Wingspan Pocket Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• For Your First Game, You'll Need
• Setup
• Overview
• Nest Action 1: Play a Bird
• Reading Bird Cards
• Nest Action 2: Draw 2 Cards
  • When a Food Deck Empties
• Reading Food Cards
• Nest Action 3: Lay 3 Eggs
• Activating Bird Powers
• End of Turn
• Bird Powers Reference
• End of Game and Scoring

For Your First Game, You'll Need

• All double-sided bird/food cards
• 1 Nest/scoring card per player
• 1 player aid per player
• The first player card
• All egg tokens
• 1 player token per player

For ADVANCED players: the goal display and double-sided goal cards.

For SOLO players: components listed in the Automa rulebook.

Replacement parts can be requested on the form at stonemaiergames.com/replacement-parts.

Setup

Ignore ADVANCED rules if this is any player's first game.

1. Shuffle the double-sided bird/food cards (shuffle them food-side up). Deal 6 cards to each player in a pile; set them aside until step H.
2. Form the Supply:
   • A. Divide the rest of the bird/food cards into 4 roughly equal decks (food-side up) and place them within reach of all players.
   • B. Flip over the top card of each food deck and place them bird-side up next to their decks.
   • C. Leave room for a single discard pile.
   • D. Place the eggs where all players can reach them.
3. ADVANCED: Place the goal display where all players can see it. Randomly select 2 goal cards and place them, either side up, on the goal display. Return the rest of the goal cards to the box.
4. Each player:
   • E. gains a Nest card to begin their Flock (the single row of cards that will later include bird cards you play);
   • F. gains 1 player token;
   • G. gains 1 egg and adds it to their Nest;
   • H. flips the top 2 of their 6 food cards to the bird side, then arranges them beneath their Flock to form their Reserve. The card order in the Reserve doesn't matter—you may sort them as you like.
     • ADVANCED: Each player may choose which 4 cards are food and which 2 cards are birds.
5. Randomly select the first player. They gain the first player card and may now take the first turn.

Overview

On your turn:

1. Take one Nest action (play a bird / draw 2 cards / lay 3 eggs).
2. Activate brown powers on birds in your Flock, left to right.
3. Refill birds in the supply, if needed.

Play continues clockwise until a player has 6 birds in their Flock. When all players have taken an equal number of turns, count your points. The player with the most points wins.

That's most of what you need to start playing; the rest of this rulebook describes each step in more detail.

Nest Action 1: Play a Bird

Play a bird from your Reserve, paying its cost. Add the bird to the right of your Flock. The cost of a bird is the egg and/or food shown in the upper left of the card.

Your Flock is your Nest card and all played bird cards to the right of it.

• Food cost: Pay by discarding food cards from your Reserve to the discard pile, food-side up. If a cost includes the any-food icon, you may use 1 card of any type of food for that cost.
• Food conversion: When playing a bird, you may use any 2 food cards as 1 food (in case you don't have the exact type of food needed).
• Egg cost: Pay by discarding an egg from your Nest or from a bird in your Flock. (Eggs are not food, so the 2-for-1 conversion does not apply to egg costs.)

Reading Bird Cards

Each bird has the following information:

• Cost: Discard the listed food and egg when you play this bird.
• Points: Score at game end if this bird is in your Flock.
• Egg limit: The maximum number of eggs that can be on this bird at one time.
• Wingspan: Other birds may hunt for birds of a certain size. They're referring to this number.
• Power: You may take this action every turn, including the turn you play this bird (see Bird Powers Reference on page 10).

Food icons used on cards: invertebrate, seed, fish, fruit, rodent.

Nest Action 2: Draw 2 Cards

Gain 2 cards from the Supply and add them to your Reserve. You may gain 2 birds from the face-up birds, 2 food from the top of the food decks, or 1 of each. When you gain a card, you must keep it face-up in the way you gained it (don't change it from food to bird, or vice versa).

• Food refills as you gain it, because the cards are in decks. You may draw from the same deck more than once.
• At the end of your turn, refill the bird Supply by flipping over the top card from the adjacent food deck.
• There is no limit to the number of cards in your Reserve.

OPTIONAL: At any time while drawing cards, if 3 or more food cards in the Supply are exactly the same, you may discard all matching cards at once.

When a Food Deck Empties

When a food deck is empty, take the bottom half of the discard pile (or the bottom half of the largest food deck if there is no discard pile), shuffle it, and use it as the new food deck. Do this immediately if a deck runs out in the middle of your turn. "Half" can be approximate.

Any time you gain cards, place them in your Reserve. You must keep cards face-up in the way that you gain them: you can't flip cards from food to bird or from bird to food. Keeping them on the table will prevent confusion over which way is up! However, you may arrange the cards in your Reserve in any order you like (e.g., all food cards together).

Reading Food Cards

Each food card is worth 1 food.

• Bird powers with "gain a specific food" or "gain any food" benefits allow you to choose any food card from the Supply showing that food.
• Regardless of how you gained it, if a card shows 2 types of food, you may spend it as either of those types (e.g., a card showing fruit/seed can be spent as either a fruit OR a seed, not both).

Nest Action 3: Lay 3 Eggs

Lay up to 3 eggs, placing each on a different card (bird or Nest) that has not reached its egg limit. A bird can hold, at most, the number of eggs shown on its card. Likewise, your Nest card can hold up to 3 eggs.

If you do not have 3 different cards with space for eggs, you may still choose this option, placing fewer eggs. Once you place an egg, you can pay it as a cost, but you cannot move it to a different card.

In the rare case there are no available egg tokens, please use a suitable replacement.

Activating Bird Powers

After you have completed a Nest action, move through your Flock from left to right, activating each bird with a brown power (see Bird Powers Reference on the next page).

• You may activate all birds with brown powers in your Flock, including the bird you played on this turn.
• All powers are optional: You may choose to skip any bird you do not wish to activate this turn. For birds that affect other players, skipping also means the bird does not benefit other players.
• Player tokens: Place your player token on the bird you are currently activating as you move through your Flock.

Green bird powers are permanent powers that are active during your whole turn. They are effective immediately after you play the bird. They can include cost reductions when playing a bird or allow you to use a specific food as any food type.

When moving through your Flock to activate birds with brown powers, simply skip any birds with green powers.

End of Turn

When you reach the rightmost card of your Flock, your turn ends. Return your player token to your Nest. If needed, refill the bird supply from the adjacent food decks. Play continues clockwise with the next player.

Bird Powers Reference

Powers with a brown background may be used one by one on each turn by moving through your Flock from left to right.

• If 2 icons are connected by an arrow, you must fulfill the requirement before the arrow to gain the benefit shown after the arrow.
• If a card shows 2 actions with no arrow, they are not connected. You may do either or both actions in any order.
• Draw a card to your Reserve — icons shown: any card, any bird, any food, specific food.
  • Powers that draw specific food: You may draw any top card showing that food (including one with 2 food options).
  • Powers that draw birds with specific food: The bird needs to have that food (the any-food icon does not count).
• Tuck a card from your Reserve (1 point): If you have the depicted type of card in your Reserve (e.g., a Rodent food card), you may tuck one card behind this bird. You may only tuck one card at a time, but there is no limit on how many tucked cards you can accumulate.
• Hunt for a bird: Look at the top card of any food deck. If the bird on the back has a wingspan less than what's shown in this power, tuck it behind this bird; otherwise, discard it.
• Lay an egg (1 point): Add 1 egg to your card (Nest or bird) that has not yet reached its egg limit.
• Discard: Discard 1 egg from your Nest or any of your birds or discard a card (note whether it's a specific type) from your Reserve. Place all discarded cards food-side up in the discard pile.
• All players gain the benefit (including you). If it says "From 1 deck," all players draw 1 card from the deck of your choice, in turn order. You choose who goes first.
• Copy a brown power: Carry out the action as if this card is the copied card, for this turn.

Powers with a green background are active during your whole turn. They change the cost of other birds or other birds' powers. These powers are effective immediately after a bird is played.

• Ignore 1 [food type] in bird costs: If a bird has this type of food in its food cost, you may pay 1 fewer of that food than it specifies. For example, for a 3-rodent bird you would now spend 2 rodents. You may not use this power to ignore the any-food icon in food costs.
• Use [food type] as [food type] when playing birds: You may spend this type of food as though it is any type of food in a bird's cost. For example, for a 3-rodent bird you could spend 2 fish and 1 rodent.
• [Food type] in powers are any food: Bird powers that refer to this specific food now equate to any food. For example, a power that draws a fruit would now draw any food.
• Copy a green power in any Flock: When using this bird power, choose the Flock of any other player. Copy 1 green bird power in that Flock.

End of Game and Scoring

Play continues until a player reaches 6 birds in their Flock.

When refilling an empty food deck, in the rare instance that there is no discard pile and the other food decks each have only 1 or 2 cards remaining, trigger the end of the game and follow the steps below.

From that point:

• The player finishes their turn.
• If that player was not the last player in turn order, players continue taking turns until each player has had the same number of turns.

Flip your Nest card to count your points:

• Bird cards in your Flock each have a printed point value.
• Egg tokens are worth 1 point each.
• Tucked cards are worth 1 point each.
• ADVANCED: Goal cards are worth 1 point per egg on specific types of birds. The same egg can potentially count towards both goal cards.

The player with the most points wins. In a tie, the player with the most cards remaining in their Reserve wins. In a further tie, players share the victory.

© 2026 Stonemaier LLC. Wingspan Pocket is a trademark of Stonemaier LLC. All Rights Reserved.