Campsite Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Objective
• Preparation
• About Terrain Cards
• On a Turn
  • 1. Placing a Terrain Card
  • 2. Placing a Tent Token
  • 3. Drawing a New Terrain Card
• End of a Round
• Scoring
• Editor's Notes

Objective

Each player starts with 7 TENT TOKENS that represent different camping conditions or terrain types:

• Desert
• Forest
• Meadow
• Mountains
• Water
• Trail
• Wilderness (which has all 6 terrain types)

Using the TERRAIN CARDS, players try to create perfect camping locations for each of their TENT TOKENS. The best locations score the most points. After each player has placed all their tents (7 turns), a round is over. After 3 rounds, the player with the most points wins.

Preparation

Sort the TENT TOKENS into sets according to the shape of the tent and accompanying icon - boots, dog, guitar, lantern, backpack, and canoe. Give each player their own set of 7 tokens. Write player names on the score sheet under their matching tents.

Illustration caption: "This a complete tent token set for one player."

Shuffle the TERRAIN CARDS. Deal each player 3 cards and place the remaining cards within easy reach to form a draw pile.

Take the top 2 cards from the draw pile and place them face up (side by side) in the middle of the table - this is the starting play area.

The first player is the person to have most recently gone camping.

About Terrain Cards

Each TERRAIN CARD features two types of terrain. Symbols for the two terrain types can be found in a corner of the card.

The terrain area may occupy anywhere from 1 to 5 squares of a 6-square card. On this card, for instance, 4 of the squares are Desert Terrain and Trail Terrain. (Note: squares are always a combination of 2 different terrains.) The other two squares are considered "empty" terrain - this is where TENT TOKENS can be placed.

Illustration caption: "This is what empty terrain looks like."

On a Turn

Players must do each of the following:

1. Place a TERRAIN CARD
2. Place a TENT TOKEN
3. Draw a new TERRAIN CARD

1. Placing a Terrain Card

(See page three for illustration.)

• A TERRAIN CARD must be placed adjacent to or overlapping another TERRAIN CARD in the central play area. Overlapping may only occur by placing cards on top - never by trying to slide them underneath.
• A TERRAIN CARD is considered adjacent as long as it shares the side of at least one grid square with another TERRAIN CARD.
• A TERRAIN CARD cannot be placed such that it overlaps (i.e. covers) the colored terrain portion of another TERRAIN CARD. Only empty terrain may be covered.
• Open gaps between TERRAIN CARDS may form in the course of play and are allowed.
• TERRAIN CARDS may be played in any orientation, there is no "right way up".
• A player must place a TERRAIN CARD on every turn.

2. Placing a Tent Token

After adding a TERRAIN CARD to the play area, players place one of their TENT TOKENS. It must be placed on an empty terrain square of a card (not onto the table surface). Place TENT TOKENS to try and maximize your score. Players score a point for each of the 8 adjacent squares to their token that match its terrain type.

Diagram: the 8 squares surrounding a token are numbered 1 to 8 clockwise from the top-left, with the token in the centre.

3. Drawing a New Terrain Card

At the end of each turn, draw another TERRAIN CARD from the top of the draw pile. Players should start a turn with 3 cards in their hand.

End of a Round

After each player has had 7 turns, record each player's token totals on the score pad. After the round has been scored, collect your TENT TOKENS, gather the TERRAIN CARDS, shuffle the deck and get ready for Round 2. At the end of 3 rounds the player with the highest score wins the game.

Scoring

When scoring, count the number of squares (out of the 8 possible) that feature the terrain pictured on the TENT TOKEN. For instance, here, the "lantern" player has a score of 6, because out of the 8 squares surrounding their TENT TOKEN - 6 of them feature Water.

Any FAIR WEATHER CARDS in the squares adjacent to a TENT TOKEN double the score for that token. Note: a FAIR WEATHER CARD has a X2 on it. If a token is next to more than one Fair Weather square - it still only doubles that token's score once (i.e. x2, not x4). Here the "backpack" player has 4 Meadow squares surrounding them - so they score 8 points.

Wilderness TENT TOKENS score one point for each type of terrain surrounding the token. Here the "guitar" player receives 4 points, since their token is surrounded by Desert, Trail, Meadow, and Water. The maximum a Wilderness TENT TOKEN can score is 6 - one point for each terrain (unless a FAIR WEATHER CARD is also adjacent).

Helpful Hint: you can improve the score of tokens you have already played, by adding more TERRAIN CARDS adjacent to it on subsequent turns. Here the "boot" player only has 4 points for this Desert TENT TOKEN. But if a Desert TERRAIN CARD is placed to the left of this token it will increase the score.

Editor's Notes

• The printed text lists six tent shapes in Preparation (boots, dog, guitar, lantern, backpack, canoe) but each player has 7 tokens, one per terrain type. The rulebook does not print an explicit shape-to-terrain key for every token; it only shows the boot (Desert), lantern (Water), backpack (Meadow) and guitar (Wilderness) examples in the Scoring section. The dog and canoe tokens are not assigned a terrain in the text.
• The publisher's address footer on each page is omitted as attribution.