BIRD CRAB QUICK REFERENCE

Bird Crab Components

The Board

• The board is a hexagon of hexagonal locations where pieces can be placed and interact.
• Standard 2 Player Board, where one player controls territories AB, BC, and CD and the other controls DE, EF, and FA:
  

• Board with location identification explanation:
  
• Cardinal direction, "towards F":
  
• The board is a hexagon composed of hexagonal locations.
• The board has cardinal directions A, B, C, D, E, F
• Locations can be in territories or darker colored trenches.
• A territory is identified by the two letters it sits between.
• A trench is identified by the letter it is next to.
• A territory location is indicated by territory name and the number on the location, such AB3.
• A trench location is indicated by the trench name and the number on the location, such as D4.
• There is an extra trench location in the center labeled as The Pit, which is relevant for bonuses.
• A piece is considered to be placed backwards if it is facing a letter in its territory's name. So a piece placed on AB6 could not be placed facing A or B.

Pieces

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• Pieces are hexagonal. The color in the background of the piece indicates which player controls the piece.
• The triangular notch at the front of the piece indicates the direction it is facing.
• However, a piece's combat and movement are determined by the Red and Blue numbers in each direction.
• The absence of a red or blue number in a direction is equivalent to a stat of zero.
• Some pieces have special rules that modify how they fight, move, or otherwise behave. These pieces have dots in their corners:
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• The full list of pieces can be found here.

The Deck

• The available pieces in the game.
• The number of remaining pieces is visible to each player, but the actual pieces are not.
• The deck is always shuffled before players draw from it.
• The deck contains a slightly different distribution of pieces each game.
• + Click for more
• If you look at the full list of pieces, you will find that some pieces have a count with a single number and some have a range.
• The minimum values of each piece's range (or the only count for pieces with no range) are shuffled into the deck, without any Snakes.
• Afterwards, the remaining pieces from the maximum range are shuffled independently.
• After the initial turn, the first half (rounded down to the nearest whole piece) of those shuffled pieces are then shuffled into the regular deck, as are the initial Snakes.

The Graveyard

• The pieces that have been killed in the game.
• These pieces are available for all players to see.

Hands

• Each player has a hand of pieces to play before they are on the board.
• Players cannot see each other's hands, but can see how many pieces there are in each hand.

Bird Crab Standard Turn

Drawing Pieces (at start of turn)

• Draw 3 to choose from
• Keep 2 in your hand
• Return 1 to the deck

Hand Maximum: 6 Pieces

• You cannot keep pieces beyond your hand maximum
• Any leftover pieces will be returned to the deck
• If you are already at your hand maximum at start of your turn, you do not draw at all

On any turn in Bird Crab, you can place up to three pieces, and move or rotate as many of your pieces as you like

In a turn, a single piece can do ONE of the following:

• Be Placed
• Move
• Rotate
• Nothing

After all players have decided upon their moves, execution of actions happens simultaneously for all players

Standard Action Execution Order (within each turn)

• Automatic Special Actions
• Placement
• Pieces placed
• Top Combat
• Close Combat
• Movement

Priority 5	Priority 4	Priority 3	Priority 2	Priority 1
Ranged Combat Pieces move Close Combat	Ranged Combat Pieces move Close Combat	Ranged Combat Pieces move Close Combat	Ranged Combat Pieces move Close Combat	Ranged Combat Pieces move Close Combat

• Rotation
• Automatic Special Actions

Placement Rules

• You can place up to three pieces per turn
• Placement must be in an unoccupied location in a territory you control
• Direction must be chosen when placing
• Pieces must not be placed facing backwards

Movement Rules

• Pieces move in a straight line a distance up to their Movement stat in that direction
• The priority a piece begins moving is equal to their Movement stat
• Combat is automatic and does not need to be specified
• Any piece who ties or loses in combat to another piece dies immediately and goes to the graveyard
• Surviving pieces continue to move uninterrupted unless otherwise specified by special piece rules

Types of Combat

• Combat happens automatically in the following situations:

• Type	When it happens	Combat output from each piece
  Close Combat	Opposing pieces are directly next to each other	Combat stat in direction of opponent, divided by number of opponents
  Ranged Combat (straight-on)	Opposing pieces try to move to the same spot	Combat stat in direction of desired spot
  Ranged Combat (angled)	Opposing pieces try to move to the same spot	Sum of two combat stats nearest to opponent
  Top Combat	A piece lands on top of another piece	The sum of each piece's Combat stats

Territory Ransacking

• If at the end of a turn,
•   a player has no pieces in one of their territories
•   AND at least one opposing piece is in that territory:
• That territory is Ransacked! The player no longer controls that territory and cannot place anything in it.
• All players with pieces in this territory get credit for ransacking it and a bonus piece

Bonuses

Endgame

Player Elimination

• If a player has no pieces on the board and has no territories, that player is eliminated.
• If a player has no pieces on the board, none in their hand, and cannot be dealt a piece, that player is eliminated.
• If Tech Fall is enabled, any player behind in Material compared to the player with the most Material by the number specified in the Tech Fall (generally 5 or 7) is eliminated
• The Material of a Player is defined as the number of their pieces on the board plus the number of available pieces in their hand.
• In-Hand Pieces are considered available if and only if the player has one or more territories.

Finishing The Game

• If all players but one are eliminated at the end of a turn, that remaining player is the winner.
• If all remaining players are eliminated at the end of a turn:
• Of the players eliminated on the last turn, the one with the most kills wins. + Click for more
• Kill count is determined by the number of opposing pieces a player has killed.
• One piece killing multiple opposing pieces counts as multiple kills.
• Multiple pieces killing one opposing piece counts as one kill.
• If two players happen to kill one piece they both oppose simultaneously, they each get a credited kill.
• A Cerberus killing an allied piece does not count as a kill.
• Priest conversion counts as a kill.
• A Skeleton dying automatically at the end of a turn after killing a player's pieces does not count as a kill.
• If all players eliminated on the last turn have the same number of kills, the game is a draw.

End-Game Drawing Fairness

• If there are not enough pieces in the deck for regular drawing, pieces will be distributed in a consistent, fair manner, starting with bonuses.
• If multiple players participate in the ransacking of a territory but there are not enough pieces for each of them to receive one, no players will receive that end-of-turn ransacking bonus draw.
• If a player has a piece in the Pit at the beginning of the turn, their hand is not full, and there is at least one piece in the deck, that bonus piece is dealt first.
• Subsequently, players with at least one kill in the previous turn and do not have a full hand will each receive their one bonus draw if there is enough for each of them to have one.
• From then on, the remaining normally drawn pieces are dealt to the greatest whole number (0, 1, 2 or 3) such that each player who didn't start with a full hand can receive an equal number of pieces, in addition to any bonuses previously received.
• Any un-dealt and returned pieces will remain in the deck as normal.
• + Click for more

Sudden Death

• If during a turn, no pieces are drawn, placed, or killed, Sudden Death begins at the end of the turn!
• At the end of the turn, the outer ring of the board is instant death for any pieces present, and the locations are removed and cannot be traveled to.
• Starting with the next turn, all territories are ransacked and players are no longer able to place pieces.
• At the end of the next turn, the next-most outer ring has the same qualities and the outer ring retains those qualities.
• This pattern continues until pieces are forced to the center or the game ends.

Other Miscellaneous Rules

Initial Turn

• Players are dealt one piece per controlled territory on the first turn
• Snakes are not added to the deck until after this turn, so nobody starts with any snakes

Interrupted movement

• If a piece is moving in a direction and is moved by interactions with other pieces, it will continue to move in the original ordinal direction for the number of priorities it was originally intending to do.
• The piece will not make any attempt to adjust, reach for, or stop at its original ending-spot.
• Because pieces can be moved, killed, or otherwise influenced by other pieces, players are allowed to attempt to make moves off the edge of the board or into allied pieces.
• However, if a piece ever actually attempts to move off the board, into an ally, or into the same spot an ally is attempting to move at the same time, it is considered Bumped and will not attempt to move for the rest of the turn.

Targeting

• If a player wants to activate the powers of the Necromancer, they must Target a piece from the Graveyard preemptively.
• That piece will remain targeted until the Necromancer has the opportunity to necromance it (if it ever does).
• The player can issue a new target with any turn.
• Targetting can be performed on the same turn as the Necromancer is placed.

Particularly Relevant Special Pieces

Snake

• You can place a Snake in a trench bordering one of your territories
• In one turn, a player can only place one snake at a time in any particular trench.
• If opposing players both place a snake in the same spot, the snakes engage in top combat.
• Snakes cannot be drawn (and thus cannot be placed) on the first turn of the game.

Witch

• Can both move and rotate on the same turn
• Rotation still happens after in Standard Execution Order.
• Dies if not moved on a turn

Harpy

• When it dies, it knocks back pieces that killed it in close combat back one spot.
• This can trigger more combat.
• Only happens if the spot the piece would be knocked back into is open.

Imp Swarm

• When it kills, it jumps to the location of the front-most piece it killed.
• This can trigger a chain of combat.

Reverse Centaur

• Fights opponents' Movement stat instead of their Combat stat.
• Note that it still uses its own combat stat and that movement is not reduced by multiple opponents.

Magician

• Fights 9 minus the Combat Stat of the Opponent.
• Note that the Magician still uses its own combat stat when fighting.
• Note that pieces fighting a Magician among other pieces will have their effective combat be:
• (9-Offense)/OpponentCount
• and NOT 9-(Offense/OpponentCount)

Skeleton

• Dies at the end of the turn if combat even if it wins.
• Note that it can still fight multiple enemies on that turn assuming it keeps winning

Cloud Man

• Disappears before turn, reappears in final location after turn.
• This means that the Cloud Man may land on allied or enemy pieces directly.
• Top Combat occurs in this case, ally or enemy, and is resolved before Close Combat
• Disappears before placement, but lands before Skeleton and Witch automatic deaths.

Necromancer

• When the Necromancer is involved in Ransacking or is killed, the player draws a targeted piece from the Graveyard.
• The player can only decide what piece to target as an action.
• Target remains until and is cleared when Necromancy occurs.
• If the player has not made this decision by the time the Necromancer is killed or ransacks a territory, Necromancy will not occur.