Rio Grande Games 270 User Manual

CONTENTS

for 2 to 5 players, aged 10 and up; length 45 minutes

PREPARATION

● With 3 players, remove all animal and offspring tiles of two types from the game.

With 4 players, remove all animal and offspring tiles of one type from the game.
With 5 players, play with all tiles.

Note: do not remove dolphins, orcas, and sea lions.
Note: the rules for 2 players are at the end of these rules.

● Place the offspring tiles in the middle of the table. They have a circle on both the front and back.

Shuffle all remaining tiles face down.
Count out 15 tiles and place them aside in a face down stack for use at game end. Place the
round wooden disc on top of this stack to mark it as the reserve.
Build several face down stacks of any height with the remaining tiles. Players will draw tiles from
these stacks during the game.

● Place as many delivery trucks in the middle of the table as there are players. Return the

remaining delivery trucks, if any, to the box.

● Each player takes a water zoo board and a depot board, placing both in his play area (the space

before him on the table). Additionally, each player takes 2 large and 2 small expansion boards,
which he places face down in his play area.
Return unneeded boards to the box.

● Each player takes 1 coin, placing it in his play area. Place the remaining coins on the table as a

supply (the bank).

● Place the coworkers as a supply on the table.

● The players choose a starting player using the method they prefer.

OVERVIEW

Each player is the owner of a water zoo. Each player tries to lure as many visitors as possible into his water zoo and earns points for the visitors that
visit his zoo. To create a zoo that people want to visit, a player must collect animals. When a player’s water zoo is successful, he may want to expand
it. When a player’s animal basins are full, he must place additional animals into his depot, which loses him points at game end. When a player makes
skillful use of his coworkers, he can gain additional points. The player with most points wins.

16 offspring tiles 88 animal tiles 10 coin tiles 30 coins
(2 each of 8 animal types) (11 each of 8 animal types)

5 water zoo boards 10 small expansion boards 1 round wooden disc

10 large expansion boards

Before the first game, carefully remove the tiles
from their frames.

Each player takes 1 coin, 1 water zoo board,
1 depot board, 2 small expansion boards, and 2 large
expansion boards, placing them in his play area.

A small expansion board with 3 spaces and a large

expansion board with 4 spaces for animal tiles.

A depot board for all surplus tiles.

16 coworkers

5 delivery trucks

5 depot boards

A water zoo with 19 spaces for animal tiles (on the board the
corners of the spaces have bright crosses).
In addition, there are 2 checkout booths and 2 feeding stations.

PLAYING THE GAME

The game is played over several rounds
On a player’s turn, he must perform one of the following three actions:

A. add a tile to a delivery truck or

B. take a delivery truck, ending the round for the player or

C. carry out a money action.

Play continues in clockwise order.
When all players have taken a delivery truck, the round ends and another begins.

A. ADD A TILE TO A DELIVERY TRUCK

The player draws the top-most tile from any stack and places it face up in an empty place on any delivery truck
in the middle of the table (not any already taken by a player). That is his entire turn.

There can be at most 3 tiles on a delivery truck. If all delivery trucks in the middle of the table have 3 tiles, the play may not take this action.
He must take action B or C.

Note: a player may only take tiles from the stack with the wood disc when all other stacks have been used!

B. TAKE A TRANSPORT WAGON, ENDING THE ROUND FOR THE PLAYER

The player takes any delivery truck from the middle of the table, placing it and the tiles on it in his play area.

He then, immediately, places the tiles from the delivery truck in his water zoo.

Note: the player may only take a delivery truck that has at least 1 tile on it!

After a player has taken a delivery truck, he takes no more turns in this round. He will again take turns as normal in the next round.
Any player who has taken a delivery truck in this round keeps it in his play area. This way, everyone can immediately see who has taken
a delivery truck in this round.

When the player places tiles in his water zoo, he must follow these rules:

● Animal tiles

When the player has empty space in his water zoo, he may place the animal tile on an empty space and so begin a
new basin or enlarge an existing basin.
Otherwise, the player must place the animal tile in his depot.
A basin consists of all neighboring tiles of the same animal type.
Each basin can have tiles of only one animal type.

➡ Start a new basin

If a player has no tiles of the animal type he is placing, he may start a new basin.

In order to start a new basin, the player places the tile on an empty space in his water zoo.
It must be at least 1 space away (not adjacent to tiles) from any other basin.

Note: two tiles that touch only at their corners are not considered to be adjacent.

Important: the player is limited in the number of basins he has in his water zoo.

At the beginning a player may have only 3 basins. He can, thus, have at most 3 different animal types
in his water zoo.
For each large expansion board he adds to his water zoo, he can have 1 additional basin with one addi-
tional animal type.

The rules for adding expansion boards are described under "C. Carry out a money action".

➡ Enlarge an existing basin

If the player already has a basin with this animal type, he must place the new animal tile either horizontally
or vertically adjacent to another tile of that same animal types. Thus, he enlarges the basin.
When enlarging a basin, it must keep the rule of being

at least 1 space away from all other basins.

When a player enlarges a basin to 3, 6, 9, or 12 tiles, he takes in each case 1 coin as a bonus.
When he enlarges a basin to 5 or 10 tiles, he takes in each case 1 coworker as a bonus.

The coin and coworker bonuses are also explained in the paragraph "special situations".

➡ Place a tile in his depot

If the player cannot or does not want to put the tile in his water zoo, he must place it in his depot. If there is
already a tile (or more) in the depot, the player places the new tile on top, making a stack in his depot.

In a player’s depot, any number of different animal types may be stacked on top of each other. The limitation
for the number of different animal types does not apply to the depot.

Claus already has a basin with 3 dol­phins and wants to begin an Orca
basin. He may not put an Orca tile on
the spaces marked with an "x",
because each basin must have at
least one space distance to another.

These tiles are not adjacent.