Organic Soup Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• About the Cards
  • The atoms
  • The basic recipes
  • The simple recipes
  • The complex recipes
  • The amino/nucleic recipes
  • The rules summary cards
• Starting the Game
  • Spill the soup
  • Basic recipes available to all at start
  • Determine a starting player
  • Start with one of each type of recipe
  • Basic recipes available at start
• Build or react
  • Always end a turn with one of each recipe type
• Building Molecules
  • Build according to the basic recipes
  • If you tie for the most, take the recipe
  • Replenish the soup
• Triggering a Reaction
  • Choose ingredients in front of you
  • Choose unguarded ingredients from one opponent
  • React to form recipes from hand up to next level
  • React to form existing recipes
  • If a player has the most, he takes the recipe
  • Account for all atoms
  • Do something with all your ingredients
  • Back up failed reactions and reconsider
  • Process in parallel
• Ending the Game
  • Create life and win
  • Or, have the most building blocks

About the Cards

114 atom cards:

• 27 Carbon
• 42 Hydrogen
• 18 Nitrogen
• 27 Oxygen

64 recipe cards:

• 4 basic
• 20 simple
• 20 complex
• 20 amino/nucleic

4 turn sequence cards

The atoms

The atom cards represent Carbon, Hydrogen, Nitrogen, and Oxygen atoms.

[Card images: Carbon Atom, Hydrogen Atom, Nitrogen Atom, Oxygen Atom.]

The molecules that make up living things are composed mostly of these four elements.

[Card images: Graphite Recipe, Hydrogen Recipe, Nitrogen Recipe, Oxygen Recipe.]

The basic recipes

The four smallest recipe cards are called basic recipes. Each basic recipe shows how each element exists commonly in molecular form.

[Card images: Graphite Molecule, Hydrogen Molecule, Nitrogen Molecule, Oxygen Molecule.]

Throughout the game, players will form molecules out of atom cards by connecting the bonds between the atoms as shown on the recipes. The basic recipes for molecular Hydrogen, Nitrogen, and Oxygen call for two atoms each.

Note that Carbon crystallizes and does not form molecules in the usual sense under normal circumstances; for the purposes of the game a molecule of Carbon (Graphite) is made up of one atom of Carbon.

The simple recipes

The next recipes are the simple recipes. These recipes show how to form various small molecules containing up to five atoms. During the game, after building basic molecules, players will move up to these simple molecules. Each recipe card lists the number of each atom needed to form the molecule, along with a picture of the molecule as it looks with the atoms bonded together.

[Card images: Carbon Suboxide Recipe and Molecule; Water Recipe and Molecule.]

The complex recipes

The next recipes are the complex recipes. These recipes show how to form various larger molecules, such as Propionitrile:

[Card image: Propionitrile Molecule.]

Throughout the game, and especially in the later stages when there are many molecules in play, players may opt to simply stack the atoms in each molecule beside each other to save space:

[Card image: Propionitrile Molecule, atoms stacked side by side.]

The amino/nucleic recipes

The largest recipes in the game are the amino/nucleic recipes. A player wins the game by forming an amino/nucleic molecule such as Glutamic Acid:

[Card image: Glutamic Acid Molecule.]

The rules summary cards

The rules summary cards serve as reminders of how to perform the two main actions in the game -- building molecules and triggering reactions, as described later.

Starting the Game

Spill the soup

Shuffle the atom cards. Draw and place twelve atom cards faceup in the middle of the playing surface to form the "soup." Leave the remaining atoms facedown in a draw deck beside the soup.

Basic recipes available to all at start

Place the four basic recipe cards faceup separately in the middle of the playing surface beside the soup.

Determine a starting player

Shuffle the simple recipe cards and deal one simple recipe card to each player faceup. The player with the recipe ranked first alphabetically goes first.

Start with one of each type of recipe

Each player takes his simple recipe into his hand. Place the remaining simple recipe cards facedown beside the atom cards to form another draw deck. Shuffle the complex recipe cards and amino/nucleic recipe cards separately and place them facedown beside the atoms and simple recipes to form two more draw decks. Each player draws a complex recipe and an amino/nucleic recipe for a total hand of three recipes.

Basic recipes available at start

Place the four basic recipe cards faceup separately in the middle of the playing surface beside the soup. The playing surface center should look like this:

[Diagram: the four basic recipe cards ("Basic Recipes") in a column beside the soup; the recipe draw decks and the atom draw deck to the right of the soup.]

Build or react

Play proceeds in turns clockwise around the table. On his turn, a player must either build molecules or trigger a reaction as explained on the next page.

Always end a turn with one of each recipe type

After the player is finished with one of the above, he draws recipes from the draw decks until he again has one of each type of recipe in his hand. If he does not need to draw, he may instead place one of his three recipes on the bottom of its respective draw deck and draw a new one from the same deck to replace it.

Building Molecules

Build according to the basic recipes

A player may spend his turn building molecules. When building molecules, the player chooses a faceup recipe anywhere on the board and takes atom cards matching that recipe from the soup to form a molecule of that type. At the beginning of the game the only molecules available to be built are out of singleton Carbon atoms or pairs of Hydrogen, Nitrogen, or Oxygen atoms as indicated by the four basic recipes. A player may build as many molecules of the same type as he wishes in one turn, but he cannot build partial molecules. For example, if there are five Hydrogen cards in the soup, he can take at most four of them to build two Hydrogen molecules, as each Hydrogen molecule requires two Hydrogen atoms.

[Example diagram: the example soup of twelve atom cards in three rows of four.]

You could build up to two hydrogen molecules out of the four hydrogen atoms or up to two oxygen molecules out of the four oxygen atoms. You could build one nitrogen molecule using two of the three nitrogen atoms. You could take the single carbon atom as a carbon molecule.

If you tie for the most, take the recipe

After building a molecule type, if the player has at least as many copies of that molecule as anyone else, he takes that molecule's recipe and places it in front of him, by his molecules of that type.

Replenish the soup

After building molecules, the player draws atoms from the draw deck and places them faceup to replenish the soup until there are once again twelve atoms in the soup.

Example: It's your turn in a three-player game and the other two players have gone before you.

[Example diagram: the soup, the basic recipes, and the molecules in front of each player.]

The first player has one Nitrogen molecule and the recipe for Nitrogen. The second player has two Hydrogen molecules and the recipe for Hydrogen. The Oxygen and Graphite recipes are still open. You could create either Oxygen or Graphite molecules and take the corresponding recipe. Alternatively, you could create one Nitrogen molecule. If you do, you will tie with the first player in number of Nitrogen molecules, and so you would take the recipe from him.

Triggering a Reaction

Choose ingredients in front of you

A player may spend his turn triggering a reaction. A player choosing to trigger a reaction first chooses the molecules to be the ingredients for the reaction. A player may always choose molecules melded in front of him to be ingredients.

Choose unguarded ingredients from one opponent

He may also choose as ingredients any molecules not accompanied by their corresponding recipe in front of one other player. For example, if an opponent has two water molecules, two hydrogen molecules, and the recipe for water, he can choose one or both of the hydrogen molecules as ingredients, but not the water molecules.

React to form recipes from hand up to next level

After choosing ingredients, the player may form molecules that match recipe cards from his hand; if he does so he places any such recipes in front of him. He may only form a simple recipe if he has a basic recipe in front of him at the start of his turn. Similarly, he may only form a complex recipe if he starts with a simple recipe in front of him, and an amino/nucleic recipe only if he starts with a complex recipe in front of him.

The player takes all the atom cards from the ingredient molecules and combines the atoms to form new product molecules of one or more types. A player may react molecules to form more than one new recipe at once.

Example:

[Example diagram: the ingredient molecules, the recipe cards in hand, and the resulting product molecules.]

You have a recipe in hand for Nitric Oxide, requiring one Nitrogen atom and one Oxygen atom. You have two Oxygen molecules in front of you. The player to your right has two Nitrogen molecules, but he has the Nitrogen recipe, so you cannot take these as ingredients for your reaction. The player to your left has one Nitrogen molecule and does not have the recipe. You may use his Nitrogen for your reaction. You react his Nitrogen molecule with one of your Oxygen molecules to form two Nitric Oxide molecules, placing the Nitric Oxide molecule from your hand in front of you.

Note that on his next turn, the player to his left could build Nitric Oxide molecules straight from the pool since the recipe for Nitric Oxide is now on the board. He would be able to build two as there are two Nitrogen atoms in the pool and five Oxygen atoms. This would move him into a tie with you for most molecules of Nitric Oxide, and so he would take the recipe from you!

React to form existing recipes

A player may also react to form molecules according to any recipes that are already on the board, regardless of who has those recipes and regardless of the level of those recipes.

If a player has the most, he takes the recipe

If as of the result of a reaction any player has strictly more of a molecule than any other player and he does not have the recipe for that molecule, he takes the recipe and places it in front of him alongside any other recipes. If there is no one player with strictly more of a molecule after a reaction, the recipe remains where it is, even if the owning player does not share the lead for the most molecules of that type.

Account for all atoms

A player must account in the product molecules for all atoms from the ingredient molecules; no atoms may be left out or added from the soup. A player keeps all the molecules from a successful reaction in front of him.

Do something with all your ingredients

A molecule type cannot be present in a reaction as both an ingredient and a product.

Back up failed reactions and reconsider

If a player cannot find a way to use all the atoms of the ingredient molecules to make new molecules, he must back up the reaction and either try a different one or build molecules as his turn.

Process in parallel

A player may include as many ingredients as he wishes in one reaction, even if the reaction is really more than one distinct transformation. For example, it is legal to react 3 Carbon, 4 Hydrogen, and 2 Nitric Oxide molecules into 1 Propane, 1 Nitrogen, and 1 Oxygen molecule, even though the breakdown of the Nitric Oxide has nothing to do with the formation of the Propane.

Ending the Game

Create life and win

When a player triggers a reaction that creates a molecule having an amino/nucleic recipe, the game ends and that player wins.

Or, have the most building blocks

As soon as the atom draw deck is depleted, the game ends. The player with strictly the most complex recipes in front of him wins the game. If there is a tie for most complex recipes, the tying player with strictly the most simple recipes in front of him wins. If there is still a tie, the tying player with the most basic recipes in front of him wins.