What the Food?! Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Objective
• Components
• Setup
• Playing the Game
  • Card Types
  • Icons
  • Starting Actions
  • Each Round
• How to Serve Up a Delicious(???) Combo
• Cafeteria Rules
• Ending the Game
• Action Reference
  • Special Actions
  • General Actions
• 2 Player Rules
• Variants
• Advanced Rules

Objective

Pick up and throw funny food combos at your opponents and avoid "humiliation" points. When any player reaches 10 points, someone has 'alerted the principal' and the fight is over.

The winner is the player with the LOWEST score.

Components

Base Game

• 10 character ID cards
• 8 condiment target cards
• 24 starting action cards
• 10 character special actions
• 12 bonus action cards
• 36 food cards
• 9 topping cards
• 9 condition cards
• 9 event cards
• 3 blank "write-on" cards
• 100 humiliation tokens
• 1 hamburger (starting player token)

Special Edition (sold separately)

• 5 character ID cards
• 12 food cards
• 6 topping cards
• 6 condition cards
• 5 character special actions
• 2 event cards
• 2 bonus action cards

Setup

What the Food?! is a game for 3-8 players. See page 10 for 2 player rules. Combine sets or bonus cards available online for 8+ players.

1. Deal everyone a Target card (colors are just for flavor) and a set of starting Actions: 1 Duck, 1 Throw, and 1 Grab.
2. Deal everyone a Character ID card and the matching special Action card for that character.
3. Put all unused Target, Character ID and starting and special Action cards back in the box.
4. The Deck: shuffle all cards together except Event cards.
5. Deal 2 cards to each player, 5 face up cards to make the Floor, and 3 face up cards to start the Trash pile.
6. Now shuffle the Event cards into the Deck.
7. The player with the relish Target card starts first. If relish was not dealt, the player who ate last begins...

Playing the Game

The food fight is played in Rounds. Each round is 3 Actions.

Card Types

• FOOD - basic ammo: worth 1pt of humiliation. May select 2 (if available) when grabbing.
• TOPPING - can be thrown solo (as a food), otherwise adds to food for 1 more humiliation.
• CONDITION - 2pts, but must be combined with food or topping. Optional advanced rules available.
• EVENT - global events. When drawn (face up or down), play and resolve immediately.
• ACTION - your abilities in the game. Once drawn, these are yours to keep and use on future rounds.

Icons

• HUMILIATION - a splat with number indicates a gain or loss of points.
• ANY CARD - top card from a pile or any card from floor or your hand.
• CONDITIONS - only condition cards.
• ANY FOOD - only food and topping cards.
• ANY THROWABLE - foods, toppings and conditions.
• TARGETING - rule affecting targeting or normal play.
• ACTION TYPES - standard (fork), special (fork and knife) and bonus actions (all).

Starting Actions

• Grab - this is the primary way to gain cards in your hand. You may select any 1 card, or 2 food cards.
• Throw - attack (discard) 1 food or topping card from your hand. May add 1 topping and 1 condition to make a combo.
• Duck - no action on your turn, but you avoid all damage from thrown foods while showing this card.

Each Round

1. New Starting Player! Pass the starting player token (hamburger) clockwise. (Except round 1).

2. TARGET! In clockwise order from the Starting Player, everyone points (aims) their target card at someone.

3. Choose Actions! Everyone chooses 3 actions to play this round, placing them in one facedown pile, putting action #1 on top.

4. Take Action! Each player flips over his/her top action. Then, in clockwise order, Starting Player first, each player acts out the instructions on their card.

5. Get Humiliated! Players gain or remove humiliation tokens as directed by the card icons.

   Repeat steps 4 and 5 for your next 2 actions.

6. Check for Game End! At the end of the round, if anyone has reached 10 points, the game is over. See page 7.

7. Go Again! Start a new round!

How to Serve Up a Delicious(???) Combo

• Food (orange) = 1 pt
• Topping (purple) = 1 pt
• Food + Topping = 2 pts
• Topping + Topping = 2 pts
• Condition (green) + Food = 3 pts
• Condition + Topping = 3 pts
• Condition + Food + Topping = 4 pts!! & you drop 2pts
• Condition + Topping + Topping = 4 pts!! & you drop 2pts

Read 'em like so: Condition + Food + Topping. (Topping style - ignore if thrown solo.)

Cafeteria Rules

"What the Food?!" - Whenever 3 cards are played together in one attack and they hit, it's called a "What the Food?!" The whole table should yell it! It's so cool and impressive that the attacker drops 2 points!

More on the Floor - Every time a floor card is taken, it is immediately replaced by a card from the deck. (Exception: if the floor already has 5 or more cards.) Everyone should get in the habit of replacing their own floor draws, to better track turns and so that events play on the correct person.

Events FYI - Always play out one event fully before beginning another. Also, event cards affect the "active player", i.e. the player who drew the event card, unless the card says otherwise.

Hand Limit - There's no hand limit in "What the Food?!" Go ahead and try and hold onto everything AND what's under the kitchen sink.

Position Matters! - Be aware that most action cards are stronger when played early in clockwise rotation. As Starting Player, you'll target first with less information, but have first strike on all 3 of your actions.

The 9 Point Rule - Sometimes enough is enough. Good news for those exactly 1 point away from epic fail - you're immune to event damage and penalties from your own actions. Only points gained by another player's actions will end the game.

Ending the Game

Does anyone really WIN in a cafeteria food fight to the humiliation?!

When any player has 10 or more humiliation tokens at the end of a round, the game ends.

The Winner is the player or players with the LOWEST humiliation score.

Ties are ok, although if you want to have a clear victor, by all means settle with another food fight!

Action Reference

Special Actions

• Boast - Deflected and splattered food can hit you, as well as non-food attacks of any kind.
• Cheer - You and someone you choose gain the same bonus. Ignore your target card for this.
• Eat - This ability is optional. Must discard both a food and a topping for the 2 pt benefit.
• Flirt - Random draw. May not take action cards. Cannot change a target to target themselves.
• Hunt - Changing your target is permitted before you take the main action.
• Mock - No cards required to play. Mock only fails if you were hit during the current action rotation.
• Outsmart - Includes flirts, taunts, etc. A player can hit themselves! Deflections and splatter attacks hit Janey!
• Pitch - Not eligible for making a combo. If no food or topping cards on the floor, pitch fails.
• Prank - Condition cards don't count for Prank. Target discards the card after taking humiliation.
• Recycle - You may not discard actions. If there are not 3 eligible cards in Trash, take what you can.
• Scare - Scare does not affect action cards.
• Shove - Only food, topping and condition cards count towards this total. Target keeps these cards.

General Actions

• Belch - Discarding a card is optional. Follow your target direction unless belching at all players.
• Catch - Do not collect condition cards as a part of the catch action. Can catch from multiple attackers.
• Cheat - If played as a first action, cheat has no effect. Cheating while playing this card is encouraged!
• Confuse - It is legal to change your own target. You may not redirect someone to target themselves.
• Copy - This action copies both the action and the targeting of the original. As such, it's optional.
• Duck - Splatter damage, pitched, lobbed, deflected food, as well as non-food attacks all still apply.
• Goose - Your target chooses which card to give you.
• Grab - If no second food card is available or becomes available from floor restock, you only get 1.
• Hide - Hide blocks any main attack OR deflection, but splatter does hit. Attackers still discard food.
• Lob - Hits ducking targets. Lob against spin hits and splatters, while main attack deflects.
• Overhead Smash - May not add more cards to a combo than usual. Smash is considered deflected, not direct.
• Rally - Return other card to top. May keep events. If so, play immediately (unless using variant rules).

2 Player Rules

Can you play a 2 player food fight? Sure thing! Play as normal, but take out the targeting cards. Be aware, some cards may not work or work partially.

• Characters: The Mascot, Suzy Floozy, Undead Fred
• Actions: Lob, Goose, Overhead Smash, Confuse, Copy
• Events: Best Friends Forever, The Janitor
• Condition Bonuses: Suspicious, Slimy, Juicy

Variants

Humiliation Galore! - When playing with any advanced rules, it's recommended you play up to 15 points.

Advanced Rules

Super Conditions - Every condition card has a unique rule printed on the card, for added strategy when you're ready. Most trigger when connecting an attack, but note that some take effect when held or when played.

Mix it up! - Add unused character specials to the deck! When changing the recipe, keep in mind the usual ratio of ingredients is about 4 food for every 1 topping, condition, event and action, so swap (not just add) cards out for best balance.

Hold the Events! - In this version of the game, when an event flips up on the floor, play it as normal, but when drawn face down, keep it and play it at ANY TIME! You can pull that fire drill seconds before you'd be hit!

Timing: One at a time. Even if a second event is played on top of an event, you completely resolve event #1 before taking on event #2, just as usual. Any event played to the floor (dropped, swapped, etc) activates right away. Events played to the Trash or exchanged between players do not trigger.

Card Changes Suggested: Consider any card with the card-stack icon (the orange, purple and green cards from the Icons key) to include events.

Note: the card-stack icon on the printed page is a small graphic rather than text; it is rendered here by its description.