Whirly Derby
Whirly Derby Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Objective
To win, own marbles that place in the top three in each race, so you can collect point-scoring trophies.
Setup
- Place the speedway in the centre of the table.
- Each player chooses a colour and takes the corresponding paddock, marbles and reload token. Place the reload token with the number 2 side face up. Put your 5 racing marbles in your paddock.
- Shuffle the trophy cards, place the deck face down on the table, and flip 3 cards face up to form the prize pool.
- Lay out the 8 basic race tokens with the red traffic light side face up, then flip one over to the green flag side to begin.
Playing a Race
Each player secretly chooses a number of their marbles to race. You must always enter at least 1 marble if you can.
Once everyone has chosen, reveal your marbles together and place them all in the launcher. It's time to race! Pour the marbles into the outer edge of the speedway and cheer on your team.
The top 3 finishers get to pick a trophy card, starting with first place. A trophy's points are marked in the top left corner.
The player who came dead last gets to return that marble to their paddock. All the other marbles that raced are put back in the box — for now.
Twice per game, you may use your reload token to buy back all the marbles you've raced. The first time, flip it to the 1 side. The second time, discard it.
After the race, reveal 3 new prize cards, flip over the next race token, and go again. If you ever run out of both marbles and reloads, you'll have to sit that race out.
Game End
After 8 races are complete, the player with the most points wins! In the case of a tie, have a 1-marble race-off.
Advanced Rules: The Thunderball
There's also an advanced rule set for pro racers — for this you'll need the Thunderball.
On setup, place 2 standard race tokens down first, then hide the 2 Thunderball tokens at random among the next 6.
When a Thunderball token is flipped, the player with the fewest points takes the Thunderball. If that's tied, it goes to whoever has the fewest marbles.
The Thunderball's owner can enter it into any race just once before returning it to the paddock. If another Thunderball token is flipped before they do, too bad — whoever has the fewest points takes it off them.
When you use the Thunderball, you must also enter at least 1 normal marble into that race.
The Thunderball blocks the speedway, and the more marbles it stops, the more cards its owner takes from the top of the trophy deck.
If any marbles make it to the end, the top 3 get to take a trophy as normal. There's no last-place bonus in a Thunderball race.
Trophy Card Bonuses
Trophy cards also carry icons on the bottom that boost your score at game end:
- Whoever has the most cactus trophies gets 15 points.
- The lava lamp trophy scores extra the more of them you have.
- Collecting a donut, a cheese and a jelly trophy together gives you 30 points.