Welcome to RATTUS!

Europe is in the grip of the Black Death and it’s up to us to stop the disease from spreading. We have three options: the farmers, knights, or nobles. But will their help be enough? The rats keep coming, and as long as they do, the plague will continue to devastate Europe’s population.

Getting Started

First, let’s set up the game. Place the game board in the center of the playing area, and place the class cards beside it. Each of us needs to choose a color to represent ourselves throughout the game. Make sure to collect all the cubes of your chosen color. Now, let’s shuffle the first 12 rat tokens and randomly place one in each region of the board.

So, here’s how the game starts. We take all the rat tokens and mix them together. These tokens are the ones we’ll use throughout the game. Next, we shuffle the starting rat tokens with the regular ones. We also need to place the plague piece in a random region on the board. And finally, we determine who goes first – it’s the youngest player. After that, we just take turns going clockwise around the group. Each player gets to place two cubes on the board, and we keep going until it’s the last player’s turn. Then we do it all over again but in reverse!

Once everyone has placed their four cubes, we’re ready to begin the game!

Okay, so now let’s talk about how we actually play this game.

On your turn, you have a few things you can do. First, you can choose to get a new class card if you want. This card gives you special abilities or bonuses. After that, you get to place your cubes on the board wherever you want. And finally, you have to move the plague piece. Remember, you can do the class card and cube placement in any order you like, but moving the plague piece always happens last.

Okay, here’s the deal. When we start playing, we can choose a new class card if we want. These cards have their perks, but they also up our chances of getting killed. So, we have to keep them in plain sight for everyone to see, unless someone else takes them.

Now, during our turn, we have to put cubes on the board. We can stick them anywhere we like. But here’s the catch – we have to put as many cubes as there are rat tokens in that region. So, if there are no rat tokens, sorry, no cubes for us.

Hey there! Let me break it down for you. When it comes to the plague piece, it has to move to a different space. It can’t just stay in one place. And get this, it has to be moved to a neighboring space. Pretty interesting, huh?

Now, here’s the deal. If the plague region doesn’t have any rat tokens, then nothing happens. But if it does have rat tokens, something happens. You ready? Brace yourself! A new rat token has to be placed in a region that’s next to the plague piece. Oh, and if there are already two rat tokens, then two new ones have to be put in the neighboring spaces. Talk about multiplying!

But wait, there’s more! If the plague region has a wooden cube, and it also has at least one rat token, things get really interesting. Those tokens are going to be flipped and evaluated one by one. The symbols on the tokens will show which group gets affected by the plague, and guess what? Payment is due.

The end of the game!

So here’s the thing – the game can end in a couple of ways. First, it might end if we run out of rat tokens. Yeah, that’s right, those little critters are pretty important here. Or, it could end if one of the players manages to get all of their cubes on the board by the time their turn ends. That’s a bit of a tricky move, but it happens!

Now, when we get to that final round, things start to get really interesting. Everyone gets to use their class abilities, except for the player who had the last normal turn. It’s like a last hurrah before the game is over.

Okay, so here’s the grand finale. We reveal and count those rat tokens. Yeah, I know, it may not sound too exciting, but trust me, it’s a big deal. And guess what? The player who has the most cubes on the board at this point? Well, they’re the big winner. Yup, they take home the crown.