FIRST CONTACT: YOUR TOWN! The Body-Snatching Alien Invasion Game GAME OVERVIEW What if intelligent beings from another planet decided to forcibly take possession of planet Earth by taking over people's bodies? And what if the place they landed to begin implementation of this take-over was YOUR town? And--what if YOU were the only one who KNEW about it? THAT'S the premise of "FIRST CONTACT: YOUR Town!" Using the game and your imagination, the future of the planet is in YOUR hands! You race against the clock to convince fellow townspeople of the evil alien threat, and identify and destroy the aliens themselves. The challenge is, you don't know who's a real townsperson, and who's really an alien occupying a townsperson's body! You determine this during the course of the game by a combination of confrontation and deduction. You've got twelve hours to rid the town of aliens before their "mother ship" arrives. If even ONE alien survives, contact will be made with the "mother ship," the invasion will commence, and all humanity will be wiped out. Can YOU save the planet? Let's find out!... PREPARING TO PLAY First, separate the perforated townspeople and town building cards. Spread out the game materials before you, making sure that the confrontation cards are within easy reach. Place the colored timer token on the clock space marked "12" on the game board. Shuffle the townspeople, alien, and building cards together in one deck. Shuffle the deck WELL, especially the first time you play. Turn the deck face UP, and deal out 25 cards--face-up--in an orderly arrangement on the table. A five-by-five alignment works well, but feel free to use any arrangement you might prefer. It is IMPORTANT to NOT look at the backs of the cards as you arrange them, so you don't know who the aliens are! Each time you play, this game will be somewhat different. Thus, you may have two, three, four, or more buildings in your "town," depending on which cards are dealt. You'll also have a varying ratio of humans to aliens. The game is designed to have this quality, so don't be concerned. However, if for some reason you don't like the layout you've drawn, feel free to gather up the cards, shuffle again, and re-deal. Once the 25 cards are arranged, turn the deck over so that you are looking at the BACK of the bottom cards, and select ONE "human" (un-marked) card to be "you." Place this card in the "action area" to the right of the game board. Put the rest of the townspeople and building cards in the game box and close the lid. You are now ready to begin.
PLAYING THE GAME The game consists of twelve turns or "hours" (actual game time is about 30 minutes). Each turn has a deployment phase and an execution phase. DEPLOYMENT PHASE: In the deployment phase, you decide which convinced townspeople will be sent into town on "confrontation missions," and which--if any--will be sent to guard buildings. (At the start of the game, this will be irrelevant, since it will be only YOU--there will be no point in guarding buildings. You need to convince people! Once you have convinced other townspeople, though, you will give more thought to how to deploy them. As the game moves on, deployment becomes more and more of an important strategy.) EXECUTION PHASE: Once you have decided on deployment, it's time to begin executing individual confrontations between townspeople. Any "convinced" townsperson may be sent to carry out ONE confrontation per turn. (At the beginning of the game, there is only ONE convinced townsperson--you--so there will be only ONE confrontation mission in the first hour/ turn.) CONFRONTATIONS Confrontations involve a match of either intellect and credibility or physical strength. All townspeople are rated for both. Humans can interact with each other using either quality, depending on the mode of confrontation. Alien versus human interaction is ALWYAS determined by a match-up of physical strength, REGARDLESS of which confrontation mode the human chooses. There are three possible modes of confrontation... FRIENDLY: The "friendly" mode is the best mode for convincing humans. However, it requires you to lower your guard, which allows aliens ample opportunity to escape once you determine that they are impostors. CAUTIOUS: The "cautious" mode is exactly that, a balanced approach. It is more difficult to convince fellow humans in "cautious" confrontations than in "friendly," but it also is easier to destroy alien impostors before they can get away! HOSTILE: The "hostile" confrontation assumes blatant, outright physical aggression. It is the best mode for destroying townspeople--alien, OR human! Sometimes, "hostile" confrontations occur in buildings. (See "ALIEN FLEES TO BUILDING," below.) There is a separate results card for these confrontations. In such confrontations, whoever is hiding in the building has a marked advantage. This is the ONLY situation in the game where an alien will attack a human. Aliens attack only when they encounter humans as they are trying to escape into a building after being "outed." However, a human may attack an alien hiding in a building at any time. Once your townspeople are deployed, each turn follows this procedure...
STEP ONE: Decide on the confrontation target and mode. EXAMPLE: You begin the game as the "Delinquent Kid." You might decide to confront the school teacher in a "friendly" mode, or take a "cautious" approach in confronting the gas station attendant. STEP TWO: Turn over the card of the confronted townsperson and discover whether they are an alien or a human. STEP THREE: Go to the proper confrontation card, and read the details to determine what MIGHT happen, depending on the dice roll. STEP FOUR: Roll the special alien invasion dice to find out what DOES happen! Here are the possible results of confrontations, if it turns out the townsperson is an ALIEN... ALIEN DESTROYED: If the dice roll indicates that the alien is destroyed, place its card in the "alien" section of the TOWN MORGUE section of the game board. Send the confronting convinced human to the "waiting area" of the game board, to be deployed again next turn. ALIEN FLEES TO BUILDING: If you confront an alien, but don't manage to destroy it, the alien will automatically flee to the nearest building. (If there is more than one building, the same distance, the alien chooses in a clockwise direction.) If there is a convinced human already in the building, the alien will automatically attack the human. Resolve these confrontations using the "Confrontations in BUILDINGS" card, and send the losers to the town morgue. Send the original confronting townsperson--the one who sent the alien fleeing to the building--to the waiting area. Here are the possible results if it turns out the townsperson is a human... HUMAN CONVINCED: This is the result you want--you'll have an ally! Place both townspeople cards in the "waiting area" of the game board to be deployed next turn. NOTE that humans can NOT be convinced using the "hostile" mode. HUMAN NOT CONVINCED: The unconvinced townsperson's card remains where it is in the town area. The confronting convinced townsperson's card is moved to the "waiting area" to be deployed again next turn. HUMAN DESTROYED: Move the destroyed townsperson's card to the TOWN MORGUE. Humans are only destroyed in "hostile" confrontations, either by another human in the town area, or by an alien in a building. If the destroyed townsperson was attacked by a human, then the surviving human's card goes to the "waiting area" to be deployed next turn. If destroyed by an alien, the alien remains in the building. STEP FIVE: Repeat the confrontation procedure for EACH convinced townsperson in the "action area." (NOTE once again that at first, there will be only ONE confrontation per turn--until you successfully convince another townsperson and enlist their help!) When ALL convinced townspeople have carried out their missions, the hour/turn ends and the clock advances. Move the colored timer token to the next hour.
STEP SIX: Move all convinced townspeople from the "waiting area" to the "action area," and repeat the procedure for the new hour/turn. Continue doing this until one of the following occurs... TIME TOKEN REACHES 12: The game ENDS immediately when the token moves from 11 to 12. At that point, all townsperson cards remaining in the town area are turned over, and the game's winner is determined. If even ONE alien remains, the humans lose the game. NOTE that it is possible that not all townspeople will be convinced, or even confronted. ALL ALIENS ARE DESTROYED: Game over, humans win! ALL CONVINCED TOWNSPEOPLE ARE DESTROYED: This would happen only if the last/ only convinced townsperson was destroyed trying to flush an alien out of a building. In this case, then the game ends and the aliens win. NOTE that there could still be unconvinced humans left in town. The aliens still win. SPECIAL RULES Only the FIRST confrontation with a human townsperson can be "friendly." If it's not successful, the other townsperson is automatically suspicious on succeeding confrontations, requiring a cautious approach. Aliens always flee to the NEAREST building, regardless of whether it is vacant or not. If two buildings are equally near, the alien always starts north and moves clockwise. (NOTE: In the unlikely event that NO building cards are dealt out, shuffle again and re-deal.) When forced to attack humans in buildings, if there is more than one human, aliens always attack the weakest human first--those COWARDS! In human attacks on aliens in buildings, however, the human may attack any alien, in any order. TWO OR MORE PLAYERS COOPERATIVE VERSION: The game can be played with two, three, or four players, each directing the actions of their own band of convinced humans. In this scenario, each of the players selects a townsperson and places his card in the waiting area. Roll a die to see who goes first, second, and so on. Player number one begins the game by moving his townsperson's card into the "action area" where he conducts his deployment and execution phases. Afterwards, each of the other players do likewise, in turn. When each player has completed his portion of the turn, the clock advances one hour. In order to keep the sense of urgency in the multi-player game, the clock must be advanced at the start of the game. In a two-player game, the game begins at two o'clock. A three player game starts at four o'clock, and a four player game begins at six. SECRET ALIEN VERSION: The game can have an added twist with multiple players if, at the beginning of the game, each player's townsperson identification as alien or human is kept secret.
This way, any or all--or NONE--of the players might actually be aliens themselves! In this version, the players may NOT at ANY time during the game, reveal their human/alien identity by turning over their card. Players may STATE their identification--truthfully or not!--but their cards may only be turned over at the END of the game. (Of course, aliens CAN be identified using the deductive method--if their human counterpart is confronted in the town area.) Also, players may not confront each other, only unconfronted townspeople. Players who draw "human" townspeople play the game normally. Players who draw "alien" townspeople, however, must play by a slightly different set of rules. Alien players may conduct themselves as human, using "friendly," "cautious" or "hostile" modes, so long as their cover is not "blown" by the revelation of their human counterpart in the town area. If an alien player is "outed," he must immediately do as any alien would do, flee to the nearest building. If he is destroyed there by a human hiding in the building, he is out of the game. If not, then when it is his turn, he may either remain in the building, or, if he wishes, may venture out and conduct a "hostile" confrontation with his choice of unconfronted townspeople. If it turns out the townsperson is also an alien, no hostility occurs, both return to the building. Otherwise, the confrontation is resolved normally, and the alien returns to the building. The outcome of the game is determined in the usual way. If at the end of the game, there are ANY aliens remaining, the aliens win and the humans lose. In the event that the "secret alien's" cover was not blown, then at the end of the game, the human player(s) get one final chance to destroy the alien(s) using a hostile confrontation. The alien(s) are allowed to hide in a building. If the hostile confrontation fails to destroy the alien, then the aliens win. SCORING OPTION Since every game of FIRST CONTACT is a little bit different, you may find it interesting to use this scoring method which grades the performance of the convinced townspeople. That way, you can compare outcomes of different games to see which was the better performance. 1) Add up the total number of aliens and humans involved in the game. If the aliens outnumbered the humans, score five points for every extra alien. If the humans out-numbered the aliens, SUBTRACT five points for every extra human. 2) Go to the TOWN MORGUE and total up the number of destroyed aliens and humans. Score ten points for every destroyed alien. SUBTRACT ten points for every destroyed human. 3) Adjust the score based on the ability of the townsperson whose card you chose to start the game. Check BOTH credibility and strength grades, and add or subtract points based on the following schedule... (A) subtract ten points; (B) subtract five points; (C) no adjustment; (D) add five points; (F) add ten points.
EXAMPLE: Let's score a game where there were twelve aliens and ten humans. The humans won, so the morgue contained all twelve aliens along with seven destroyed humans. The person you chose at the beginning was the waitress, rated C for credibility and F for strength. 1) Since the aliens out-numbered the humans by two, we award ten points. 2) Checking the TOWN MORGUE, we score 120 points for the twelve destroyed aliens, and subtract 70 points for the seven destroyed humans. That leaves us with a net score of +50 points. 3) The waitress scores no bonus points for her cedibility, and gets a ten point handicap for her lack of physical strength. Thus, the score for this game would be 70. NOTE that had there been twelve humans and ten aliens, or if nine humans had been destroyed instead of seven, the performance score would only have been 50. QUESTIONS OR COMMENTS? We're always happy to answer any questions about our games! Simply write or e-mail! Hello@nextBESTgames.com.