3: Rotate Your Storage Tile
• End of the Game
• The 5 Areas of Your Board
  • 1. Mango Tree
  • 2. Beehive
  • 3. Animal Reserve
  • 4. Coast
  • 5. Garbage Removal
• Scoring Example (3-Player Game)

Object of the Game

Your mission is to breathe new life into this patch of nature through a competitive card drafting game. On each turn, you and your fellow players simultaneously select a card from your individual hands, then pass the rest to the next player.

The twist: each card you choose has two halves. You'll tuck one half under your board, removing it from the game, while the other remains visible to score points. This adds a layer of strategy, as you must consider not only which halves to use for yourself, but also which to deny your opponents.

When all cards have been played, the player who has created the most vibrant and point-rich ecosystem around their mango tree wins.

For 2 to 4 players, ages 7 and up.

Components

• 4 boards. Before your first game: dispose of the X-pieces; fold the side panels onto the back and affix them with their adhesive strips.
• 60 cards
• 4 garbage tiles (front for 2 and 3 players, back for 4 players)
• 4 storage tiles (each with a night edge and a day edge)
• Additionally in 4-player games: 4 lorikeet covering tokens, 4 animal covering tokens

Setup

Shuffle the cards into a face-down deck and place it in the middle of the table. In 2-player games, first return to the game box the 20 cards whose halves are divided by a black line (instead of a white line) and only use the remaining 40 cards. With 3 or 4 players, use all 60 cards.

Then, each player does the following:

• Take a board and place it in front of you.
• Take a garbage tile and flip the side for your player count face up. Then, place it onto your board covering the backrest of its bench (and the family of quokkas), so that the garbage heap is to the left of the bench. In 4-player games, also cover the mango in the tree with a lorikeet covering token and the animal scoring with an animal covering token.
• Beside your board, place a storage tile with the notch of its day edge facing you. Leave a hand's breadth between the tile and your board.

Playing the Game

The game lasts a fixed number of rounds:

• 2 and 3 players play 5 rounds.
• 4 players play 3 rounds.

Each round is comprised of 3 phases.

Phase 1: Deal Cards

Deal face down to each player as many cards from the deck as shown on the bench on the boards:

• in 2- and 3-player games, deal 4 cards each,
• in 4-player games, deal 5 cards each.

Then, each player takes their cards into their hand, keeping them hidden from their opponents.

Phase 2: Play Cards

In this phase, you all simultaneously choose a card in your hand (Step 1), add it to your board (Step 2), and then pass your remaining hand of cards to your neighbor (Step 3). Repeat these steps until all of this round's cards have been played.

Step 1: Choose a card in your hand. Each card has two halves, each half belonging to one of the 5 areas of your board (see The 5 Areas of Your Board). Secretly decide on one of the two halves and place the card face down in front of you, so that the chosen half is in the notch of your storage tile that is facing you. Then, place your remaining hand of cards face down above your storage tile as a pass-on stack.

Step 2: Once everyone has chosen a face-down card and placed it in the notch of their storage tile, all players simultaneously reveal their chosen card. When revealing your card, make sure the chosen half remains in the notch so that it's clear which half you've chosen. Then, take the card and tuck it under your game board in the corresponding area (or the cards already there), so that only the chosen half is visible.

Step 3: Pass your pass-on stack to your neighbor in the direction of the arrow on your storage tile (giving them their next hand of cards for the following Step 1). Example: If the arrow is pointing left, pass the pass-on stack to the player to your left.

Once a single card is passed to you, carry out the usual Steps 1 and 2 with it. After that, Phase 3 takes place.

Phase 3: Rotate Your Storage Tile

Rotate your storage tile 180 degrees so that the arrow now points in the other direction. Make sure that the new orientation is the same for all players (the same edge must face each player). In 2-player games, you can skip this phase, as you always pass the cards back and forth to each other. Then a new round begins.

End of the Game

If at the beginning of Phase 3 the deck is empty, the game ends and scoring takes place. Each player scores their board by going through its 5 areas and adding up their points (see below). The player with the most points wins. If tied, all tied players win.

To tally your scores, the rulebook recommends the Deep Print Games App, which has virtual scoring pads for this and many more of the publisher's games.

The 5 Areas of Your Board

Mango tree, Beehive, Animal reserve, Coast and Garbage removal. Note: There is no limit on how many cards you may have in each area.

1. Mango Tree

Here you collect mangoes and lorikeets (a type of parrot). To score, multiply the number of your visible mangoes by the number of your visible lorikeets and get the result as points. (Make sure to include the mango or lorikeet that has been on your board from the beginning.)

2. Beehive

Here you collect bees. To score, count the bees on your visible cards (there are cards with 2, 3, or 4 bees). If you have more bees than the player to your left, you get 8 points. If you have more bees than the player to your right, you get 8 points as well. Thus, you can get up to 16 points from bees. Note: In 2-player games, you can get a maximum of 8 points, as the same player sits to your left and right.

3. Animal Reserve

Here you collect animals. There are 6 animal species: kangaroo, wombat, echidna, lizard, frog, platypus. (Note: lorikeets, bees, fish, and quokkas don't count for this area.) To score, gain 6 points (or 7 points in 4-player games) for each species of which you have exactly two animals. For each species of which you have at least three animals, you gain 12 points (or 14 points in 4-player games). Single animals are worth nothing.

4. Coast

Here you collect fish. To score, gain points for sets of unique fish (there are 8 types in total). The more types of fish a set includes, the more points you get for it (see table on the board). You can collect multiple sets.

5. Garbage Removal

Here you collect garbage bins that resemble koalas. To score, check if you have at least as many bins as is shown in the bottom right of your garbage tile (4 with two or three players, 3 with four players). If you do, remove your garbage tile from your board to avoid losing points (and rejoice over the return of the quokka family). If you have fewer bins than required, the garbage heap remains on your board and you lose the points shown next to it (-13 with two or three players, -9 with four players).

Scoring Example (3-Player Game)

• Mango tree: 4 mangoes x 2 lorikeets = 8 points.
• Beehive: 6 bees. You gain 8 points, because the player to your right has fewer bees than you. The player to your left has 6 bees, like you, so you don't get points through them.
• Animal reserve: 3 wombats = 12 points; 1 kangaroo = 0.
• Coast: a set of 5 and a set of 1 (point values are given by the table on the board, which is not reproduced in the rulebook text).
• Garbage removal: 4 garbage bins = no points lost.
• Total = 44 points.