Cartographers

Give everyone a map and choose four goals

Use Thunderworks Games' original English Cartographers: A Roll Player Tale, with the 2019-credit base rulebook. This guide's main game seats 2–8 people together and uses wilderness map side A. Leave Heroes cards, skills and expansion maps in their boxes. Give each person a fresh sheet and pencil; write a name at the top so passed maps return to the right person. The game includes four pencils, so supply more for a larger group. Everyone needs writing space and a view of the shared cards.

Lay out edict cards A, B, C and D in that order. Sort the 16 scoring cards into their four back-design groups, shuffle each group separately, and draw one from each. Put one goal below each edict in any order; return the other goals to the box. Keep these four goals in place for the entire game. Read their scoring conditions aloud before beginning, including whether they reward individual squares, connected clusters or completed lines.

Stack season cards with spring on top, followed by summer, fall and winter. Their time limits are 8, 8, 7 and 6; their scoring pairs are A+B, B+C, C+D and D+A. These numbers measure revealed cards, not minutes. Shuffle the four ambush cards as a separate face-down pile. Shuffle all 13 explore cards, including the two ruins cards, then take one unseen ambush and shuffle it into the explore deck. Put that deck beside the seasons.

A mountain is already filled and cannot be drawn over. A printed ruins symbol marks an otherwise empty square that you may draw over. Shapes need not touch earlier drawings. For scoring, adjacent means sharing a side; diagonal touching does not count. A cluster is one or more same-terrain squares joined through shared sides.

Reveal, draw together, then check the season

Handle ruins and pass maps for ambushes

Ruins: When one or both ruins cards appear, the next terrain explore card must be drawn so at least one square of its shape covers an unfilled ruins symbol. Two ruins cards still require only one ruins square, not two. You may cover ruins during an ordinary reveal too. If no offered shape can legally cover an unfilled ruin, or all your ruins are already filled, use the one-square fallback anywhere with any terrain except mountain. It need not cover ruins.

Ambush: Pass every map to the neighbor in the arrow's direction. With two people, swap maps whichever way the arrow points. On the map you receive, draw the entire displayed monster shape in empty squares, rotating or mirroring it if useful. You choose its legal location; it need not cover ruins or touch other monsters. Mark every square as a monster. If that whole shape cannot fit, draw one monster square in an empty square instead. Check whether the new monsters complete any mountain surrounds, so the owner receives those coins.

Return maps to their named owners and remove the revealed ambush from the game. It never goes back into the explore deck. If an ambush appeared after ruins, resolve monsters normally, then carry the ruins requirement to the next terrain explore card; the ambush does not consume that requirement. Continue the usual reveal/draw/check flow.

Monsters remain filled squares for all later placement and scoring. You do not erase or defeat them in this edition. Filling the empty squares alongside them can reduce future penalties. Before passing a map, identify its owner and keep your pencil marks clear enough for that person to score.

Score the whole map each season

At spring's end, evaluate the goals under A and B. Summer scores B and C, fall scores C and D, and winter scores D and A. Score your entire current map according to each active card, including terrain drawn in earlier seasons. Write the two goal totals in the season's boxes. A goal scores twice across the game, so an earlier useful pattern may earn points again.

Then add one point for every coin marked on your track, including coins earned in earlier seasons. Coins are never spent or cleared. Finally subtract one point for each empty square sharing a side with at least one monster square. Count each such empty square once, even if two or more monsters touch it. Count the empty squares, not the monsters; ignore diagonal contact. Add those two goal scores and coins, then subtract the penalty to get that season's total.

For example, goals worth 12 and 9, five marked coins, and four distinct empty squares beside monsters give 12+9+5−4 = 22. Record the monster penalty separately; it is also the final tiebreaker. An untouched ruins square is still empty, while mountains, monsters and side B's wasteland squares count as filled for goals that ask for filled spaces.

Unless this was winter, remove the current season card to expose the next. Gather and reshuffle all explore cards, both revealed and unrevealed. Keep any ambush that was never revealed in the deck. Add one new unseen ambush from the separate pile, then shuffle again. Leave your maps, coins and four goals as they are; clear the previous season's reveal column and start its time count at zero.

After winter's scoring, add all four seasonal totals. Highest total wins. If tied, compare the total points lost to monsters across all four seasons: the smallest loss wins. If still tied, share the victory. The printed numbers in the lower corners of scoring cards are for solo rating; do not subtract them in this multiplayer game. For another game, take fresh sheets and repeat setup.

Keep the map readable and the group together

Before the first reveal, check that everyone can identify the four goals and knows which pair scores first. Focus on spring's A and B without hiding the later goals. Allow soft conversation and rules questions; wait for a clear finished signal before turning the next card. Each player chooses their own drawing, even when discussing possibilities.

Show doubtful shapes before committing pencil marks. Verify the whole shape, any ruins requirement and every covered square. Use the scoring card's diagrams and the rulebook's scoring-card explanations for disputes about that goal; do not change its meaning midway through the game. Connected terrain uses side contact only. Keep patterns and labels readable rather than judging drawing quality.

This guide suggests two house remedies for unusual errors. Correct a clearly mistaken drawing before the next reveal, restoring its terrain and any coin it incorrectly earned. Once later shapes depend on it, agree on a fair repair together rather than silently redesigning a map. If a map has no empty square left, skip its drawing and continue its seasonal scoring while others play; never draw over a filled square. The base rulebook does not specify a fully filled-map procedure.

Ask the group about drawing on one another's sheets before starting. If they would prefer a purely personal mapping puzzle, agree on the no-monsters house variation at setup. Use the same format for everyone throughout the game.

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