˜ goal of the game ˜
You live in Hamelin, a town infested by rats. The easiest way to get the rats
out of your house is to send them to your neighbors. Whenever too many
rats are jammed into a house, its occupants get desperate and move out! The
player who can best keep the rats out of his house wins!
˜ contents ˜
• 5 House miniboards, each with 7 oors .
• 5 Rat trackers .
• 6 wooden rat gurines (each rat has a different tail color, corresponding to the
colors of the Character cards).
• 1 Pied Piper gurine, and its plastic base.
• 21 Character cards .
• 50 Action cards .
˜ setup ˜
Look at the diagram inside the box cover for 4-player setup:
1. Place a House board and a Rat tracker in front of each player. The Rat
tracker starts off the House.
2. Choose a start player (whoever last saw rats in a bathtub... or, the youngest player).
3. Place a rat gurine between each house. Then, to the left of the start player,
add a second rat gurine and the Pied Piper gurine. Point the gurines to the
right, as shown in the diagram. Remove unused houses and gurines from the
game, as well as their corresponding Character cards (the color of a rat’s tail
corresponds to the color of its Character card).
4. Shufe the remaining Character cards to form a face-down deck. Flip
the rst four cards of the deck face-up to form a line in the center of the
table.
If you revealed more than one Pied Piper card , discard all but one, and replace
them with new cards from the deck. Continue until you have four cards, with only
one Pied Piper card. Shufe any Pied Piper cards you discarded back into the deck.
The rules of the game
5. Shufe the Action cards to form a face-down deck. Then deal four
Action cards to each player.
˜ playing the game ˜
Game Concept
The Action cards allow you to move gurines: either rats or the Pied Piper.
Whenever a rat gurine passes a house, that house’s Rat tracker moves up
1. When the Pied Piper passes a house, he lures rats out of the house. That
house’s Rat tracker moves down 1. Whoever has the fewest rats in his house
at the end of the game is the winner.
Game Turn
To start the game, the start player places an Action card from his hand face-up
on a Character card. Then draw an Action card to rell your hand to four cards.
From then on, everyone plays in counterclockwise order
(in the direction of the green arrows on the houses’ weather-
vanes ).
On your turn, do the following phases in this order:
1. Place an Action card face-up on a Character card.
2. Place a second Action card face-up on a different Character card.
Setup for 2 Players
This is similar to 4-player setup, with the following differences:
- The two players and their houses sit opposite each other. The other two houses between
them (one on each side) are neutral, and belong to nobody.
- Each player receives a Rat tracker that goes on his house. The neutral houses between
the players do not get a Rat tracker.
3. After placing your Action cards, check to see if a Character card is activated.
If a Character card has two Action cards, this character activates!
Move that character’s gurine as the Action cards on it direct. Move
in the order the cards were played (top card, then bottom card).
If two Character cards activate, you decide which character goes rst. Once you
resolve the Action cards, discard them face-up. Also discard any Character cards
face-up that activated this turn (to a different discard pile), and replace them with
new cards from the Character deck. If the Character card deck is empty, shufe
the discarded Character cards to form a new deck.
See the end of the rulebook for descriptions of the card effects.
4. Finally, draw two Action cards to rell your hand to four cards. If the
Action card deck is empty, shufe the discarded Action cards to form a new
deck.
Then play passes to the right
(in the direction of the green arrow ).
Rules of Being a Good Neighbor:
Rule #1
You cannot place two Action cards on the same Character card in a
single turn. (You can add a second Action card
to one placed on a previous turn.)
Rule #2
Rat and Pied Piper gurines obey the same movement rules. The
only difference is what happens when they pass through a house
( or ):
- A rat raises the house’s Rat tracker 1 oor.
- The Pied Piper lowers the house’s Rat tracker 1 oor.
Example of a turn:
e Character card showing the yellow rat is discarded, then replaced with a new card from
the Character deck. e two Action cards that moved the yellow rat are also discarded. Finally,
Maya draws two new Action cards to rell her hand. Now it is her right neighbor’s turn to play.
Player Elimination
If your Rat tracker reaches the roof of your house after an Action card
resolves, you immediately ee your rat-infested house, and are out of
the game.
It’s Maya’s turn, and she plays the following cards: and
Once she has placed the cards,
Maya checks to see if she has
activated any characters. Two
Action cards have been played
on the yellow rat, so the yellow
rat activates.
+1
then
+1
e yellow rat walks
through the house in
front of it, which raises
that house’s Rat tracker 1
oor. en it walks back
through the same house,
again raising the house’s
Rat tracker 1 oor.
Remove your house from the game. The player whose turn it is claims your Rat
tracker (and any Rat trackers you collected from other eliminated players).
In addition, any gurines that were on either side of your removed house now
gather together in the gap. Your two next-door neighbors are now neighbors
with each other.
If you were eliminated by a character’s rst action, the second action takes effect
right after your elimination nishes. It happens in the new neighborhood, without
your house.
˜ end of the game ˜
The game ends as soon as only 2 players are left in the game. Even if a
character’s rst action reduces the player count to 2, the game ends immediately,
with no second action.
The winner is the remaining player with the lower Rat tracker.
If there is a tie, whichever player claimed more Rat trackers wins. If a tie still
remains, play a rematch!
End of the Game for 2 Players
The game ends as soon as one player’s Rat tracker reaches the roof of his house.
His opponent immediately wins the game.
Reminder for 2 Players
The neutral houses that sit between the two players do not have Rat trackers. They can
never be eliminated from the game. You still count them just like a player’s houses
when moving gurines, though.
×
˜ Li’l Tips to Remember ˜
• There can never be more than two Action cards on the same Character card.
Two Action cards will activate a Character card after the card-placing phase.
• You cannot place two Action cards on the same Character card in a single
turn. You can add a second Action card to one placed on a previous turn.
• The Rat and Pied Piper gurines obey the same movement rules. The only difference
is what happens when they pass through a house ( or ): A rat raises the
house’s Rat tracker 1 oor. The Pied Piper lowers the house’s Rat tracker 1
oor .
˜ variants ˜
“Rugrats” Variant
During setup, remove the special Action cards +1 and Melody. They are not
used in this variant.
During the game, when you place an Action card on a character, apply its
effect immediately (do not wait until two Action cards are on it). Leave the
rst Action card on the Character card after resolving it.
You discard the Character card and the two Action cards only after resolving the
character’s second Action card. Then replace the Character card as usual.
“A Happy Life is a Secret Life” Variant
On your turn, you can place one of your two Action cards face-down (either
your rst or your second card can be face-down).
Face-down cards are revealed when the Character card activates (when two
Action cards are on it after the card-placing phase).
In the same way, on the rst turn, the rst player can play his one and only
card face-down.
˜ The 4 Basic Action Cards ˜
e gurine moves through the house in front of it, following
the green arrow.
- If it was a rat, raise the house’s Rat tracker 1 oor.
- If it was the Pied Piper, lower the house’s Rat tracker 1 oor.
e gurine ends its movement to the right of the house it
passed through.
e gurine moves through the two houses in front of it,
following the green arrows.
- If it was a rat, raise each of the two houses’ Rat trackers 1 oor.
- If it was the Pied Piper, lower each of the two houses’ Rat trackers
1 oor.
e gurine ends its movement to the right of the second
house it passed through.
e gurine moves through the house behind it, following
the red arrow.
- If it was a rat, raise the house’s Rat tracker 1 oor.
- If it was the Pied Piper, lower the house’s Rat tracker 1 oor.
e gurine ends its movement to the le of the house it
passed through.
e gurine slips through the sewer past the house in front
of it, following the green arrow.
Regardless of whether it was a rat or the Pied Piper, the
house’s Rat tracker doesn’t change.
e gurine ends its movement to the right of the house it
passed through.
˜ Special Action Cards ˜
e +1 card adds 1 to a gurine’s move. is card has no
eect unless it is combined with a basic Action card, whether
above or below it.
e Melody card has no eect unless it is combined with a
basic Action card, whether above or below it.
is card causes the basic Action card on the character to
apply to all gurines in the same location as the activated
character.
Move the whole group of gurines simultaneously.
Note: A Character card may receive two special Action cards. When this
happens, the gurine does not move. Discard the Character and Action
cards as if you had resolved actions.
In this example, the red rat activates, and walks
through the 3 houses in front of it, following the
green arrows (2 houses because of the Action
card, + 1 because of the card).
In this example, the
blue rat has activated.
anks to the Melody
card, the Pied Piper
and the red rat go
along with him.
In total, the owner of this house will raise her Rat tracker 1 oor (+1 for the
blue rat,+1 for the red rat,
- 1 for the Pied Piper = +1 oor). e yellow rat
does not join the group when the group goes by it.
+1
