Pickomino

Introduction

This is a dice drafting and tile collecting game with "push your luck" elements.

The BGA game is based on the 40th anniversary edition, in which players are meerkats competing to gather tasty bugs.

The original version, often known by it's other name of Heck Meck, saw players competing as chickens to gather tasty worms. The game pieces look slightly different, but the rules are the same.

Aim

The aim is to gather more bugs than your opponents. You do this by using a combination of dice rolls to either win tiles from the playing area, or steal tiles from other players.

Game play

1. Roll the dice. Choose one value. All the dice with that value are moved and put in a line at the bottom of the board.

• For example, if you rolled some 3s, you could choose them and they would all be added to the line.

2. Once you've added dice to the line, you can re-roll the remaining dice. However, you cannot choose any dice value that is already in the line.

• For example, you might roll a 3 and decide to add it to the line. If you now re-roll the remaining dice and get another 3, you cannot use it.

3. Your score so far is shown on the right hand side of the line. This is calculated as a total of all the dice, plus 5 points for each paw print.

4. To win a tile, you must have at least 1 paw print in your line by the end of the turn.

5. Continue re-rolling dice until either:

• you are happy with your current score, or
• there are no more dice to roll, or
• you can't add any more dice to your line.

You can now do the end of turn actions.

End of turn actions

If you have a paw print in your line, you may now choose a tile from those available. If a tile exactly matches your score for this turn, you must take it, even if it is in another player's hand. Doing this steals points from your opponent. Otherwise, you may take a tile that is worth less than your score from the playing area.

Your new tile is placed on top of any existing tiles you have already collected. This protects the existing tiles, as your opponents can only steal the top-most tile.

If you have not scored enough to collect a tile, or you do not have a paw print, you will not be able to collect a tile. In this case, you lose the top-most tile from your hand, which is returned into play on the game board (if you don't have any tiles, there is no penalty). Next, the highest value tile on the game board is turned over and removed from play for the rest of the game.

Play now passes clockwise to the next player.

End of game

The game ends when there are no more tiles available on the game board.

Final scores are calculated by the number of bugs shown on each tile (not the tile value). The player with the most bugs is the winner.

Hints

• Remember that you need to add at least one paw print to your line, on each turn
• To get higher value tiles, you could hold out for more than one paw print to boost your score, but you run the risk of getting none
• Lower value tiles are easier to win, but also easier for opponents to steal
• Remember that the final score is based on the number of bugs on the tile, not the value of the tile