Published by Queen Games.
Designed by Wolfgang Kramer.
Translated by Bob Scherer-Hoock.
Each player receives a number of expedition cards at the start of the game. These cards are research missions for certain places in the world. The same picture is also shown on the game board at the corresponding place.
Three independent, neutral expeditions are taken by the players across the world map. If an expedition reaches a place that the player has a research mission for, the card is laid aside and the player receives one point for it. And whoever at the end has collected the most points wins the game.
The game board is put in the middle of the table. One recognizes the continents of our earth. Across a route network (black lines) many different colored points are connected together.
All places to which a picture belongs on the game board are possible research-destinations, for each player may hold expedition cards that belong to them. The point of the destination has the same color as the card. When an expedition reaches such a place, all players check the research missions in their hands. The person who has a matching card may lay it aside even if it is not their move.
The green and red stations enable special actions for the players, as soon as an expedition reaches such a station.
Whoever leads an expedition to a green point may immediately place another arrow at the end of any expedition.
Whoever leads an expedition to a red point gets a trip coupon from the bank.
At the right and left game board sides there are three stations marked with white arrows. At these locations a connection to the opposite game board sides exists.
The stack of cards is shuffled and each player receives: 12 cards - with 2-3 players; 9 cards - with 4-6 players. (Translator's note: The quick-start rules supplied with Terra X say to deal out 8 cards with 4-6 players, which means there's a misprint somewhere. The original Wildlife Adventure rules say to deal out 8 cards to 4-6 player, so take your pick.)
Furthermore six cards are put openly alongside the game board. These are public research missions that may be fulfilled by any player and earn an additional one point in the scoring at the end of the game. Each of these public research missions must be at least three spaces from the starting point.New cards are drawn until all six missions fulfill this condition.
The remaining cards are again shuffled and placed face down in a stack beside the game board.
All players look first for all their research destinations on the game board, for which they have drawn the corresponding cards. The picture and text on the card provide more information. Furthermore each place on the game board has a dot in the color of the game card. These colors have been assigned to continents so that each player may swiftly find his goals.
Each player must classify as specially important four of his research missions. Using the game chips in his color, players mark the places on the game board that they particularly want to reach during the game. If he succeeds in this, he receives one additional point for each research destination with chips. Each chip that is not reached, however, is minus one point at the end of the game. Furthermore one should consider that the locations marked with chips are known by all other players!
The arrows are sorted by colors and put beside the game board for all to reach. Each player, when his turn comes, takes any one arrow and he places it between two points, i.e. on the black line.
All arrows of one expedition have the same color. Each of the three expeditions goes out from the starting point and over the course of the game form a protracted route.
A player is chosen as bank holder and distributes to each player at the start of the game three trip coupons. Through handing over these coupons to the bank, players can execute additional actions during their move. At some points on the game board players can receive new coupons from the bank. Anyhow with trip coupons one can well manage a turn.
The cards that each player has received at the outset are his own research missions. He should look after them and try to see that the expeditions travel, preferably quickly, to the places for which he possesses a card.
No matter if the expedition through his move or that of another player reaches a location, in either case, even if it's not his own turn, the affected mission is settled immediately and the card placed face up before him.
The research missions of a player are on principle secret; only when the mission is fulfilled is the card uncovered. The lone exception is the missions that have been marked by a colored chip of the player on the world map.
At the outset of the game all players mark four places, for which they naturally must have a research mission, with the chip of their color.
The most aged player begins and places a chip. He is followed by all other players in clockwise order. This process is repeated until all players have placed four markers.
One should consider that with the selection of the places, by their markings, the missions are no longer secret.
Marked research destinations must be at least 2 spaces removed from the starting space.
The public research missions are considered to be for each player. Whoever leads an expedition to the destination of a such mission takes the corresponding card and lays it in front of him. You get one additional point at the end of the game.
Subsequent the public research mission stock is replenished again to six. The card that is uncovered is valid for each case, no matter how far it is from the starting point and even if an expedition has already traveled to this place.
The expeditions are neutral. They "belong to" no player and their color serves only for discrimination into three separate expeditions.
Plays proceeds in clockwise order. Per game turn, one may place one arrow. The arrows must always be put on a position between two points.
The oldest player starts. He takes one arrow of an any color and puts it by the starting point on one of the six positions. But the arrowhead always points from the origin to the next station.
Then comes the next player in the chain. He now has the choice of continuing the expedition in the same color or beginning a new expedition with a different color.
If he starts a new expedition, he takes a different colored arrow and puts it on a free position at the starting point. Each new expedition starts at the starting point, and at no time is there more than three expeditions.
Otherwise the players in their move always have the free choice of which expedition they want to continue and which direction they want to take. But players can always only build further at the end of an expedition route.
Branches off are not allowed except immediately after the construction of a bow. Also a turnabout by 180 degrees may not be placed. Arrows of one color may never lie parallel on one position. Different colored expeditions are allowed to be placed parallel to another route, i.e. they may use the same position between two points.
Illustration 1: Not allowed: branches off! (Only in the trap of tie permissible!) Not allowed: a turnabout, or a parallel construction in the same color.
Illustration 2: Allowed: the parallel construction among different colored expeditions.
One, by use of trip-coupons or by the reaching of a green station-point, may place more arrows than allowed on this or on different expedition routes.
If an expedition reaches the left or right game board side (at the station 1, 2 or 3), the expedition may continue on the opposite side. You must however continue from the station with the same number.
Each player tries to steer the expeditions so that they reach the places for which he possesses research missions. If an arrow reaches such a destination the player may reveal the corresponding card and lay it beside them. This mission counts for one point at the end of the game. Furthermore if he has a chip on this place, he removes it and also counts it as one point at the end of the game.
Also if a place is reached during the game move of another player, a player may lay aside a matching mission card and remove a chip if one is there. One should therefore pay attention to the moves of the other players!
If a player realizes only later that he could have laid aside an expedition card, he may catch up on this only if the expedition is still at this place. If the expedition is already further along, he may no longer lay aside this card. He must try rather to guide the route of an expedition to this place again before he can fulfill this mission.
When an expedition leads back to its own route, i.e. a bow forms, the player then may ad another arrow to this expedition, in fact at any point on this route. Only in this event is a second branch allowed!
The new start for the additional arrow may be chosen freely. But it must be a point that the expedition was already at, i.e. a like-colored arrowhead must be present on this point. The arrowhead of the new location is as of now the end of the route. Here the expedition continues.
A player may form in his move, per expedition, only one bow!
The meaning of the point at which the a bow comes about naturally stays the same. At a green point e.g. the player may place two more arrows - one for the establishment of the bow (an arrow of the same color) and one for the green point (an arrow in any color).
Please note: A bow can also form from the removal of an arrow! (See: 5. Trip coupons)
An expedition has finished if no arrows of this color are available. In this event only the remaining expeditions can continue.
A player may use a maximum of two trip coupons per move to execute additional actions at the beginning or at the end of his game turn.
The following additional actions are possible by handing over a trip coupon:
We recommend: Whoever uses a trip coupon uses, place it first of all on the words "Terra-X" on the game board and pays it to the bank only at the end of his move. In this way one can see that a player hasn't used more than two trip coupons per move.
An example of the use of trip-coupons: An expedition is at Marib (Yemen, Asia). The next player puts an arrow to the red point. He takes a trip-coupon from the bank and puts with his others. Now he decides to use a trip coupon. He takes one from his stockpile and puts it on the game board. Nest he takes an arrow (in our example, of the same expedition) and puts this to the green station. He therefore immediately again places an arrow and leads this expedition further to the red station. He again takes a trip coupon from the bank. Then he immediately may use this one and he also places it on the game board and puts one more arrow to the green point. For it he again places an arrow and so that the expedition reaches Borobudur. He has now altogether used two trip coupons so his move is finished. The coupons are now given to the bank.
If a player uses a trip coupon to remove an arrow, he leads the expedition to its last point back.
If this is a research destination, players now have a new opportunity to lay aside the corresponding research mission, if one has neglected this previously. If this leads the expedition back to a red or green station, then the corresponding rules (5.1 and 5.2) apply. (Translator's note: My copy of the rules has no sections 5.1 and 5.2, but the intent of the rules is clearly that the player gets the benefit of the red or green dots when an arrow is removed and the expedition in effect backtracks to one of those positions.)
An example for the removal of an arrow: The expedition is now in Borobudur. The next player pays a trip coupon and takes the last arrow that leads to Borobudur off. The expedition is now at a green station, i.e. the player may place one additional arrow. He puts this arrow to Angkor and with his actual game move leads the expedition along to Tschangan. Although he could use one more trip coupon before he finishes his move.
The last option to use trip coupons is to exchange a research mission. The player using a trip -coupon hands in one of his research cards, puts it beneath the stack and receives instead two new cards from the stack (provided there are still some available). He chooses one of the cards and takes it into his hand, the other is again concealed beneath the stack.
When a player lays aside his last expedition card, each player, that in this round has not yet moved was, gets one more play. Then the game has finished.
The game ceases immediately though when no more arrows can be played.
The research missions and game chips are settled now:
All points are added. The winner is the player with the most points.
All rules apply from the basic game except for the following additions.
At the start of the game players receive all chips of their color. Everyone may decide now to place as many game chips as they want. Decision on where the chips are placed must agree with the basic rules. Who there are no more chips that he wants to place, he puts the unused chips back into the box.
Also in this variant: each gathered game chip counts one plus point, each chip that remains on the game board at the end counts one minus point.
Whoever forms a bow, the additional arrow is placed only at a point of the bow and not, as in the basic game, at an any point in the expedition.
Three points are here to note:
a) One may further place only at the point of the last formed bow of the expedition.
(The examples in the following illustrations demonstrate the course of the last bow. The numbers specify the order of play).
Illustration 3: The expedition my build further only at the points 2, 3, 9 and 10.
b) In the event that several bows of one expedition criss-cross itself and the proper course of the last bow at first look is not obvious, the directions of the arrows should denote the last built bow.
Illustration 4: The expedition builds further here across the stations 11, 12, 13 and 14, and it has closed one more bow. If one looks at the last point of this new bow (station: 14) the course the arrows follows becomes clear, that the new bow includes the following stations: 14, 7, 8, 3, 9, 10, 2, 11, 12, 13. From these points the expedition may now further proceed.
c) In the event that an arrow establishes several bows, the expedition is always considered to be in the shorter bow. And only from this end may more be built.
Illustration 5: Here the expedition has continued across stations 15 and 16, and it was again closed a bow. One realizes that there are now two possibilities to determine the last bow. Go out from the last point of the bow at station 16 to the first possible bow over the points of 16, 10, 2, 3, 9 and again to 15. The second possible bow travels across 16, 10, 2, 11, 12, 13, 14, 7, 8, 3, 9 and 15. In this event there are two possibilities, so it is always the shorter bow that is considered.
Variant B can be added to the rules of the basic game or the rules of Variant A. The following rules come in addition:
For the course of this game the chips are considered to be:
The winner in this variant is the one player who first gathers all his game chips. If no one succeeds in this, then the winner is the one with the most chips. If this is a tie, then the spaces are counted to the completion of the missions still on the board. The winner then is the player who would take the fewest possible moves to reach the remaining missions. If there is a tie here too, then the game is a draw.
For those who are familiar with Wildlife Adventure, an earlier version of Terra X/Expedition, here are the changes:
No blue dots on the Terra X board;
No chance cards in Terra X; instead red dots on the board mean you pick up one trip coupon;
No obstacle chips are used in Terra X
Chips have been added. Each player has their own color. Four are placed before the start of the game to mark certain target missions and make them twice as valuable (and to penalize players who don't reach these goals;
Different expeditions may run parallel to each other in Terra X (not allowed in Wildlife Adventure);
Branches off expeditions are allowed when expeditions loop back on themselves to form "bows" (branches are never allowed in Wildlife Adventure);
Trip coupons in Terra X only have three uses, 1) Place an additional arrow; 2) Remove an arrow from the end of an expedition, 3) Exchange a research mission card. All of these uses cost one coupon (unlike Wildlife Adventure, nothing costs two coupons). Also, when an arrow is removed, the dot you go back to takes effect in Terra X, e.g. if you go back to a red dot you receive a trip coupon, if you go back to a green dot you lay another arrow. Also, when you exchange research mission cards, you put one back, draw two and keep the one you like best (in Wildlife Adventure you just take the top card and live with it).
Scoring differs in that the chips come into play. 1 extra point for reaching missions marked with chips; 1 minus point for failing to reach missions marked with chips.
How to convert Wildlife Adventure to Terra X's rules as a variant:
The Game Cabinet - editor@gamecabinet.com - Ken TidwellTreat the blue dots on the Wildlife Adventure board as green dots, and treat the three connecting spaces on the sides of the board additionally as red dots (though they obviously still connect to the opposite side).
Find some chips in different colors and give four to each player.
Ignore the chance cards and treat the red dots as spaces where you gain a trip coupon.
Then simply follow the Terra X/Expedition rules.