Valley of the Vikings
Valley of the Vikings Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Game Designers
Wilfried and Marie Fort
Illustrated by: Maximilian Meinzold
Editorial staff: Annemarie Wolke
Play time: 15 - 20 minutes
Game Contents
1 large Viking Valley game board (to be pieced together from 7 parts), 8 Viking flags, 4 Viking tokens, 1 cardboard bat, 4 ships (each to be assembled from 4 cardboard sections), 1 bowling ball, 24 gold coins, 4 wooden barrels, 1 rulebook
Before the First Game
Gently push the pieces and figures out of the panels and dispose of the cardboard surrounds. Assemble the ships as shown.
Tip: Take the sails out of the ships after each game. In this way, the ships will fit in the box on their side and do not need to be completely taken apart.
Game Setup
- Piece the large game board together in the middle of the table.
- Each player chooses a Viking color and takes the ship and Viking token of that color.
- Line up all the Viking tokens in front of the first space of the dock, even if there are fewer than 4 players.
- Place your ship in front of you. Ships that do not belong to any player are put to one side of the game board. Put a gold coin in each ship.
- Place the hoard of remaining coins, the bowling ball and the bat next to the board.
- Shuffle the 8 Viking flags face down. Randomly place one flag in each slot on the board face up.
- Place the 4 barrels randomly in the grass circled holes in the middle of the board.
How to Play
Play goes in a clockwise direction. The player who most closely resembles a Viking starts. Take the ball and the bat.
In the corner of the village closest to you, place the bowling ball in the hole at the top of the ramp. Use the bat to propel the ball in the direction of the barrels to try and knock them over. You are allowed to keep trying until you have knocked over at least one of the four barrels.
For each colored barrel that has been knocked over, move the matching Viking token one space further along the dock, always to the right. Skip over any spaces that are occupied. If you knock over more than one barrel, you decide the order in which the tokens are moved.
Scoring & Gaining Coins
When a token needs to move and there are no empty spaces remaining to the right on the dock, they are moved off the dock, into the water! The current player's turn ends immediately – any remaining Viking token movements are lost.
Now the Vikings whose tokens are still on the dock are rewarded with coins. Players place the gold coins they have won into their ships. Coins are only given to Vikings still on the dock, starting with the Viking who is furthest on the right and working back to the start.
If there are fewer than 4 players, the Viking tokens not claimed at the start of the game still get moved just like the others, and their ships still gain coins as well.
- Vikings on a space with a Viking flag with gold coins take the number of coins depicted (1 - 4 coins) from the hoard. If there are not enough coins left, the player just takes what is there. If there are none at all, they go empty-handed.
- Vikings on a space with a Viking flag showing their own Viking image, are allowed to steal one gold coin from each of the other players. If any of the other players do not have coins in their ship, the Viking cannot steal from them.
- Vikings on a space with a Viking flag showing the Viking image of another player are allowed to steal a coin from this Viking. If this player has no coins in their ship, the Viking unfortunately misses out.
Example
The player paired up with the orange-colored Viking Tjarne has bowled over both the orange barrel and the blue barrel. She moves her own Viking token first, leapfrogging the red Viking token. She now moves the blue Viking token. The blue token falls into the water at the end of the dock. This triggers scoring and the earning of coins.
- The blue Viking, Finn, gets nothing because he was the one who fell in the water.
- The orange Viking, Tjarne, gets 4 coins from the hoard.
- The red Viking, Magnus, who was not paired up with any of the players at the start of the game, gets a coin from all other players because he is on the square that has his personal Viking flag.
- The green Viking, Inga, steals a coin from Viking Tjarne.
After a player moves one or more Viking tokens or after coins have been distributed, it is the next player's turn. First they place all the overturned barrels in any spaces they like. Any barrels that were not knocked over stay where they are. If a Viking token has fallen into the water, it is returned to in front of the first space on the dock. All the other Viking tokens stay where they are on the dock.
End of the Game
When the hoard is empty, the game ends. The players are still allowed to steal from each other according to the rules of the game to finish the current turn. But after that, the game really is over.
The players then count up the coins in their ships. The player with the most coins wins the game and has earned the title of Valley Viking Chief. If the ship containing the most coins belongs to a Viking who was not paired up at the start with a player (fewer than 4 players), all of the players have lost.
If there is a tie, the winner is the player whose Viking token is closest to the start of the dock.