Living Forest

1.Setup

• 2 to 4 players, ages 10 and up.
• The Circle of Spirits goes in the middle, with a value-2 Fire at its centre; beside it, the Guardian Animal board, the Fire Varan board and the Tree dispensers.
• Each player takes their Forest board, with the starting Protective Tree in the centre, their Spirit standee, their 14 starting Guardian Animal cards, shuffled into a face-down draw pile to the right of their Forest, and their 3 Victory tiles (Fire, Sacred Flower, Tree), to the left.
• The other Guardian Animals form three piles by level; reveal the first 4 cards of each to form the reserve. Sort the Fire tiles by value (2, 3 and 4); the Fragment tiles and the Fire Varan cards each form a pile.
• Arrange the Protective Trees by increasing cost. With three players, remove one copy of each Tree costing 3, 4 and 5, that is 6 tiles; with two, two copies of each of those Trees and one of each Tree costing 6, 7 and 8, that is 15 tiles.
• The first player, chosen at random, receives the Sacred Tree; the standees start on the rocks marked for the number of players, in turn order.

2.How to play

• Each round has three phases: Guardian Animals, Action, then end of round.
• Guardian Animals: all at the same time, each player turns over the cards of their draw pile one by one to form their Help Line, and stops whenever they like. On the third solitary symbol, they must stop; each gregarious symbol cancels a solitary one. An empty draw pile is rebuilt from your discard pile at the moment you want to draw.
• Fire Varan cards count as solitary animals and bring nothing else. Discarding a Fragment tile sends the Varan you have just turned over back to its pile, or sends the animal you have just turned over to your discard pile; you may then carry on or stop.
• Action: in turn from the Sacred Tree, take 2 different actions if you have fewer than three uncancelled solitary symbols, only one otherwise. An action's strength is the number of its symbols visible on your Help Line and your Forest.
• Take a Fragment tile, kept for a later Guardian Animals phase.
• Attract Guardian Animals from the reserve, for a total cost no higher than your strength; they go face down on top of your draw pile.
• Put out Fires from the Circle, with a total value no higher than your strength; keep them beside your Forest.
• Move your standee around the Circle by up to as many rocks as your strength, not counting occupied rocks: take a Victory tile of your choice from each Spirit you jump over, and the rock you land on triggers an extra action.
• Plant a single Protective Tree costing no more than your strength, next to a Tree already planted, never diagonally. Its symbols count straight away and until the end; completing certain rows or planting in a corner gives a bonus.
• End of round: if Fires remain in the centre and your strength for putting out fires is lower than their total, add one Fire Varan to your discard pile per Fire tile in the centre.
• Then add to the centre a Fire of 2, 3 or 4 for each level 1, 2 or 3 animal attracted during the round, never more than 7 Fires; if none are left, add a Fire of 2.
• Refill the reserve, everyone discards their Help Line, and the Sacred Tree passes to the next Spirit clockwise.

3.Scoring

• Living Forest is not played for points: you win by reaching 12 in one of the three categories.
• Trees: the different Protective Trees in your Forest, the starting one included, plus your Tree Victory tiles.
• Fires: the number of Fire tiles won, not their value, plus your Fire Victory tiles.
• Flowers: the Sacred Flowers visible on your Help Line, on your Forest and on your Flower Victory tiles.
• If several Spirits reach 12 in the same round, each of them adds up their three categories; the highest total wins.
• In Marquoir, enter each player's three categories, then 1 in the Victory box for whoever reached 12: it is worth 100, so that the ranking follows the rules.

4.End of the game

• The game ends at the end of the Action phase in which at least one Spirit has 12 different Protective Trees, 12 Fires or 12 Sacred Flowers.
• If they are alone, they win. If there are several, the highest sum of the three categories decides.

House rules and pitfalls

• Two identical Trees may grow in the same Forest, but only one counts towards victory.
• A gregarious symbol cancels only a solitary animal's symbol: that animal's elements still count during the Action phase.
• An action earned from a rock or a corner of the Forest adds to the others, may repeat an action already taken, and is played with all your visible symbols.
• Some Trees let you take the same action twice instead of two different actions.
• If there are not enough Fire Varans left, share out the remaining ones evenly, in turn order; if there are none, nothing happens.
• The rules say nothing about a tie in sums between Spirits who reached 12: Marquoir counts it as a shared victory.

Frequently asked questions

The box

Released

2021

Age

Ages 10+

Designer

Aske Christiansen

Artwork

Apolline Etienne

Publisher

Ludonaute

Mechanics

Deck BuildingPush Your LuckSimultaneous Action SelectionRaceTile Placement

Contents

• 1 Circle of Spirits board
• 4 Forest boards and 4 Spirit of Nature standees
• 1 Sacred Tree standee
• 56 starting Guardian Animal cards, 14 per Spirit
• 51 Guardian Animal cards of levels 1 to 3
• 23 Fire Varan cards
• 39 Protective Tree tiles and 4 starting Trees
• 58 Fire tiles worth 2, 3 or 4
• 20 Fragment tiles and 12 Victory tiles
• Guardian Animal and Fire Varan boards, 2 Tree dispensers

Expansions

• Living Forest: Kodama · 2023

score sheets for this game →

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