Board Game's Cover
Plague Inc. The Board Game is a board game simulating pandemic diseases for 1-4 players (with 5th player expansion available) lasting 60–90 minutes. It is based on the game Plague Inc., and was released in April 3rd, 2017.[1]
Overview[]
Each player is deadly disease competing against the other plagues. Players may choose between 2 disease types, which is Bacteria or Virus. The goal is to get as many DNA Points as possible, while trying to eradicate the humanity. The player with the most DNA Points at the end of the game wins.
The game setup consists of :
- a World Board, the main part of the game
- a Card Mat, to place the cards, or flip it over to play Single-player
- Evolution slides
- Play Tokens, represents the infected countries.
- DNA Point markers, to mark how many DNA Points the player gathered.
- Country Cards
- Trait Cards, used to evolve disease.
- Event cards
- an End Game Bonus card, explains the bonus that players will get at the end of the game, and,
- a Death Dice.
Gameplay[]
Multi-player[]
Setup[]
The World Board must be placed at the center of the table, with the Card Mat, Bonus Summary Card and Death Dice next to it. Then, each player must be given their respective 16 colored Play Tokens and matching DNA Points Tracker along with an Evolution Slide matching the tokens in color, Bacteria side up (as recommended for beginning players). Then, one player must take the Country card stack and separate all seven of the Starting Country cards from it, shuffling them, and then handing one to each of the players in the game. After, the remaining Starting Country cards are shuffled with the remaining Country cards.
Each Evolution Slide has Core Traits, shown in a box with the aforementioned Text. For Bacteria, the Core Traits include two infectivity points and one lethality point. These are base values, and may vary as the game progresses.
Depending on how many people are playing, the amount of Country cards used for the game varies, according to a table in page 2. For two players, the amount of cards in the Country cards deck should be 24; for three, 27; for four, 32. Then, the Country card deck must be placed face down on its slot on the Card Mat, and the top three cards must be flipped up and placed one next to the other, to the right of the Country card deck.
Starting the game[]
To start the game, each player must place their Starting Country card face up in the correct continent and place a Play Token on it. Then following a starting order, the first player must place their DNA Points Tracker on zero on the DNA Points tracker on the World Board. The game follows going clockwise, and so the second player must place their marker on 1, then the third player on 2, and so on. Quoting the rule book, "the person who washed their hands most recently goes first".
Every turn, each player must complete 5 phases before the next player can play their turn. These are summarized on the right side of each Evolution Slide, and the order goes as follows :
Phase 1 : DNA[]
During this phase, the player must move their DNA Points Tracker based on how many DNA Points they get in that turn. The amount of DNA points is determined by how many countries they control, and that itself is determined by having the most amount of Play Tokens on that Country card. If there's the case where more than one player has an equal amount of tokens on the Country card, then the players share control of the country and a DNA Point is scored for each player in their respective turn.
Phase 2 : Country[]
In this phase, the player draws one Country card from the card mat. The player may pick between the 3 face-up Country cards or a face-down card from the Country card deck. Then, the player may choose to place the Country card on the World Board in its corresponding continent or discard it from the game. If a Country card is discarded, regardless of the reasons for it, the player must then discard their Trait cards and pick five new ones from the Trait card deck on the Card Mat. If a face-up card was drawn, a new face-up Country card must be placed on the space the previous one had on the Card Mat.
Phase 3 : Evolution[]
During this phase, the player may choose between placing a Trait card on their Evolution Slide (evolving), or discard one card from the Evolution Slide (devolving), or choose to do nothing and skip the phase.
If the player chooses to evolve a Trait, they must look at their hand of Trait cards (initially five at the start of the game) and, if possible, evolve a Trait. It is possible to evolve a Trait if the player has available space for it in their Evolution Slide and they can afford DNA Points for it. The cost of each Trait is written on the top right corner of each Trait card, and based on the amount of DNA Points that the player has (kept track by their DNA Points Tracker on the World Board), the player may choose to evolve a Trait.
If the player chooses to devolve a Trait, they discard the Trait card from their Evolution Slide and it is left out of the game. The DNA Points used to evolve the Trait do not get refunded. A player can devolve as many Trait cards as they want during their turn, at any point, with no prevention of any other action.
Lastly, the player can choose to neither evolve or devolve, and no punishment is applied for this.
Phase 4 : Infection[]
During this phase, the player may infect countries by placing as many Play Tokens as possible in a Country card's City slots. If the player has run out of usable Play Tokens, nothing happens. The number of tokens placed in this phase is limited to the amount of infectivity of the disease, determined by counting how many yellow Infectivity bars the Evolution Slide has in total, including evolved Traits.
The requirements to be able to infect a Country's City are two: connected and climate resistant.
- Connected. The player is connected to any Country if they are able to reach it through an Airport (the Country card must have a purple edge with an Airplane on it and any Trait card with the Air Transmission trait must be evolved and placed on the player's Evolution Slide), a Seaport (the Country must have a green edge with a Boat on it and any Trait card with the Water Transmission trait must be evolved and placed on the player's Evolution Slide), or if it simply is available within the same continent that the player's disease is already present in.
- Climate resistant: The player is climate resistant if they are able to spread to a Country and are resistant to its climate; that is, looking at a Country's Cities and observing one of three possibilities: sun, snowflake, or an empty black hexagon. Empty black hexagons represent a neutral climate, and the player will always be climate resistant to these. Suns represent a hot climate, and the player must have Heat Resistance evolved on their Evolution Slide to place tokens in these cities. Similarly, snowflakes represent a cold climate, and the player must have Cold Resistance evolved on their Evolution Slide to place tokens in these cities.
The player may also choose to do nothing and skip the phase.
Alternatively, if possible, the player may choose to use an Ability if present in their Evolution Slide instead of following the Infection steps as usual.
Phase 5 : Death[]
Lastly, in this phase, the player must try to kill fully infected countries that they have control over. When the player attempts to kill a fully infected Country, they must say the Country's name and then roll the Death Dice. If the rolled number is less than or equal to the number of the lethality points visible on their Evolution Slide, then the country dies. Otherwise, nothing happens and the country survives.
If a Country is successfully killed, each player present in the Country when it was killed gets one DNA Point for each token they had on it. Then, every player present in the now dead Country gets 1 Event card for a maximum of three, and no more are earned after that limit is reached. Play Tokens are removed and returned to their owners, and finally, the player who killed the Country keeps the Country card for end game bonuses.
End Game Bonuses[]
Scoring[]
Each player gets DNA Points based on the price of every Trait card they have on their Evolution slide. Then, players get End Game Bonuses. The bonuses are the following :
- Lucky Escape, rewarded for player who gets the most token on the board at the end of the game. The player gets 4 extra DNA Points.
- Continent Killer, rewarded for having the most killed countries in a given continent. The player(s) gets 6 DNA Points per continent.
- Ultimate Wipeout, Rewarded to the player who killed the country with the most cities (or population if the amount of cities are tied) in the game. The player gets 7 DNA Points.
If the game is a tie, then the player who falls down to the floor first and pretend to be dead wins.
Single-player[]
In single-player mode, the player play against the "PlagueBot". To start, player should flip the Card Mat over and the mat become PlagueBot slide, your opponent. While the cards that normally be put on the Card Mat should be put on the table next to the board instead.
PlagueBot plays with special rules, as the following :
- PlagueBot has unlimited Play Tokens (instead of 16)
- PlagueBot starts with 3 starting countries (instead of 1)
- PlagueBot doesn't get any Trait cards.
- PlagueBot always starts second
While the player does their turn normally (the same way as playing Multi-player), PlagueBot only play through 3 phases for every turn, which are the following :
- Country Placement, similar with the player's Country phase, except that PlagueBot only takes from the face-down Country deck. If there is no card left on the deck, then it will take the largest Country from the face up Country cards.
- Auto-Evolve, PlagueBot draws one card from the Trait deck, and put it on the leftmost space of its slide. Every turn, the Trait cards should be moved to the right and every new Trait card should be placed on the leftmost space, and the rightmost Trait card is discarded.
- Trait Control, PlagueBot does specific actions according to the Traits it has and the instructions on the bottom of PlagueBot slide. PlagueBot will do actions in order from the leftmost Trait card it has to the rightmost. If a Trait card has more than one trait, then PlagueBot will start from the upper trait first.
In the Trait Control phase, PlagueBot may do the following :
- Waterborne, place a token in every climate suitable, connected country with a seaport.
- Airborne, place a token in every climate suitable, connected country with an airport.
- Cold Resistance, place a token in every cold climate, connected countries.
- Heat Resistance, place a token in every hot climate, connected countries.
- Infectivity, place a token to all climate suitable, connected countries.
- Lethality, place a token in every climate suitable, connected country that the PlagueBot doesn't already infect. Then PlagueBot kill one largest, fully infected, and PlagueBot controlled country.
In the Trait Control phase, in some conditions, PlagueBot might not be able to do some actions, which is alright. But if the PlagueBot can't do anything in this phase, it is considered stuck, and will do one of the following :
- PlagueBot draws one Country card, put it on the board, and put a token on it. Then it process the Traits it has.
- If PlagueBot still unable to process any Traits after doing that, then PlagueBot will discard all the Trait cards it has and replace it with the new ones, and end its turn.
There is no Sudden Death Mode, but the game ends in 2 ways :
- If PlagueBot is stuck and unable to draw any new Country card, then it will automatically kill all fully infected countries controlled by PlagueBot, and end the game.
- If the player is eradicated, and there is no Country card left to draw.
Scoring[]
The scoring goes as normal but with some special rules :
- PlagueBot doesn't score from Trait cards, while player scores from Trait cards as normal.
- PlagueBot earns twice as many as the player would normally get from the End Game Bonuses.
Rules[]
- Each player gets DNA Points for each countries they conquered + bonus DNA points from special abilities.
- Player infect a country by placing a token on a Country card.
- Player conquers a country by having the most Play Tokens placed on the country.
- If there are more than one player with the most Play Tokens placed on a country, then those players conquers the country and received DNA Points from that country.
- If a player choose to discard a country card, they must also discard all of the Trait cards they have and draw 5 new Trait cards, no matter how many Trait cards they discarded.
- If a player takes a country card but unable to place it in the correct continent on the board, then player must discard the card.
- Discarded country card and trait card is removed for the rest of the game.
- Evolving costs DNA points. Therefore if a player evolve their disease, they must move their marker back based on how much the Trait costs.
- If a player chose to place a Trait card on a special ability space, then the ability is disabled until the Trait is devolved.
- Player may only infect a new country if it is connected with the country they infected.
- Player is connected to a country if :
- the country is in the same continent as the country the player have infected.
- the player is able to infect the country through its port. (e.g. if the player have Airborne Trait and the country they infected have an airport, then the player may infect ANY country with airport.)
- Player may only infect country if the player is resistant to that country climate. (e.g. hot countries requires Heat Resistance Trait, neutral climate countries doesn't require any resistance trait, etc.)
- A country is fully infected if the country has no empty token spaces left, regardless of who infected the country.
- Players may only try to kill a fully infected country.
- Player may try to kill as many countries as possible as long as they conquer the country.
- Players may play event cards as long as they meet the card criteria.
- Players may not use Event cards at the same turn they received it.
- Player who already have 3 event cards may not draw a new event card.
- If a player has no token left on the board, then the player is eradicated.
- If there is no Country card left on the Card Mat, then the game enters Sudden Death Mode.
- In Sudden Death Mode, all Country phase are skipped.
- The player is eradicated if they don't have any play token on the board.
- If the player is eradicated before Sudden Death Mode, they may only return to the game again by paying a small DNA Points penalty (consult the rule book for more details).
- If a player is eradicated in Sudden Death Mode, then the game ends and goes to the Scoring.
- Largest country card is determined from the number of token spaces on the card. If it is a tie, then it is determined from the number of population of the country.
Development[]
On March 10th, 2016, Ndemic Creations posted a news article on their website regarding the announcement of Plague Inc: The Board Game, stating it had been in development for two years and following with the mention of a Kickstarter campaign launching soon.[2][1]
On May 10, 2016, Ndemic Creations launched a Kickstarter Project, with fundraising goal at $34,000. The project was a huge success, with the goal reached only one day after launch. On June 1, 2016, the project was closed with $355,784 earned from 6,590 backers. The developers then announced that they will release the game by November 2017.
Gallery[]
Photos[]
Videos[]
Countries[]
In the board game, there are certain countries that are not found in the PC or Mobile versions. These countries are available in the Board Game as separate entities.
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Source: This image was taken from the digitisation of the Official Cards included in the Plague Inc.: The Board Game Add-On for TableTop Simulator
(Original Add-On Link on Steam, respective credits for the digitization of Board Game Cards scanned by them) |
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Source: This image was taken from the digitisation of the Official Cards included in the Plague Inc.: The Board Game Add-On for TableTop Simulator
(Original Add-On Link on Steam, respective credits for the digitization of Board Game Cards scanned by them) |
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Source: This image was taken from the digitisation of the Official Cards included in the Plague Inc.: The Board Game Add-On for TableTop Simulator
(Original Add-On Link on Steam, respective credits for the digitization of Board Game Cards scanned by them) |
Trivia[]
- According to the rule book, the included die is called "Death Dice" and not "Death Die", and the reason is acknowledged in the back. Quoting page 8: "Grammatical apology: sorry if you have been wincing/screaming every time you read 'Death Dice'. We know that it is grammatically incorrect and that it should be Death Die - unfortunately calling it this caused confusion with some players. Blame the global education system - not us! :-P".
- It is possible that the rule to determine the first player, that being the person who washed their hands most recently going first, could be interpreted as the most free of germs and thus, logically, the person with the least possible amount of microbial DNA in their hands. Therefore, it makes sense that their DNA Points Tracker must be on zero.
References[]
- ↑ "Scenario Creator set for launch, Board Game hits retail and Shadow Plague infects PS4 and Xbox One!" (2017). Ndemic Creations Official Website Retrieved on December 10th, 2023
- ↑ "Plague Inc: The Board Game - New game announced" (2016). Ndemic Creations Official Website Retrieved on December 3rd, 2023.
- Plague Inc.: The Board Game Main Page
- Plague Inc.: The Board Game on Kickstarter
- How To Play Plague Inc: The Board Game
| Series | |
|---|---|
| Games | Plague Inc. • Plague Inc: Evolved |
| Board Games | Plague Inc.: The Board Game • Plague Inc: Armageddon |
| Merchandise | T-Shirts • Plush Toys |
| Others | Plague Inc. Original Soundtrack |