USPS: The Great American Mail Race Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Aim
• Set Up
• Play
  • Transport Cards
  • Travel
  • Traveling Rules
  • 2. Picking Up Mail
• Delivering Mail
• Delivery Assistance
• Postcards
• End of the Game
• Scoring
• Winning
• Key to Transport Cards
• Contents

Aim

To deliver the most mail and collect the most points by the time the Transport Cards run out.

Set Up

1. Take everything out and set up the board:
   • Place the Delivery Cards from the four regions (West, Midwest, South, Northeast) plus the Postcards nearby.
   • Place the Transport Cards: Levels 1, 2 and 3.
   • Place the Delivery Trucks x4 and Mail Cubes x4.
   • Place the Bicycle Cards x4.
   • Place the Mailboxes x4 (pop these out of the punchboard and slot the mailboxes into the clear plastic bases).
   • Place the Ink stamp.
   • Place the Postcard Token.
   • Place the Delivery Slips.
2. Each Mail Carrier (that's all players) tears off a Delivery Slip.
3. Choose a Delivery Truck and Bicycle Transport Card of the same color. (You keep your Bicycle Card throughout the game.) The color you pick represents your 'hometown': BLUE is Nibley, PINK is Castle Danger, GREY is Waterproof and GREEN is Frackville. If you pick up mail from your Hometown and successfully deliver it, you get bonus points.
4. Place all the Delivery Trucks on the starting location.
5. Separate the Transport Cards into their levels: 1, 2 and 3. Shuffle each deck separately, and then stack them so that Level 3 cards are at the bottom, Level 2 in the middle and Level 1 cards are at the top. Deal out the top three cards, face-up, like this.
6. Separate the Delivery Cards into Postcards and General Mail. General Mail is split into four decks: West/Bear, Midwest/Wolf, South/Buffalo and Northeast/Eagle. The postage stamp on each card indicates the region it is from. Place the five decks above the board.
7. Move a Postcard to the board and place the Postcard Token on the correct location on the map.
8. Turn over a Delivery Card from each of the four regions and place them on the board along with the corresponding Mailbox on top of each card. Place a Mail Cube on the depot on the map of the same color. Depots are marked with an animal head.

Now you're ready to deliver the goods!

Play

If you were the last person to send some mail, you go first. On your turn you can make 3 Actions in this order: take Transport Cards (costs 1 Action for each card taken), use your Transport Cards to move around the board (costs 1 Action for each card used).

Here are the possible combinations:

Transport Cards

• Take 0 cards
• Take 1 card
• Take 2 cards
• Take 3 cards

Travel Moves

• Use 3 cards from your hand
• Use 2 cards from your hand
• Use 1 card from your hand
• Use 0 cards from your hand

Transport Cards

Each time a Transport Card is taken from the three face-up on the table, it is replaced by a new card from the deck. If you don't want any of the three Transport Cards on offer, you can blind pick one from the top of the deck.

Travel

If you have any Actions remaining after taking the Transport Cards you wanted, you can use them to play Transport Cards and move your truck around the board. Once played, the Transport Card is discarded, unless it was a bicycle.

The Bicycle Card is the only Transport Card that can be used more than once in a single turn. It can be used a maximum of two times.

Bicycle Card — On your turn make 3 actions:

Draw	Play
0 cards	3 cards
1 card	2 cards
2 cards	1 card
3 cards	0 cards

Bicycle Card can be used twice per turn. Never discard.

Traveling Rules

1. Each mode of transport moves in a different way. (See: Key To Transport Cards below.)
2. You must travel the exact number of spaces your Transport Card indicates.
3. You cannot double back or retrace your path on that turn.
4. You cannot end your turn on a location if it is occupied by another player.
5. If you pass through a location that is occupied, you can 'assist' them. (See Delivery Assistance)

2. Picking Up Mail

In order to pick up a delivery, you must land on the depot, not pass through it.

After picking up a delivery, put the Mail Cube in your van, take the Delivery Card from the board and place the same-colored Mailbox on the destination location. You can carry a maximum of two Mail Cubes at one time.

Delivering Mail

1. To deliver mail, you must land on the destination, not pass through it.
2. Once delivered, turn over the Delivery Card to the 'Delivered' side.
3. It's time to stamp your Delivery Slip! First, stamp the letter or parcel symbol, and then stamp the region your delivery came from (the animal symbol on the card will guide you): West, Midwest, South or Northeast. You can only stamp a region once. Finally, check for any of these one-off bonuses:

Same Day — You picked up and made your delivery in one turn. (If you acquired the mail by 'assisting' another player, you cannot claim this bonus.)

Hometown — Your delivery was picked up from your hometown.

Fragile — You delivered a 'fragile' parcel without using any air transport.

Draw a new Delivery Card from the deck (make sure it's from the same region as the one you delivered) and place it on the board with the mailbox on top. Place the correctly colored Mail Cube on the matching depot on the board.

Delivery Assistance

As you travel around the map, you may pass through a location occupied by a fellow Mail Carrier.

If you do, you can choose to 'assist' them by taking one of their deliveries or giving them one of yours. (After all, what are colleagues for?) Remember to take their Mail Cube and Delivery Card or give them yours.

If they pass through your location on a future turn, they might want to 'assist' you in return... so watch out!

Postcards

Postcards don't need to be delivered. Just pick one up by landing on (or traveling over) a Postcard Token. Now take the Postcard from the board and stamp the icon on your Delivery Slip. Draw a new Postcard from the deck and place the Postcard Token on that new location on the board.

End of the Game

The game ends when the Transport Deck runs out – so keep an eye on it throughout the game. Once the final Transport Card has been turned over, every player (including the player who turned over the final Transport Card) gets one last turn.

Scoring

Add up the points on your Delivery Slip as follows:

The most recently stamped letter, parcel and postcard shows the points you've accumulated.

Letters: 2 / 6 / 12 / 20

Parcels: 4 / 10 / 18 / 30

Postcards: 1 / 2 / 10 / 15

Check for any letter + parcel + postcard combos. Add 5 points for each combo. (Combo thresholds: +5 / +5 / +5 / +5.)

Count up the number of regions you stamped. 1 region = 1 point, 2 regions = 2 points, 3 regions = 5 points, 4 regions = 10 points.

Add up any bonuses: Same Day +2, Hometown +2, Fragile +2, Fragile +4.

Take 3 points off your total score for any undelivered letters or parcels in your van.

Winning

The player with the most points at the end of the game is crowned Mail Carrier of the Century. Permission to carry that person around on your shoulders like a sack of mail.

Key to Transport Cards

Icon key: wheel = travel by road only; cactus = travel by trail only; wheel + cactus = travel by trails or road only; droplet = travel by water; rail = travel to any station; cloud = travel by air.

Bicycle — Travel on roads only, 1 move. In St. Petersburg, Florida, mail carriers still ride their signature steel yellow bikes made by Worksman Cycles, NYC, since 1917.

Motor Bike — Travel on roads only, 2 moves. Special Delivery messengers often used motorcycles. In 1920, the U.S. War Department transferred 1,087 standard-design motorcycles to the Post Office Department.

Van — Travel on roads only, 3 moves. USPS operates a fleet of 37,391 alternative fuel capable vans. Most use ethanol, electricity or compressed natural gas to keep things green.

Mule — Travel on trails only, 1 move. Mules with mail still travel switchbacks to the bottom of the Grand Canyon, 3,000 feet below. This is the last mule mail route in the United States.

Pony Express — Travel on trails only, 2 moves. In 1860, the Pony Express began running mail between Missouri and California, taking half the time of regular mail.

4x4 — Travel on trails or roads only, 3 moves. In August 1953, the first postal Jeeps rolled out. They were all right-hand drive so the carrier could reach the mailbox without getting out.

Mail Jump — Travel on water only, 1 move. Still in operation to this day, a Mail Jumper hops off a moving boat, runs to the mailbox, delivers the mail, and then runs back and dives onto the boat before it leaves. Sometimes they fall in!

Steam Boat — Travel on water only, 2 moves. In 1848, steamboats began carrying U.S. Mail from New York to California via Panama. This was before the construction of the canal, so mail was taken off and transported 50 miles by canoes or pack animals to steamboats waiting at the Pacific coast.

Sea Plane — Fly from any water to any shore airport. Ten times a day, an Alaskan pilot would load the 1939 Grumman Goose, an amphibious seaplane, with mail, and battle through freezing weather on his 30-mile flight to Akutan.

Hot-Air Balloon — Fly over 1 location via roads. On August 17, 1859, balloonist John Wise took his 233rd voyage in his balloon named Jupiter. He flew 25 miles from Lafayette, IN to Crawfordsville, IN, carrying 123 letters and 23 circulars, the first air mail delivery.

Plane — Fly from any airport to any other airport. The first regular air mail pilots in the U.S. were Army Air Service pilots who flew between Washington, D.C., Philadelphia and New York.

Rocket — Fly from any airport to any location. In 1959, the first official missile mail flight occurred. A rocket carrying 3,000 letters was fired from a Navy submarine (on which a branch Post Office was temporarily created) to Mayport, Florida, 100 miles away.

Train — Travel from any train station to any other train station. The first delivery by rail was in 1832. By 1930, over 10,000 trains were transporting mail. But planes soon took over, and by 1970 almost no mail was delivered by rail.

Contents

• 98 cards
• 4 mail cubes
• 4 van pieces
• 4 mailboxes
• 4 bases
• 1 postcard token
• 1 board
• 1 ink stamp
• 1 envelope
• 1 scorepad (50 sheets)
• 1 potato sticker