Landing Zone
| Landing Zone | ||
|---|---|---|
| Carlton Noles | ||
| Crash land your ship to get the diamonds | ||
| Players: | 2 - 5 | |
| Length: | Fast | |
| Complexity: | Simple | |
| Trios per color: | 2 | |
| Number of colors: | 1 per player | |
| - - - - - - Other equipment - - - - - - | ||
| A large-ish flat surface 4 Zendo Stones( 1 in a differnt color from the other 3 | ||
| Strategy depth: | Low | |
| Random chance: | Low | |
| Game mechanics: | Dexterity | |
| Theme: | Space | |
| Status: Complete (v1.0), Year released: 2009 | ||
The Story[edit | edit source]
An asteroid has impacted the moon. There are four large pieces left, one of which is composed mainly of DIAMONDS!! You have two ships to use to claim your riches. Unfortunately, the only way to land is to crash land. Avoid the wreckage of other ships and have just the right touch on the throttle and you can emerge victorious.
Setup[edit | edit source]
Each player takes two matching trees to form their ships. Set the Asteroid pieces (Zendo stones or other markers) and arrange them in a shape resembling an inverted kite with the different marker set furthest back.(see below)
Mark a line about 18 inches away. This is the Launch Line. The playing area should appear more or less like below.
If the table is really large mark an out of bounds area roughly 5 to 8 inches beyond that farthest marker. If not the edges of the table are out of bounds.
Play[edit | edit source]
Choose a player to go first. Starting with that player each player in turn places one of their ships (trees) behind the launch line. Then the player launches their ship (flicks the tree causing it to topple) trying to get as close to the asteroid peices (stones) as possible. Once every one has gone start again with the first player and each player launch their second ship. Do not remove the wreckage until all players have launched both ships and scores are calculated. Play (at least) as many rounds as there are players the second player from the previous round going first, the third..second, the fist..last and so on.
- Note - the ship doesn't have to topple. In my experience however one that doesn't topple also doesn't travel as far and rarely has a chance to score.
Scoring[edit | edit source]
At the end of the round the ship or more rightly the piece of wreckage closest to each of the asteroid pieces scores one point, except the diamond piece ( the different colored piece) which is worth 3. If wreckage is touching an asteroid piece it scores double. A piece must be within one length of a large piece from an asteroid piece in order to score.
Any wreckage going out of bounds scores -1 per piece.
If a piece of wreckage is the closet to multiple asteroid pieces score only the one it is closest to. If it is equidistant choose one.
If two pieces of different players are of the same distance from an asteroid piece both score.
Player with the highest score at the end of the game wins.
Optional Rules[edit | edit source]
- Close Enough Rule - as touching rarely occurs we did give double points to wreckage that was "close enough". generally this meant that it was within approximately the thickness of a wall of a pyramid from the asteroid piece.
- No out of bounds - you can if you want, I suppose. I find it makes the game less challenging and i end up picking up a lot more pieces.
- Mulligan - Allowing a player to go again if their tree doesn't topple and it only moves an inch or two. We started with this in our first play testing but dropped it after one player did this on nearly every turn.
External Links[edit | edit source]
- Landing Zone is listed on BoardGameGeek.
- Rules in French available in pdf format at www.jeux-icehouse.com
| Entered in the Icehouse Game Design Competition, Spring 2009 |
|---|
| Winner: Apophis 2nd: Landing Zone 3rd: 3-High |
| 4th: Diamond Mine 5th: Who Made The Team |