Alien Invasion Pie Fight™
An Out of This World Game for 3-6 People
Flagpole Edition
Rules and Clarifications
A Blood and Cardstock Game
by Joan Wendland
© 2011
Man, this invasion trip is taking forever! Your cramped living quarters have ratcheted up the tension in the crew. You can’t wait to get to Earth to unleash your neurotoxin pies, so you’re just going to have to throw them at each other. Now clearly these aren’t normal pies. They are propelled by jets at the bottom of the plate and launched psionically. They have the following properties:
- Certain pies are more effective against certain adversaries
- Pies cling to the site they hit, and render that site useless
- Pie throwing is a mental action – you don’t need to use your manipulators to do it
Now that pie throwing is established as an action, let’s talk about actions. Actions occur in a certain order because they take time– and the time is directly proportional to the difficulty of the action. All cards are marked for the phase they happen in. All cards are considered actions and you only get one action per round. Some actions require the use of a manipulator, or a tentacle cluster, or your head, or even your torso – they are clearly marked. If the required body part is covered in pie the action will not execute. Important safety tip – manipulators are not tentacle clusters, and tentacle clusters are not manipulators. Read cards carefully.
Actions are resolved by phase. All actions within a phase are considered to happen simultaneously. When pies hit they stick unless an action prevents them. If all 6 regions of your body are covered in pie you’re out. If you’ve managed to grow a second head then all 7 regions must be covered in pie. Both heads are region 1 for targeting purposes and can only hold one pie each before sliding occurs. Last thing standing wins!
The first time playing through the deck, all level 1 actions leave the game after they’ve been played rather than go into the discard pile. After reshuffling all level 2 cards will leave the game after being played. If you reshuffle again then the 4’s leave the game and there is nothing but pie. Did I mention I don’t like games to last too long?
Setup: Pick which crewman you are by selecting the six cards your body is made out of – one card for each limb (or set of limbs), your torso, and your head – and put them face up in front of you. They are numbered one through six for the purposes of targeting. Arrange them to look body shaped if you like – it’s not necessary. Give each player a set of targeting tokens – one of each color represented by the players. Deal 5 cards to each player from the action deck.
Play: Each player selects the one action they will do each round and plays it face down. Then each player will place one colored token in his closed hand to signify who the action is aimed at. Defensive actions should be aimed at yourself, offensive actions aimed at others. Defensive actions will have a big D on their cards. Everyone count to three together, yell PIE FIGHT, drop your target token onto your card, then flip the card face up. Resolve the actions in phase order. This means that if the Navigator throws a pie (phase 3) at the Pilot who played a dodge (phase 1) it misses because the Pilot has already dodged. Hopefully this will be straightforward. If a pie strikes your head in phase 3 and the action you wanted to cast in phase 4 needs a clear head it will fail because your head has pie on it by the time you try the action. If you are completely covered in pie after phase 3 you are out – no phase 4 actions will complete. After resolving all actions everyone draw one card to replace. You always draw one card, even if the result of play adds or removes cards from your hand.
Pies: There are three kinds of pies: Random Pies, Directed Pies, and Nemesis Pies.
- Random Pies hit random regions based on a d6 die roll. Rolling a 1 will place a pie on region 1 (the head) etc.
- Directed Pies hit wherever the player who threw it SAYS it hits.
- Nemesis Pies are Directed pies against one crewman. They are Random if aimed at any other crewman. That doesn’t mean you can’t throw it at another crewman, it means it will be a Random pie except when thrown against the crewman with a weakness against it. Pies are marked both by name and color to show which crewman will be direct hit by them.
Random Pies are resolved first, then Nemesis Pies, then Directed Pies since they require more concentration. If a Nemesis Pie is thrown at its special crewman, then mirrored, sliced or otherwise redirected, it will become random since it is no longer targeted against the player most affected by it. Conversely, if you can redirect a Nemesis Pie at the player who has a weakness against it, you may direct the hit. Redirecting Directed Pies allows the redirecting player to pick the location of the hit – NOT – the player that threw it.
Unless an appropriate defensive action is used, a pie that is aimed at you sticks. Place the card on the region it hit and leave it there unless you play a card that can remove it. The first and second pies that hit a region stick. Place the cards on the region. If a pie is targeted to a region that already holds 2 pies it’s too gunky to stick there now so it will slide. Pies slide by the numbers so a pie that was rolled to land on region 2 will slide to region 3. The slide will continue if the next region is “full” until it reaches a region has less than 2 pies on it, then sticks. This includes sliding from region 6 to region 1. Please don’t get fussy about gravity – don’t forget about the jets under the pie plate. (Sliding rule credit: Mark Morgan)
Reset rule: If your hand contains no cards that you can execute (no pies or no actions that will execute due to the amount of pie on you), play any card face down but use ALL of the targeting tokens when you target. This indicates you will take no action this turn except throwing away all your cards and drawing 5 cards to replace them.
End game: The moment all your regions are covered in pie you are OUT. Remove the pies from your body and put them in the discard pile. Put the cards from your hand into the discard pile as well. Pout for a bit, then cheer as others are pied out. When there are only two players left, you enter sudden death. In sudden death if you have a pie you MUST play it. If you play any other type of card in sudden death the other player may insist on seeing your hand to prove there are no pies in it. You may use the reset rule in sudden death if you need to.
Clarifications: Limbs are manipulators and tentacle clusters, not your head or torso. A region is any one of the six body regions. You are all ambidextrous. Projectiles include all the pies, and the pie plates as well. It is possible to have simultaneous pie hits that end the game with no winner. All action cards are discarded after each round except for the cards that grow or replace body parts, and the Body Armor, Bubble Helmet (Thanks AJ!).
Try not to over-think your play – this is a fast paced fun game. Ganging up on someone IS fair. Throwing pies is NOT violent; please tell your local PTA etc. to calm down and have some fun.
Let the pies fall where they may – Joan
Copyright: © Joan Wendland 2011