Problem Picnic: Attack of the Ants Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Setup
• Gameplay
  • 1) Send Out the Ants!
  • 2) Bring Back the Food!
  • 3) Get Ready for the Next Round.
• Scoring
• Your Ants
  • 1 Soldier
  • 3 Workers
  • 2 Scouts

Setup

1. Shuffle the picnic cards into a face-up deck. Draw cards from the deck and place them face up in the middle of the table to create the picnic area as shown, based on the number of players (2 players: 5 cards; 3 players: 7 cards; 4 players: 9 cards). Leave enough space between the picnic cards so that even the largest die could fit between them easily without touching either card.

   Then place the deck along with the Puddle card nearby where they won't get in the way of dice rolls.

2. Each player picks a color. Take the anthill card in your color and place it in front of yourself. (The flower indicates the player color.)

   Put all six ant dice in your color on your anthill: 1 Soldier, 3 Workers, 2 Scouts.

3. Place the Majority card away from the picnic area. Shuffle the other Scoring cards and deal some face up next to the Majority card: use 1 more than the number of players. Return all others to the box.

   Mix the Reward tokens face down, then randomly place one face up on each of the Scoring cards, and six on the Majority card. Return all leftover Reward tokens to the box.

   The Tie tokens won't be needed until the end of the game; make a pile of them off to the side.

4. Shuffle the Round cards face down and deal 5 of them face down into a pile near the Scoring cards. Return any leftovers to the box. Make a supply of the Action tokens near the Round card pile.

   The oldest player will be the starting player in the first round. You are ready to begin!

Playing with very young kids? Ditch the Scoring cards and only use the Majority card!

Gameplay

Problem Picnic lasts six rounds. Each round has three parts:

1. Send Out the Ants!
2. Bring Back the Food!
3. Get Ready for the Next Round.

1) Send Out the Ants!

Turns go clockwise around the table. On your turn, if you have any dice left on your anthill, you must pick one and toss it into the picnic area. You want your dice to land on cards that you hope to collect!

• When rolling, your hand is not allowed to get too close to the cards; keep your hand at least the width of a card away from the picnic area!
• You may pick whichever one of your dice that you want; Scout, Worker, or Soldier. Each type of ant works differently; see Your Ants for details.
• Dice must be rolled or tossed, not slid or flicked.
• You might knock other dice, cards, or tokens around with your roll. This is allowed... smash away! Stuff stays where it lands.

Example: Purple plates are valuable this game, so you select a Worker die, aim for the purple cookie plate, and toss! Nice shot, you landed on it with 3 ants showing! Hopefully you'll still be in position to collect it by the end of the round!

If you have no dice left when your turn comes around, the turn order skips you and continues onward until all players have run out of dice to roll. Some players might get more turns because they started the round with more dice; this is normal!

2) Bring Back the Food!

Once all players have run out of dice, follow these steps in order:

1. Return all dice that are on the Puddle card (if any) and any loose dice that are not touching picnic cards to their owners' anthills.

2. Resolve each picnic card that has any dice touching it, one card at a time. The player with highest value of ants on, touching, or overlapping the card wins it.

   • If any dice are touching more than one card, their owners (in turn order) should move them so that they are only touching one card each.

   Example: Magenta's dice on this card show 6 ants total. Green's dice show 4 ants total. Magenta wins the card!

   • If there is a tie for highest ant value, the winner is the tied player with more dice on the card. If it's still a tie, the tied player with the biggest die (Soldier > Worker > Scout) is the winner. If it's still a tie, there is no winner.
   • Return any dice on the card that aren't the winner's to their owner's anthill.
   • Move all of the winner's dice on the card to the Puddle card; they'll be unavailable for the next round. (The only exception to this is a Soldier die; it is returned to the winner's anthill.) The winner then collects the picnic card.

   Non-winners go home. Winners go to the Puddle... except for winning Soldiers, which go home.

3. Once you have collected all of the cards you won this round, you must add them to your colony in any order you choose. (Your very first card is just placed on the table in front of you to begin your colony.) After the first card, place cards so that the plate on the new card covers one of the visible ants in your colony.

   Example: You've already got a few plates in your colony, and you've collected a new card. Rotate it any way you want and place it so the plate covers a circled ant.

   • You may rotate the card 180° or 90° in either direction before adding it.
   • Once placed, cards in your colony may not be moved.
   • You may not place in a way that covers earlier plates from view.
   • You will want to place collected cards in such a way that they help you win the Scoring card Rewards; see Scoring for details.

3) Get Ready for the Next Round.

Lay out new picnic cards. If there are any missing picnic cards, draw fresh ones from the draw pile and fill the gaps so that the picnic area is the same shape it was at the start of the game.

Example: Two cards were collected in the previous round, so they are replaced now.

Who is the new starting player? The new starting player is the one that has the fewest plates in their colony.

If this is a tie, then the tied player with fewer dice on their anthill is the starting player. If that's still a tie, the tied players roll all the dice from their anthills and the player with the higher ant total is the starting player.

The starting player now must take the top Round card from the pile. (If there are no Round cards left to draw, the game is over; proceed to Scoring.) The player reveals the Round card to everyone; each Round card provides a unique power that its owner can use later.

Round cards. The Round cards act as the game's timer, and also give their owner a cool bonus power. Save your Round cards until you want to use them; each card tells you when you are allowed to use it. Using a Round card on your turn does not replace your turn, you do still get to roll a die as usual (either before or after you play the Round card). To play a Round card, simply follow the instructions on the card, then return the card to the box.

Some Round cards need specific Action tokens to resolve their powers. Take the tokens you need from the pile as necessary.

After all this is complete, (and if the game didn't end due to lack of Round cards for the starting player to draw), begin a new round.

Scoring

After the sixth round, the game ends and scores are tallied! Scoring in each game is different depending on which Scoring cards are in play, and how the Reward tokens were distributed.

For each Reward token, the single player who achieves that goal earns that token. If there is a tie to win the token, discard the token and give each tied player a Tie token worth 3 points.

The Majority card's tokens are won by the players who collected the most of the different foods and plate colors. For example in this game, the player who has the most:

• Watermelons earns 5 pts.
• Sandwiches earns 6 pts.
• Cookies earns 5 pts.
• Blue plates earns 7 pts.
• Green plates earns 4 pts.
• Purple plates earns 5 pts.

Each of the other Scoring cards tells you exactly what must be achieved for a player to win its token... for example, this card's 6-point Reward token goes to the player who has the most lines with exactly 1 of each food.

If this was your colony at the end of the game, you'd have 2 lines with exactly 1 of each food. If no other colony had more such lines than yours, you'd win the Reward token and its 6 points!

• Some Scoring cards refer to "lines". A line is a horizontal row or vertical column of plates. There can be gaps in a line, and all the plates in it still count as being in the line.
• Some Scoring cards refer to plates "touching" or being "connected". Two plates are only touching or connected if they are horizontally or vertically adjacent; not diagonal.

Once all Rewards have been resolved, each player tallies up their points. The player with the most points wins! (If it's a tie, all tied players share the victory!)

Your Ants

There are three types of dice, representing your three types of ants:

1 Soldier

Your Soldier is bigger and bulkier than other ants, which means that it's perfect for knocking other ants out of the way. It's not the greatest at collecting food, but it has an additional special ability: A Soldier does not go to the Puddle when it is involved with collecting a picnic card; send it right back to your anthill instead!

3 Workers

Your three Workers have no special abilities, but they are the best at collecting food since they have higher ant totals on their faces than the other dice.

2 Scouts

Your two Scouts are decent collectors but they are small and easily knocked around by the other bigger dice. They have a unique special ability too: When you roll a Scout, if it touches no other dice during the roll and does not come to rest touching a picnic card, you may immediately retrieve it and roll it again (one time per turn).