Rickety Ships (Space Nertz) Rules 1.1

Rickety Ships
Rickety Ships is a frenzied, print and play puzzle game of intergalactic shipbuilding.
For 2-6 players
20-30 Minutes
Designed By: Blaise Sciurba

Rickety Ships uses 2-4 standard decks of playing cards and poker chips or pocket
change to partially simulate the experience of the space-truck building phase of "Galaxy
Trucker". This game is in no way meant to be a build your own "Galaxy Trucker" game
nor should it be played instead of playing "Galaxy Trucker." Instead, Rickety Ships is
meant more to serve as a new experience for groups who regularly play speed games
like "Nertz" or "Pick Two!"


Rickety Ships components:


- 2 - 4 decks of playing cards


- 120 poker chips or pieces of pocket change of any size (for up to 6 players)


- 15 victory point markers of any kind

(A note about the playing cards needed for this game: You may quickly find that you are
running out of table space when using standard, poker sized decks of playing cards. We
went to our local craft store and found a 1 inch square die cut and cut the edges of our
cards of 2 decks of playing cards, thus giving us 4 decks of small card tiles. This works
perfect. Pictures of these tiles will be posted on BoardGameGeek soon.)



Rickety Ships Set-Up:
-Each player takes a "7" of a different suit (unless there are 5-6 players and then a couple suits
will be duplicated) and places it in front of them.
-Then each player takes their 20 poker chips (or pieces of pocket change) and sets them to the
side, within quick reach, but out of the way of your shipbuilding area.
-The group then mixes the rest of the cards face down in a pile in the middle of the table.


Rickety Ships Rules:
-Rickety Ships is played over 3 rounds. In each round, each player seeks to build his own ship
from the supply of cards in the middle of the table, attempting to earn as many of the 5 victory
points available at the end of each round. At the end of the 3rd round, the player who has earned
the most of the 15 available victory points is the winner.

Pregame:
-Before each round begins, each player will place his "7" in front of him. This "7" is what the
whole ship will be built from. When each player is ready, someone will say "go" and everyone
will begin building.

Drawing Cards:
-Each player will take 1 card using 1 hand, bring it to his ship and flip it over to look at. If it fits,
he may place that card on his ship and take another card. Once another card has been taken, the
card that you played on your ship may never be moved again. If the card is not played on the
player's ship, the player must return the card, face up, to the middle of the table. The player can

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then choose another card from the middle of the table. Players may take any of the face up or
face down cards when drawing.

Building Your Ship:




The Basic Ship Shape:
This is the basic shape that should be used for your first few games, then new shapes can
be introduced later. The "C's" in this ship stand for "Cannons", the "R's" for "Rockets",
and the 7 is the starting space from which all other cards must stem. The "Cannons" and
'Rockets" will be explained later, in the "Victory Points" section of this booklet.
Diagram 1: The Basic Ship Shape







C



C
C


C
7
C



R
R
R
R



The Build Process:
-Each card played, must be played adjacent (north, east, south, or west) to or on top of
another card already played. Players seek to complete a ship of a predetermined shape
and size.

Adjacent to:
-A card played to the east or west of another card must be the same suit as its neighbor.

Diagram 2: east or west


7

?
? ?

-or-
-A card played to the north or south of another card must be exactly 1 number above or
below its neighbor.
(Either, but not necessarily both of these rules must be observed when playing a card.)

Diagram 3: North or south

6 or 8 of any suit




7

?


6 or 8 of any suit

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On top of:


-A card played on top of a card already played must be in the same suit and 1 number
above or below the card it is being played on top of.
-After this card has been played, the player will put 1 of his 20 poker chips on top of this
card, signifying that the card has been played on top of another card.
-A player may play on top of that card, with the poker chip as well, observing the same
rule as before but this time putting 2 poker chips on top of this card.
-A player may do this a third time, this time putting 3 chips on top.
-No cards may be added to a card with 3 chips on top of it.
-Once a player has put a card on top of another card, all cards subsequently played
adjacent to this card will use the new, top value of this card to play from, disregarding its
original value.
Diagram 4: On top of

From this ------------------------------------------------------------------to this


7
7
8
8
8
8
9
10
9
8
9
10

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-OR-

7
7
6
6
5
5
4

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6
5
4

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Ending a Round

-The player who first completes his/her ship says, "I'm Done" or something similar and after
letting out a collective sigh, everyone stops building.

Victory points

-Each player is seeking to earn his/her share of 5 victory points at the end of each round. The
victory points are earned as follows:


1 point for the player that completed his/her ship first and called out "I'm Done"


-This one is pretty self-explanatory

1 point for the player with the strongest "Rockets"
-"Rockets" are in spaces at the back of the ship and are labeled with an "R" in
Diagram 1. Not everything placed on these spaces count as "Rockets". You may
place any card in these spots in order to finish your ship but you will not receive
points for "Rockets" unless they are a Jack, a Queen, or a King. When calculating
who has the strongest "Rockets", players will count Jacks as 1 point, Queens as 2
points, and Kings as 3 points. The player with the highest "Rocket" point total
earns this victory point. Jacks, Queens, and Kings only count as "Rockets" when
they are in designated "Rocket" spaces.
1 point for the player with the strongest "Cannons"
-"Cannons" are in spaces at the front of the ship and are labeled with a "C" in
Diagram 1. Not everything placed on these spaces count as "Cannons". You may
place any card in these spots in order to finish your ship but you will not receive

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points for "Cannons" unless they are an Ace, a 2, or a 3. When calculating who
has the strongest "Cannons", players will count 3's as 1 point, 2's as 2 points, and
Aces as 3 points. The player with the highest "Cannon" point total earns this
victory point. Aces, 2's, and 3's only count as “Cannons” when they are in
designated "Cannon" spaces.
1 point for the player with the most "Crewmembers" and "Cargo Holds"
-"Crewmembers" and "Cargo holds" may be anywhere on the ship. Any "7" that
is visible counts as a "Crewmember". Any "6" that is visible counts as a "Cargo
Hold." Each "7" or "Crewmember" visible at the end of the round is worth 2
points. Each "6" or "Cargo Hold" visible at the end of the round is worth 1 point.
The player with the highest total point value in "Crewmembers" and "Cargo
Holds" earns this victory point.
1 point for the player with the most "Battery Packs"
-"Battery Packs" are the chips that players have placed on their ships in order to
place one card on top of another card. The player with the most visible battery
packs at the end of the round earns this victory point. (Only count the packs on
the top of the cards, not the ones that are underneath the cards. For example, a
card that has 3 chips on top of it will also have 2 chips below it, and 1 chip below
that. This is only counted as 3 battery packs, not 6)

Diagram 5: Example of 2 player game scoring



2
A

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2
4
2
A
4
A
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?

?
A
4
7
10
A
7
7
2



Vs.
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4
7
6
J
3
J
7
6
Q
3
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J
K
Q
K
K
K
K

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1 victory point for finishing first No victory point for finishing first

Players tied for rockets (9 pts) so no point
Players tied for rockets (9 pts) so no point

1 victory point for cannons (12 pts)

No victory point for cannons (11 pts)

No victory point for crew/cargo (5 pts)

1 victory point for crew/cargo (7 pts)

No victory point for battery packs (7 pts)

1 victory point for battery packs (12 pts)

These players are tied after this round with 2 victory points a piece.






I think that is about it. Any questions, please send me an email at BlaiseSciurba(at)Yahoo.com - 6/15/2009

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