A card game for 2 players, © by Bill de Veas, 2020-03-31
2-player co-op or competitive game. Save — or overrun — the city!
A 5x5 grid represents a neighborhood of city blocks.
There are two competing forces in the city: Medics (red cards), and Plague Rats (black cards).
The goal of each player is to secure as many blocks as they can for their side, which will determine whether the neighborhood survives or falls.
This game uses a standard French-suited card deck (52 cards, no Jokers).
Before shuffling, remove one of the black 10 cards from the deck; set it aside but leave it accessible for later.
Shuffle, then deal 13 cards to each player. Lay out the next 25 cards in a 5x5 grid, face-down.
Players should determine which side they want to play on, and also choose between themselves whether to discuss their alignment up-front, or keep it a secret to be revealed upon the start of the game.
(Tip: If you have more (and/or better) cards for one side, consider playing for that side.)
In any case, the two players will either be on the same side (playing cooperatively against opposing forces in the city) or on opposing sides (thus competing against each other as well).
Card values are as follows:
Except for each side's special cards, pip card ranks denote the strength of force for the side associated with the card's color.
Face cards:
Special card notes:
At the start of the game, the two players can reveal their alignment by the following method: each takes one of their cards that represents their chosen side, and puts it face-down on the table. At the count of three, both simultaneously reveal their card, then return it to their hand.
Players take turns during which they first reveal a city block card, then play one of their cards from their hand onto it.
If the block card and played card(s) are of opposing sides, then:
If the block card and played card(s) are all of the same side, then the block is considered "reinforced" by the owning side.
If both players are on the same team, here are two additional rules which allow the city's high cards to be matched or defeated through teamwork.
After each player has played at least 12 cards from hand, there will be one city block remaining.
Reveal this card. Turn order ends at this point.
If either player has a card left in their hand, they may each choose whether or not to play their last card on the final block, in any order.
If neither player has a card left in their hand, then either player may choose to play the leftover card on the final block.
Review each city block, counting the wins for each side and ignoring draws.
Any block owned by one side scores 2 points for that side, with +1 if it's reinforced (that is, no opposition on the block).
If the Medics won, the neighborhood survives.
If the Plague Rats won, the neighborhood falls.
Simulate a battle for the entire city by playing through several rounds of the game, giving each neighborhood a unique name.
For a light change, don't reserve a Swarm card during the setup. Rather, deal out the usual 13 cards per player and 25-card grid, and leave the final undealt card face-down for use in resolving the final city block. This puts both Swarm cards into the main game and introduces a random element to the endgame.
Try adding one or both of the following conditions to the game:
In this mode, the two red Aces are instead Ambulances: mobile but otherwise identical to Field Hospitals.
Whether revealed as a city block, or played from hand, a player may, after revealing a Plague city block, pick up an Ambulance card from a Medic-owned block to play on the newly revealed block. They must then play another card from hand on the place from where the Ambulance was moved.
Both players are Medics. As part of the setup, extract one Field Hospital card and all the black 2s, 4s, 6s, 8s and 10s from the deck. Deal the spades to one player, and the clubs to the other player, as the first five cards of their hand. Leave the extracted Field Hospital card out. Then, shuffle the deck and deal the remaining cards as usual. In the Endgame, the leftover Field Hospital card may be played on any city block, adding 11 Medic strength to that block. In addition to the usual scoring, count all drawn blocks as worth 1 point for the Medics.
Both players are Plague Rats. As part of the setup, extract both Swarm cards from the deck and set them aside. When laying out the grid, lay down both Swarm cards, one atop the other, in place of the center city block. There is no leftover card in this variant. Your cooperative goal is "infection without detection", by getting each block either "drawn", or "infiltrated" (still Medic-owned but within 2 points of drawn), while actually owning as few blocks as possible.
If at any time you have 2 adjacent reinforced Plague blocks (including the center), the infection becomes too obvious and the game immediately ends in a loss for the Plague Rats. Fortunately, it's usually pretty easy to avoid reinforcing a Plague block.
Scoring: Score 3 points for each drawn block, 1 point for each infiltrated block, and -3 for each Plague-owned block.
As with the above scenario variants, feel free to tweak the players' starting decks or the contents or layout of the city grid, once you're familiar with the general setup (i.e., 13 cards per player, 25-card grid, 1 leftover).