Overtime Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Goal of the Game
• Components
• Game Setup
• Card Details
• Cards
• How to Play
  • The Start of the Round
  • Action Phase
  • Employee Cards
• Work Cards
• Rest Cards
• Tiredness
• Draw Phase
• Discard Phase
• Playing Reactions
• The Pile
• The End of the Round
• End of the Game and Winning
• Quick Reference

Goal of the Game

When you're stuck at work on a Friday evening, there is not much to do but push through and work. If you want to go home, here's what you'll need to do:

Each player wants to be the first Employee to complete or discard all of their Assignment cards. You can do this by working hard and honestly, or by unloading your assignments onto the other players. Both roads lead to victory, but the choice is up you!

Components

Your game of Overtime should include the following components:

• 30 Assignment cards
• 6 Average Joe/Average Joanna starting Employee cards
• 20 one-point Snooze tokens
• 15 three-point Snooze tokens
• 10 Task tokens
• 1 six-sided Work die
• 122 Main deck cards
• 6 Reference cards
• 1 eight-sided Round tracker die and the Time card
• This rulebook

Game Setup

1. Shuffle the Main deck and place it face down in the middle of the table. Place all of the Snooze tokens, Task tokens and the Work die within easy reach of all players.
2. Give each player an Average Joe/Joanna card, a Reference card, 1 one-point Snooze token and 5 Assignment cards. Each player should have 1 of each different Assignment card (1 Lead Generation Report, 1 Project Cost Breakdown, 1 The Quarterly Report, 1 User Experience Survey and 1 Monthly Sales Forecast).
3. Deal 4 cards from the Main deck to each player.
4. Choose the first player. This should be the person who worked the longest hours the previous day. Each new round will begin at the start of that player's turn.
5. Place the Time card near the Main deck and the Round tracker die on its designated place on the Time card. Place the die so the number "1" is facing up, indicating the start of the first turn.
6. The game is now ready to start.

Card Details

Each card shows the following elements:

1. Card type
2. Card name
3. Art
4. Card effect
5. Flavor text
6. Tiredness rating
7. Stats values
8. Special ability
9. Tasks

Cards

There are 6 different types of cards:

Card icons:

• W – Work cards
• R – Rest cards
• E – Employee cards
• S – Shady cards
• B – Boss cards
• A – Assignment cards
• Task tokens and Snooze tokens are marked with their own icons.

The Main deck is made up of Work, Rest, Employee, Shady and Boss cards.

Assignment cards – A are not part of the Main deck, but are dealt to each player at the start of the game.

W, R, and E cards are Action cards. Action cards can only be played during your turn and each costs one action to play.

S and B cards are Reaction cards. They can be played during any player's turn, but have a specific condition that must be met before they can be played. Reaction cards always state what they can react to (see Playing Reactions below).

Some cards have two card types, such as W/R cards or S/R cards. This means that these cards count as both of those types for triggering reactions and being targeted by other cards.

On the table or just played – Cards that are played on the table remain in play until discarded or canceled.

A card is considered just played until its effect resolves. After a card is resolved, or when it is discarded or canceled, put it into the discard pile. See The Pile for more detail on resolving cards.

How to Play

The game is played over the course of 8 rounds, in which every player takes a turn in clockwise order, starting from the first player.

Each player's turn is played out in 3 phases: Action phase, Draw phase and Discard phase. These phases correspond to the Stats on the Employee card of each player.

Turn order:

1. Play actions up to your Productiveness value.
2. Draw cards up to your Laziness value.
3. Discard cards down to your Determination value.

You can React to cards played at any time!

The Start of the Round

At the start of each round, all players gain a number of Snooze tokens, depending on the current round. The Time card lists the number of Snooze tokens gained each round.

Skip this step at the start of the first round as each player already starts with 1 Snooze token, distributed during the setup.

Action Phase

Play actions during your turn. An action can be playing an Action card or using an Employee's Special ability.

A player can play a number of actions up to the limit of the Productiveness value of their current Employee card.

E.g.: A player with a Productiveness value of 3 can play up to 3 actions during their turn.

Employee Cards

Employee cards represent the player's role within the game. Playing an E card will replace the player's current E card in play. The current card is discarded and placed in the discard pile and the new E card takes its place. A player must always have an active E card.

Each Employee has a set of stats listed on its card. There are 3 different stats plus a special power:

• Productiveness – Number of actions you can play on your turn.
• Laziness – Number of cards you draw at the end of your turn.
• Determination – Number of cards you can keep at the end of your turn.
• Special ability – The unique power of the Employee!

Playing a new E card can change the stat values of the player in the middle of their turn. If the player already played more actions than their new Productiveness value, they cannot play any further actions for the remainder of their turn.

If the first action played during your turn is an E card, it can be played for free without using an action. E cards played later during the turn count as one action for that turn as normal.

Special abilities – These are unique abilities of the Employee to help you out during the game. When and how a special ability can be used is stated on the E card. Abilities that don't specify when they can be used are always active.

Work Cards

Work cards are the primary way to complete your Assignments and win the game. Playing W cards will in most cases give you Snooze tokens which will make it harder for you to continue working (see Tiredness).

W cards that are played on an Assignment become attached to that A card, and remain on the table as long as the A card is in play. A W card played on an Assignment will complete its stated number of Tasks, and will remain attached to the Assignment. An A card can have multiple W cards attached to it, each of them completing their respective number of Tasks. If a Work card would complete any number of Tasks on another Assignment other than the one it is attached to, use the Task tokens to mark the completed Tasks. If any effect removes or cancels a W card attached to an Assignment before it is complete, all the Tasks gained with that W card are also lost.

Once the number of completed Tasks is equal to or greater than the number of Tasks printed on the A card, the Assignment is complete. Discard it along with any W cards played on it. Remove the discarded A card from play, and place any W cards attached to it into the discard pile.

Example: Playing A HARD DAY'S NIGHT will complete 2 Tasks on the A card LEAD GENERATION REPORT. It will also give the player 2 Snooze tokens. Since the LEAD GENERATION REPORT requires 3 Tasks to be completed, A HARD DAY'S NIGHT remains on the table attached to the A card to show how many Tasks have been completed. A HARD DAY'S NIGHT will remain in play until the LEAD GENERATION REPORT has all of its Tasks completed, or until the W card is canceled. In both cases, the W card will be moved to the discard pile.

Complete or discard Assignments – Completing an Assignment will result in that card being discarded. Certain S and B cards can react to a player completing an A card, however an A card that is discarded by any other effect is not considered complete and cannot be affected by those S and B cards. It just goes away!

Rest Cards

Rest cards are used to lower the player's amount of Snooze tokens and overcome the negative effects of Tiredness.

The amount of Snooze tokens removed, and which player or players are affected by the R card is indicated on the card itself.

Return the removed Snooze tokens back to the common token pile.

"Yourself", "Another Player" and "Any Player" – "Yourself" refers to the player that plays the card. "Another Player" refers to any player other than the one who played the card (chosen by the player that played the card). Effects that state "Any Player" mean just that – any player.

Tiredness

During their turn, each player needs to keep track of the number of Snooze tokens they have or risk becoming too tired.

In order to determine the Tiredness of each player, compare their number of Snooze tokens to the Tiredness Rating shown on each player's E card.

Each level on the track imposes penalties to that player's actions: by reducing their Productiveness value and forcing the player to roll the Work die when playing W cards.

The Effects of Tiredness:

• No effect. (The Tiredness Rating ranges 0-3, 4-6, 7-9 and 10+ are the ones printed on the Average Joe/Joanna card; the rulebook's Tiredness table itself shows only the four effects.)
• Tiredness Rating 4-6: -1 Productiveness, roll for W cards: a 3+.
• Tiredness Rating 7-9: -2 Productiveness, roll for W cards: a 5+.
• Tiredness Rating 10+: Discard all of your Snooze tokens. Skip the rest of your turn.

How Tiredness affects a player can change in the middle of their turn: by gaining or losing Snooze tokens, or changing their E card (and so changing their Tiredness Rating). By moving up or down a level on the track, players can lose or gain back actions, and reduce the penalties for playing W cards.

If a player starts their turn or at any point during their turn has more Snooze tokens then permitted by the last level of the Tiredness track, they must immediately skip the remainder of their turn and discard all of their Snooze tokens.

Playing W cards outside of your turn while under the effects of Tiredness still requires you to roll the work die.

Note that discarding Snooze tokens is not the same as removing them!

Skipping your turn – Whenever an effect calls for a player to "Skip your turn", that player draws two cards and must end their turn. They cannot play any actions, and do not draw cards based on their E card's Laziness value. They also skip the discard step of their turn.

The Work Die – When a player plays a W card while tired, they must first roll the Work die before any player can react to their card. Depending on their level on the Tiredness track, a player needs to roll equal or higher than the number shown on the die of their Tiredness level. The final level of tiredness also requires a roll of 5+ in order to play Work cards.

If the roll doesn't succeed, the W card is automatically canceled and fails. Players cannot react to a card canceled this way.

Draw Phase

Once a player has finished playing all of their actions – either because they've reached their limit or because they decided not to play any more cards – they move into the Draw phase.

They draw cards equal to the Laziness value on their E card, and these cards are added to the player's hand.

Players can draw and hold cards in excess of their hand size during their turn and only need to discard down to their hand size at the end of their turn.

The Discard Pile – the discard pile is formed when the first player discards or plays a card, and should be placed next to the main deck. Any player can look at the cards in the discard pile – the order of cards in the discard pile is not important.

Some Special abilities, such as that of The Workaholic or The Average Joe/Average Joanna, can allow a player to take cards from the discard pile. That player can take any card of their choice that the ability allows. Should the main deck ever run out of cards, simply shuffle the discard pile to make a new deck.

The Common Courtesy – While speeding up the game is good and all, you should always be patient and wait for the previous player to finish discarding cards before playing your first card for the turn.

No player can play any card or use any Special ability during the Draw and Discard phases of any player's turn. Wait for them to finish, so they can follow the game and react on time!

Discard Phase

Before their turn is over, that player must discard any extra cards from their hand. A player is allowed to keep a number of cards equal to the Determination value shown on their E card. The excess cards are put into the discard pile face up.

Cards that are kept in hand can be used during another player's turn or during your next turn. Only cards played as a reaction can be played during another player's turn.

Players only draw cards at the end of their turn, or as part of an effect of an Action or Reaction card, so you should always plan ahead on what you want to keep!

After the Discard phase, your turn is over, and the next player can begin theirs!

Playing Reactions

Unlike actions, reactions can be used at any time and there is no limit to the number of reactions a player can play.

Each reaction has a specific trigger that must be met for the card to be played. You cannot play a reaction unless the effect that triggers it has happened.

Work Is Its Own Reward (a S/B card) can only react to another player completing an A card. So it can only be played after a player completes one of their A cards. Its text reads: "React to another player completing an A card. Give one of your A cards to the player that has the least amount of A cards left, or is tied for the least." Its flavor text reads: "Since you seem to be doing so well, the Boss said you should help me out a little. Here, take this pile!"

When forming a Pile (see below), a player can react only to the last played card in a Pile or to the Lead card – one of those cards must be the trigger for the reaction!

Shady Reaction cards – Shady cards are used to mess with your opponents – tampering with their W and R cards, canceling their attempts to complete Assignments and even to give them your A cards and bring you closer to victory!

Boss Reaction cards – Boss cards are primarily used to keep the other players in check and stop them from using their S cards. However, calling on the Boss can have consequences for all players, including you.

Cancel a card – A card that is canceled is discarded. Its effect doesn't happen, and it is simply put into the discard pile.

Copy the effect of a card – The card or ability that copies the effect of another card works in every way as the copied card, except its card type doesn't change. E.g.: a S/W card that copies the effect of a W card is still a S/W card – it can still be targeted and canceled by a B card!

Give and Take – To give or take an A card, it must be a card that is on the table. Place that card in front of the new owner, along with any W cards and Task tokens already attached to it. It now belongs to the new owner, and is now part of their goal.

How the Pile works (examples printed on page 8): Since the Watchful Eye card can only target the top card of either Pile, the player playing the card has a choice between reacting to either Power Outage card or I'll Just Copy That! card. Since someone already reacted to the "Quick" Data Check card with the Power Outage card, it can no longer be reacted to with the Watchful Eye card.

The Pile

When one or more players react to an action, their cards form the Pile.

The Pile is a stack of cards placed on the table, and consists of the Lead card (usually an Action card played) and the Reaction cards (all the other cards added to the Pile).

Any card that is added to a Pile must either react to the Lead card or the last played reaction in a Pile. Any time a card is played as a reaction to the Lead card, it makes a new separate Pile next to the Lead card, and becomes a possible target for other reactions. When a card is added to a Pile, it is placed over the card it reacted to, showing that the covered card can no longer be reacted to. The Lead card is never covered by a Reaction card, and can always be reacted to again.

Any player can add a Reaction card to a Pile, as long as it is triggered by either the Lead card or the last played reaction. In case two or more players want to react to a Pile at the same time, the first player to physically place their card on the Pile reacts first. His card then becomes the last played Reaction card in the Pile.

Special abilities that are used as a reaction can also be "added" to a Pile. Unlike other reactions on the Pile, Special abilities are resolved immediately and do not cover the card they reacted to – these cards can be reacted to again unless they were canceled.

Any card added to the Pile will have its effect happen unless it was canceled (even if the Lead card is canceled, the Reaction card's effect still happens).

Note that an Action card, such as a W or R card, usually cannot be played as a reaction to the Lead card, even if it was played during your turn.

When all players have finished adding cards to the Pile, each Pile resolves in reverse order, with the last played Reaction card playing out first and then the rest until finally the Lead card resolves. No card will have its effect resolved until this step. The Lead card will always resolve after resolving all of the Piles.

The End of the Round

Once each player has played their turn, the round ends. Turn the Round tracker die to the next number, and start a new round.

End of the Game and Winning

The game ends at the end of the turn in which any player completes, discards or gives away their last A card. Unless another player can give them an Assignment before the end of that turn, that player is the winner!

The game also ends after 8 rounds have been played (the 8 hours from 4 pm to midnight). If no player manages to complete all of their Assignments before the end of the 8th round – no one wins: all players lose the game.

Someone.... Or No One! – It's not important if you lose, it's important that no one else wins! Don't be a King Maker, unless you're going to be the King!

Quick Reference

The printed back-page quick reference repeats the card icons, turn order, Employee stats and the effects of Tiredness shown above.