When playing Everdell, the first thing you need to learn is setup. Now, don't worry—the process is pretty straightforward. You can complete everything in six steps:
Board and Ever Tree: Place the game board on the table and set up the Ever Tree at the top.
Resources and Tokens: Arrange twigs, resin, pebbles, and berries along the river bank. Place point and occupied tokens beside the board.
Forest and Event Cards: Shuffle the Forest cards, placing the appropriate number on the forest clearings based on player count. Similarly, shuffle and place Special Event cards on the Ever Tree.
Meadow Cards: Shuffle the main deck and lay eight cards face up in the Meadow.
Player Preparation: Each player chooses a color, receives workers and starting cards, and places additional workers on the Ever Tree's branches.
First Player: Randomly select the first player to start the game.
Everdell Gameplay: What's Your Move?
Each turn you take in Everdell is a step in crafting your unique story. You have three critical actions to choose from:
Place a Worker
Play a Card
Prepare for Season: The "Prepare for Season" action is how you transition from one season to the next. This action has a few key components:
Worker Retrieval: You bring back all your deployed workers from the board. This retrieval is crucial as you can’t move to the next season with workers still on the board.
Worker Addition: Depending on the season, you may add one or more workers to your pool, reflecting the growth of your critter community.
Card Activation: Green Production cards activate during specific season transitions, providing resources or other benefits essential for building your city.
Drawing Meadow Cards: In Summer, this unique option allows you to add Meadow cards to your hand, giving you more strategic choices for your city's growth.
Strategic Implications
Each season in Everdell is not just a thematic element but plays a vital role in shaping your strategy. Knowing when to transition to the next season is a critical decision. Moving too quickly might leave you with unutilized resources or actions, while delaying too long could mean missing out on opportunities in the next season. Balancing the timing of your "Prepare for Season" action with your overall strategy is key to building the most prosperous city in Everdell.
The Game's End: Scoring And Victory
As the game winds down, players will pass when they can't or choose not to perform any more actions. The game ends when all players have passed. Scoring involves tallying points from various sources:
Base value of cards
Point tokens
Bonuses from purple Prosperity cards
Journey points
Completed Events
The player with the highest score is declared the winner of Everdell. In case of a tie, the player with the most achieved Events wins. If still tied, leftover resources break the stalemate.
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