Sleep Tight Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Components
• Goal
• Setup
• Playing a Round
  • 1. Draw Dreamscapes and Take Soul Fragments
  • 2. Draw Actions
  • 3. Play Actions Facedown
    • Dreamscapes Can Change Fragment Requirements
    • The Action Type
    • Reducing Fragment Requirements by Discarding Cards
  • 4. Resolve Actions and the Sandman Card
• Dreamscapes and Dreams
• Special Cards
  • Playing as an Undercover Agent
  • Playing as an Exposed Agent
• Card Symbols
• Card Examples

Components

• Action: 40 cards
• Dreamscape: 28 cards
• Sandman: 28 cards
• Soul Fragments: 26 tokens

Goal

There are two ways to win:

1. Kill the Sandman. If the Sandman deck is empty, all the players win. If you prefer to have one winner in this case, the winner is the player with most Soul Fragments. (The nightmare ends, and everyone wakes up.)
2. Escape the nightmare. If a player has 10 Soul Fragments and plays the Wake Up! card (alarm-clock icon), that player wins and the other players lose. (The dream collapses, leaving the other players to be consumed by the Sandman.)

There are two ways to lose:

1. Everyone dies. If every player dies by reaching 0 Soul Fragments, the players lose. (They die and are completely consumed by the Sandman.)
2. The nightmare traps you. If the Dreamscape deck is empty, the players lose. (The kids are trapped in their dreams and can't wake up anymore.)

Setup

1. If you are playing with fewer than 4 players, remove Sandman, and Dreamscape cards marked with the symbols shown below.
   • ③ Remove these cards if playing with 2 players. Keep them if playing with 3 or 4 players.
   • ④ Remove these cards if playing with 2 or 3 players. Keep them if playing with 4 players.
2. Shuffle the Sandman, Dreamscape, and Action decks.
3. Collect the 26 Soul Fragments into a pile. Each player takes 3 Soul Fragments.
4. Each player draws 7 Action cards, chooses 4 cards to keep, and returns the other 3 cards to the Action deck. Then, shuffle the Action deck.
5. Decide who will take the First Player token this turn. The First Player has precedence in drawing the action cards and they draw the Sandman card (see page 8). Every turn the next player on the left becomes the First Player.

Playing a Round

1. Draw Dreamscapes and Take Soul Fragments

Each player draws 1 Dreamscape card, reveals it, and places it in front of themself. Each player takes Soul Fragments from the pile equal to the number shown in the bottom-right corner of their own Dreamscape card.

Note: There are only 26 Soul Fragments in the game, so when there are no more Soul Fragments left on the table, the only way to earn more is to steal from other players or to wait that some player lose them and return them on the table. Only on the first turn the Soul Fragments are not picked but the rules of the card still applies.

2. Draw Actions

Each player draws 1 Action card. (If the Action deck is ever empty, shuffle its shared discard pile to reform the deck.)

At any time in this phase, each player may return Soul Fragments to the pile to draw more Action cards, up to the number of Fragments listed on their Dreamscape. For each Soul Fragment you return, you draw 1 Action card.

3. Play Actions Facedown

At the same time, all the players play any number of Action cards from their hand facedown in front of themselves.

Each Action card requires the player to have some number of Soul Fragments, as listed in its top-right corner. (You do not spend these Soul Fragments.)

At any time in this phase, players may discard Action cards from their hand to take Soul Fragments from the pile. For each Action card you discard, you take 1 Soul Fragment from the pile. You cannot discard Action cards in this way if you would have 7 or more Soul Fragments after the exchange.

Dreamscapes Can Change Fragment Requirements

Dreamscapes can make some types of Action cards require more or fewer Soul Fragments.

For example, while in this Dreamscape, all Run cards require double the Soul Fragments to play.

The Action Type

Each Action card shows its action type:

• Hide
• Attack
• Run
• Collect

Reducing Fragment Requirements by Discarding Cards

You can reduce the Soul Fragment requirement of an Action card by discarding a second card with it.

During phase 4, you can play 2 Action cards at once, stacking the top card face down and the bottom card face up. Doing this reduces the Soul Fragments requirement shown of the top card by the requirement shown on the bottom card. (The printed rule says "phase 4"; the stacking happens while Actions are played facedown in phase 3, so the phase number is given here as printed.)

For example, you want to play a card that requires 3 Soul Fragments, but you have only 1 Soul Fragment. You stack a card below it that only requires 2 Soul Fragments, which reduces the requirement of the top card to 1 Soul Fragment.

Apply this rule with 3+ players.

4. Resolve Actions and the Sandman Card

All the players reveal their Action facedown cards, and any player draws 1 Sandman card and reveals it.

First, discard cards if prompted. Some Action cards will discard others.

Then, resolve the Sandman card. This card damages the players as follows. Each player loses 1 Soul Fragment, and each player in a dream matching any dreams shown on the Sandman card loses an extra Soul Fragment. (The Sandman is never present in limbo dreams.) Some Action cards can prevent or divert this damage.

Finally, resolve the other Action cards. The effect of each card is listed at its bottom. Adjust the number of your tokens for the next turn accordingly.

After resolving all the cards, the round ends.

In this example, the Hell Pig is lurking in dreams of desolation and shadows.

Each player in a dream of desolation or shadows will lose 2 Soul Fragments rather than 1 Soul Fragment.

Dreamscapes and Dreams

Each Dreamscape shows one of five dreams. In each, the Sandman and his vile helpers will try to consume the players' Soul Fragments.

• Cold (the cold touch of being scared in your nightmares)
• Shadow (the reappearing of familiar faces and locations that frighten)
• Darkness (being lost in a nightmare, breathing heavily to resurface from darkness)
• Desolation (the ruins of the world, the deep fears of destruction come alive)
• Limbo (some kind of heaven where the Sandman is not so influential)

Make the Game a Little Easier: To avoid getting the Soul Consumer card early in the game, we suggest cutting the Sandman deck in two decks and adding the Soul Consumer card to the bottom one before stacking them together. This will make the beginning of the game easier. However, the game will statistically be more challenging later on.

Special Cards

"I Am the Sandman" — When you draw this card, you may choose to immediately refuse the Sandman's offer. Lose 1 Soul Fragment, reveal this card, return it to the Action deck, and shuffle the deck. You cannot refuse the offer if you only have 1 Soul Fragment left.

If you do not refuse the card, you become an undercover Sandman agent. (You want to offer a sacrifice to the Sandman, redeeming your life and waking up as a prize.)

Playing as an Undercover Agent

You can no longer win by escaping the nightmare, and you lose if the Sandman dies. Now, you win and the other players lose if you kill a player by reducing them to 0 Soul Fragments. You must deliver the killing blow by stealing a Soul Fragment or passing damage. (The other players may try to deduce who the undercover agent is if they suspect one.)

Most of the normal rules still apply to you. You can take damage and die, gain Soul Fragments, play Action cards, and damage the Sandman.

At the start of any round as an undercover agent, you can play the I Am the Sandman card to become an exposed Sandman agent.

Playing as an Exposed Agent

You can no longer win by escaping the nightmare, and you lose if the Sandman dies. Now, you win and the other players lose if all of the other players die. You do not need to deliver the killing blow. (This is a dangerous situation, and the exposed player must have planned their strategy in advance.)

From now on:

• The Sandman does not damage you.
• Whenever you would damage the Sandman, you instead damage a player of your choice.
• Whenever another player damages the Sandman, they also damage you in equal amount.
• You cannot discard Action cards during phase 3 to gain Soul Fragments. Instead, you can discard Action cards to deal 1 damage to any player per card discarded.

"Where Is The Sandman" — When you play this card, the playing holding the I Am the Sandman card in their hand, if any, must reveal it and become an exposed Sandman agent. (This player not be ready to reveal, making them easy prey.) Then, remove the Where Is the Sandman card from play forever, whether or not a player revealed the I Am the Sandman card.

"Soul Consumer" — When this card is revealed, all other cards fail, and each player takes damage equal to the sum of the Soul Fragment requirements of all the Action cards she played. For example, if he played 3 cards that required a total of 5 Soul Fragments, he loses 5 Soul Fragments.

However, if any player has the Discard Soul Consumer card in their hand, they can use it instantly after the Soul Consumer is revealed, canceling its effect.

Card Symbols

• Draw 1 Action card.
• You must play this card face up at the start of your turn.
• Affects another player.
• You take one random card from the affected player's hand.
• Discard the Sandman's Soul Consumer card if it is played (see page 12).
• You cannot play any other cards this turn, but you cannot be affected by any other effects this turn, and you cannot be damaged by the Sandman this turn.
• This card affects the player to your right or left. In a two-player game, either symbol affects the other player.
• You return 1 Soul Fragment, and the Sandman shuffles 1 random card from his discard pile into his deck. Alternatively, you can deal all the damage you would take to another player, as shown by the arrows on the card.
• Discard 1 Sandman card.
• Affects every player except you.
• Discard all played actions of the shown type. They have no effect.
• Take this number of Soul Fragments from the pile. If the "affects another player" symbol is shown, you may instead take this number of Soul Fragments from another player.
• Wake Up! If you have 10 Soul Fragments you can use this card at any moment to wake up and win the game alone.
• Prevent this amount of damage to you dealt by the Sandman.
• Affected player must show you their hand and you take any card you want.
• Prevent this amount of damage to you dealt by other players.

Card Examples

• Draw 2 Action cards. You must play this card at the start of the turn.
• Discard 3 Sandman cards and take 1 Soul Fragment from the pile.
• All Action cards have no effect. Because this is a Sandman card, each player also loses 1 Soul Fragment. (Check the Sandman card rules and description.)
• This turn, the Sandman damages the player to your left, not you.
• All actions played against you by other players fail.
• Draw 3 Action cards, and then shuffle 2 Action cards back into the deck. (They do not need to be from the cards you drew.)