Munchkin Grimm Tidings Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Setup
• Card Management
  • Conflicts Between Cards and Rules
• Character Creation
• Starting and Finishing the Game
  • When You May Take Actions
• Turn Phases
• Character Stats
  • Eldest, Youngest, and Princess
• Treasures
  • Items
  • "One-Shot" Treasures
  • Other Treasures
• Combat
  • Example of Combat
  • Monsters
  • Monster Enhancers
  • Fighting Multiple Monsters
  • Interfering With Combat
  • Asking For Help
  • Rewards
  • Running Away
• Curses

Setup

Using the art on the backs, divide the cards into the Door deck and the Treasure deck. Shuffle both decks. Deal four cards from each deck to each player.

Card Management

Keep separate face-up discard piles for the two decks. You may not look through the discards unless you play a card that allows you to. When a deck runs out, reshuffle its discards.

In Play: These are the cards on the table in front of you, showing your Class (if any) and the Items you are carrying. Continuing Curses also stay on the table. Cards in play must be visible to the other players.

Your Hand: Cards in your hand are not in play. They don't help you, but they can't be taken away except by cards that specifically affect "your hand." At the end of your turn, you may have no more than five cards in your hand (see Charity).

Cards in play may not be returned to your hand.

Conflicts Between Cards and Rules

This rulesheet gives the general rules. Many cards add special rules, so in most cases when the rulesheet disagrees with a card, follow the card. However, ignore any card effect that might seem to contradict one of the rules listed below unless the card explicitly says it supersedes that rule!

1. Nothing can reduce a player below Level 1, although card effects might reduce a player's or a monster's combat strength below 1.
2. You go up a level after combat only if you kill a monster.
3. You cannot collect rewards for defeating a monster in the middle of a combat. You must finish the fight before gaining any rewards.
4. You must kill a monster to reach Level 10.

Any other disputes should be settled by loud arguments, with the owner of the game having the last word. You could also read the Munchkin FAQ and errata pages at munchkin.sjgames.com, or start a discussion at forums.sjgames.com.

Character Creation

Everyone starts as a Level 1 human with no class. (Heh, heh.) Munchkin characters may be either male or female. Your character's sex is the same as your own at the start of the game, unless you declare otherwise.

Look at your initial eight cards. If you have one or more Class cards, you may (if you like) play one by placing it in front of you. If you have any usable Items, you may play them by placing them in front of you.

Starting and Finishing the Game

Decide who goes first by whatever method you like.

Play proceeds in turns, each with several phases. When the first player finishes his turn, the player to his left takes a turn, and so on.

The first player to reach Level 10 wins. You must reach Level 10 by killing a monster.

When You May Take Actions

You may perform these actions at any time:

• Discard a Class.
• Play a Go Up a Level.
• Play a Curse.

You may perform these actions at any time, as long as you are not in combat:

• Trade an Item with another player (the other player may not be in combat, either).
• Change which Items you have equipped.
• Play a card that you have just received (some cards may be played even during combat; see above).

You may perform these actions on your own turn:

• Play a new Class card (at any time).
• Sell Items for levels (except when you are in combat).
• Play an Item (most Items cannot be played during combat, but some one-shot Items can).

Turn Phases

Your turn begins as soon as the previous player's turn ends. When your cards are arranged the way you want, go to phase 1.

(1) Kick Open The Door: Draw one card from the Door deck and turn it face up.

If it's a monster, you must fight it. See Combat. If the card is a Curse, it applies to you immediately if it can. It is then discarded, unless it has a persistent effect or upcoming effect.

If you draw any other card, you may either put it in your hand or play it immediately.

(2) Look For Trouble/Loot The Room: If you fought a monster in phase 1, skip this phase and go to phase 3.

If you did NOT draw a monster when you first opened the door, you have two choices: either Look For Trouble or Loot The Room.

Look For Trouble: Play a monster from your hand and fight it, just as though you had found it when you kicked open the door.

Loot The Room: Draw a second card from the Door deck, face down, and place it in your hand.

(3) Charity: If you have more than five cards in your hand, you must play enough cards to get you to five or below, or give the excess cards to the player with the lowest Level. If other players are tied for lowest, divide the cards as evenly as possible, but it's up to you who gets the bigger set(s) of leftovers. If YOU are the lowest or tied for lowest, just discard the excess.

As soon as you are finished with Charity, the next player's turn begins.

Character Stats

Each character is a collection of weapons, armor, and magic items, with two stats: Level and Class. For instance, you might describe your character as "a Level 8 Tailor with Braids and the Teleporting Boots."

Level: This is a measure of how buff and studly you are. When the rules or cards refer to your Level, capitalized, they mean this number.

You gain a level when you kill a monster or when a card says that you do. You can also sell Items to buy levels.

You lose a level when a card says you do. Your Level can never go below 1. However, your combat strength can be negative, if you get hit by a Curse or suffer some other kind of penalty.

Class: Characters may be Hunters, Tailors, Thieves, or Woodcutters. You may not belong to more than one class at once. If you have no Class card in front of you, you have no class.

Each Class has special abilities. You gain the abilities of a Class the moment you play its card in front of you, and lose them as soon as you discard that card. Some Class abilities are powered by discards. You may discard any card, in play or in your hand, to power a special ability.

See the Class cards for when abilities can be used. Note that a Thief cannot steal while he or the target is fighting – and as soon as a monster is revealed, the fight is on!

You can discard a Class card at any time, even in combat: "I don't wanna be a wizard anymore."

Eldest, Youngest, and Princess

These cards stay in front of you, like Classes, but they are not Classes, and cards that affect Classes do not affect them. You may play them at any time it is legal to play a Class, and may discard them at any time.

Treasures

Treasure cards include permanent and "one-shot" cards. Any Treasure card may be played to the table as soon as you get it, or at any time on your own turn except during combat (unless the rules below or the card itself says otherwise).

Items

Most Treasures are Items. Items have a Gold Piece value. "No Value" is equivalent to zero Gold Pieces, and cards with No Value are also Items.

All Items you have in play are considered "carried." Items that are actually giving you a bonus are "equipped." You should indicate Items that are not equipped by turning the cards sideways. You may not alter the status of your Items during a combat or while running away.

Anyone can carry any Item (except for extra Big items; see below), but you may equip only one Headgear, one suit of Armor, one pair of Footgear, and two "1 Hand" Items (or one "2 Hands" Item) . . . unless you have a card that lets you ignore these limits, such as Cheat!, or unless one of the cards says otherwise. If you are carrying two Headgear cards, for instance, you can equip only one of them at a time.

You cannot discard Item cards "just because." You may sell Items for a level, trade Items with other players, or give an Item to another player who wants it (see below). You may discard Items to power certain Class abilities. And a Curse or a monster's Bad Stuff (see Running Away) may force you to get rid of something!

Trading: You may trade Items (but no other cards) with other players, at any time except when you or your trading partner are in combat. You may only trade Items from the table – not from your hand. Any Item you receive in a trade must remain in play.

You may also give Items away without a trade, to bribe other players – "I'll give you my Cannon Hat if you won't help Bob fight Rumpelstiltskin!"

Selling Items for Levels: At any point during your turn except during combat or Running Away, you may discard Items worth a total of at least 1,000 Gold Pieces and immediately go up one level. ("No Value" cards are the same as zero Gold Pieces.) If you discard (for instance) 1,100 Gold Pieces worth, you don't get change. But if you can manage 2,000 worth, you can go up two levels at once, and so on. You may sell Items from your hand as well as those you are carrying.

You may not sell Items to go to Level 10.

"One-Shot" Treasures

A Treasure card that says "Usable once only" is often called a "one-shot" Treasure. These cards may be played from the table or your hand. Most of these are used during combat to strengthen the munchkins or the monsters. Some have other effects, however, so read the card carefully! Discard these cards as soon as the combat is over or their effect is resolved.

One-shot Items with a Gold Piece value may be sold for levels, just like other Treasures.

Other Treasures

Other Treasure cards (like Go Up a Level cards) are not Items. Most of these cards say when they can be played, and whether they stay in play or are discarded. A specific example:

Go Up a Level cards may be played on yourself or any other player at any time, even during combat. Discard them once they are played. Exception: You cannot play a Go Up a Level card to give a player the winning level!

Combat

To fight a monster, compare its combat strength to yours. Combat strength is the total of Level plus all modifiers – positive or negative – given by Items and other cards. If the monster's combat strength is greater than or equal to yours (monsters win ties!), you lose the combat and must Run Away (see below). If your combat strength totals more than the monster's, you kill it and go up a level (two levels for some big monsters). You also get the number of Treasures shown on its card.

Sometimes a card will let you get rid of the monster without killing it. This is still "winning," but you don't get a level. Unless the card says otherwise, you don't get the Treasures, either.

Some monster cards have special powers that affect combat – a bonus against a particular Class, for instance. Be sure to check these!

You and the other players may play one-shot Treasures or use Class abilities to help or harm you in your combat. Some Door cards may also be played into a combat, such as Monster Enhancers (see below).

Remember: while you are in combat, you cannot sell, equip, unequip, or trade Items, or play Treasures from your hand, unless these rules or the card says otherwise.

If you kill a monster (or monsters!), discard the monster(s) and any other cards played, and claim your rewards. But note: someone may play a hostile card on you, or use a special power, just as you think you have won. When you kill a monster, you must wait a reasonable time for anyone else to speak up. After that, you have really killed the monster, and you really get the level(s) and Treasures.

Example of Combat

Gretchen is a Level 4 Hunter with the Scissors (+3 to her combat strength). She is facing the Level 10 Wicked Stepmother. Gretchen plays the Flying Ladle (+4) to raise her combat strength to 11, beating the Wicked Stepmother's 10. Unless someone interferes, Gretchen has won the combat!

Monsters

If drawn face-up, during the Kick Open The Door phase, Monsters immediately attack the person who drew them.

If you get a Monster card any other way, it goes into your hand and may be played during your own turn to Look For Trouble, or played with the Wandering Monster card to join another player's fight. (See Fighting Multiple Monsters, below.)

Each Monster card is a single monster, even if the name on the card is plural.

Monster Enhancers

Certain cards, called monster enhancers, raise or lower the combat strength of individual monsters. They also affect the number of Treasures the monsters are worth. Monster enhancers may be played by any player during any combat.

All enhancers on a single monster add together. If there are multiple monsters in a combat, the person who plays each Enhancer must choose which monster it applies to.

Fighting Multiple Monsters

Some cards (such as Wandering Monster) allow your rivals to send other monsters to join the fight. You must defeat their combined combat strengths. Any special abilities, such as forcing you to fight with your Level only, apply to the entire fight. If you have the right cards, you can eliminate one monster from the combat and fight the other(s) normally, but you cannot choose to fight one and Run Away from the other(s). If you eliminate one monster, but then run from the other(s), you don't get any levels or Treasure!

Interfering With Combat

You can interfere with others' combats in several ways, including:

• Use a one-shot card.
• Play a Monster Enhancer.
• Add a monster from your hand to join the combat, either with a Wandering Monster card or by using special rules on the monster cards themselves.
• Backstab a player, if you're a Thief.
• Play a Curse card.

Asking For Help

If you cannot win a combat on your own, you may ask any other player to help you. If he refuses, you may ask another player, and so on, until they all turn you down or someone helps. Only one player can help you, adding his combat strength to yours. Anyone can play cards to affect your combat, however!

You may offer your helper any Item(s) you are currently carrying, or any number of the Treasure cards the monster has. If you offer him part of the monster's Treasure, you must agree whether he picks first, or you pick first, or whatever. You may also offer to play any cards from your hand that you legally could, such as Go Up a Level cards, on your helper.

The special abilities or vulnerabilities of the monster also apply to your helper, and vice versa. For instance, if you are facing the Robbers and a Tailor helps you, the monster's combat strength is increased by 4 (unless you, too, are a Tailor and the monster's combat strength has already been increased).

If someone successfully helps you kill the monster, discard it, draw Treasures (see Rewards, below), and follow any special instructions on the monster card. You level up for each slain monster. Your helper does not go up any levels. You draw the Treasure cards, even if it was your helper's special ability that defeated the monster, and distribute them according to the agreement you reached.

Rewards

When you kill a monster, you get one level per monster, unless the Monster card says something else . . . and you get Treasure! Each monster has a Treasure number on the bottom of its card. Draw that many Treasures, modified by any Monster Enhancers played on it. Draw face-down if you killed the monster alone. Draw face-up, so the whole party can see what you got, if someone helped you.

If you defeat a monster by nonlethal means, you do not get a level and you may or may not get the Treasure, depending on the method.

Treasure cards can be played as soon as you get them, even if you are the helper.

Running Away

If nobody will help you . . . or if somebody tries to help, and your fellow party members interfere so the two of you still cannot win . . . you must Run Away. You don't get any levels or Treasure. You don't even get to Loot the Room. And you don't always escape unharmed . . .

Roll the die. You escape on a 5 or more. Some Class abilities and some Treasures might make it easier or harder to Run Away from all monsters. And some monsters give you a bonus or penalty to your roll for that monster only.

If you fail to Run Away from a monster, it does Bad Stuff to you, as described on its card. This may vary from losing an Item or cards to losing one or more levels.

If you are fleeing from multiple monsters, you roll separately to escape each one, in any order you choose, and suffer Bad Stuff from each one that catches you as soon as it catches you.

If two players are cooperating and still can't defeat the monster(s), they must both Run Away. They roll separately, and each player chooses in what order to Run Away. The monster(s) CAN catch them both.

Once you have resolved all Run Away rolls, discard the monster(s).

Curses

If drawn face-up during the Kick Open The Door phase, Curse cards apply to the person who drew them.

If acquired some other way, such as by Looting The Room, Curse cards go into your hand and may be played on any player at any time. Reducing someone's abilities just as he thinks he has killed a monster is a lot of fun.

Usually, a Curse affects its victim immediately (if it can) and is then discarded. However, some Curses give a penalty later in the game or have a continuing effect. Keep these cards until you get rid of the Curse or the penalty takes effect. (Curse cards you keep as a reminder may not be discarded to power Class or Race abilities. Nice try!)

Note: If someone plays a "your next combat" Curse on you while you are in combat, it counts in that combat! The same is true for a "your next turn" Curse played during your turn.

If a Curse can apply to more than one Item, the victim decides which Item is lost or Cursed.

If a Curse applies to something you don't have, ignore it. For instance, if you draw You Got Baked! and you are already at Level 1, nothing happens; discard the card. (Some Curses have alternate effects, though, so read the card!)

There will be times when it will help you to play a Curse or Monster on yourself, or to "help" another player in a way that costs him Treasure. This is very munchkinly. Do it.