How to Play
— A Detailed Overview —
Mutations
Begin by picking your species, starting region, and a mutation - an ability your herds will have for the entire game.
Mutations are extremely powerful, highly asymmetric, and make every game different from the last.
Movement
On your turn, each of your herds can either move or heal. At first, every move will result in combat with neighboring humans to take control of their regions and the resources they produce. The number of humans guarding each region is written on the back of each Human Worker Token (shown below) and hidden until you enter their region. Because humans are very lazy, they never leave their region.
Combat
Combat is decided by rolling custom dice. You roll one die for each unit your side has in combat. Combat continues until either side retreats or is wiped out. Herds have two health and humans have one.
Players choose how to allocate the damage the receive
• A die showing nothing is a miss and does no damage.
• A die showing a head does one damage to a human, if the other side has any. Otherwise it does no damage.
• A die showing a gun does one damage to a herd or human.
Resources
At the end of your turn, roll the two Resource Dice. All players collect resources for each region they control that matches the resources shown on the dice. In the below example, weapons and wheat are rolled. The pigs control two weapons factories and one field, so they collect two weapons and one wheat. The cows collect one weapon and one wheat, and the sheep collect one weapon.
Due to the busy nature of taking over the countryside, you can trade resources with each other at any time except during your turn.
Building
You can spend resources on Barns, Armories, Spy Cards, and nukes. Barns spawn a new herd every turn and are worth one VP. Armories are upgraded Barns worth 2 VP that add one bonus damage to each round of combat. Spy Cards, like "Field Hospital" shown here, offer powerful one-time abilities. Some spies are even worth VP.
NUKES
Nukes deal one damage to all herds in an adjacent region, and two nukes can wipe them out completely. So watch out! Grouping your herds in one region makes you stronger in combat but more vulnerable to nukes. Adjust your strategy to the nuclear threat by spreading your forces and stockpiling nukes to act as a deterrent. The player who builds the most nukes claims the Nukiest Card, which is worth 1 VP and is way more impressive than building a long road.
CONQUEST
Conquering another players' regions is the final and most important way to earn VP. In the below example, both the cows and the pigs have two Armories which are in regions that are not pictured and roll two guns on their Combat Dice. That means they each deal 2 damage from their dice and two more from their Armories, for a total of 4 damage to each side. The pigs are wiped out, and the cows each take one damage. Because the cows conquered the region, the pigs' Armory is destroyed and the cows earn a VP Token.