Basic Concept

For Northwood! Is a solo hand management and precision trick-taking game.

You want to peacefully unite the woodland kingdom of Northwood. You do this by visiting eight fiefs and engaging their rulers in dialogue (tricks) to win them over.

You start with four allies, with special abilities that you can use once per visit. These abilities allow you to manipulate your hand to help you hit the target score.

Once you’ve won over a ruler, they can temporarily replace one of your allies, giving you more choices for abilities.

Dialogue Cards

Valued 1 to 8 in four suits:

• Claws
• Flowers
• Leaves
• Eyes

Character Cards

6 in each suit

Gameplay Overview

Each game follows the five steps below:

• Choose an unvisited fief to visit.
• (Optional) Bring in friendly rulers to substitute for allies.
• Play out dialogues (tricks) with the chosen fief’s ruler to try to hit their target score exactly.
• If you exactly hit the target score at the end of the visit, the ruler is now friendly.
• Repeat until you’ve visited all the fiefs.

Choose a fief to visit

You must visit each of the eight fiefs once and only once per game.

Each fief’s ruler starts off neutral, and they each require you to end your visit with an exact score as indicated by the number beneath them.

The target scores range from 0 (leftmost) to 7 (rightmost).

The currently visiting fief will be indicated by the arrow card above the row. That ruler's suit will also be the trump suit for that round.

Bring in friendly rulers

When visiting a fief, any number of friendly rulers from previously visited fiefs may be brought in to temporarily substitute for an ally.

Each substitute brought in replaces a single ally, allowing you to use their ability for that fief only.

Any ruler can substitute for any ally.

Play out dialogues (tricks)

Continuously play out dialogues (tricks) with the fief’s ruler until either of you run out of cards.

A single dialogue consists of the ruler playing a card from the deck and you responding with a single card from your hand.

Each ruler has a favorite conversation topic, represented by their suit. (This is known as the Trump Suit)

1. You may activate one ally ability.
2. The top card of the deck is played face up into the discard pile. This card is the ruler’s statement.
3. Play one card from your hand as your response. Cards you can play follow standard trick-taking rules:
   • Your card must be the 'same suit as the ruler’s card if possible. This is called following suit.
   • If and only if you cannot follow suit, you may instead play any card.
4. You score a point in the trick if either:
   • Your card is a higher card of the same suit as the ruler’s card (a strong, on-topic rebuttal!), or
   • The ruler’s card doesn’t match the ruler’s suit, but your response does. (You played a trump card.)
5. If you score, place your card goes into the score pile (face up), otherwise it goes into the discard pile.

Ally Abilities

Each ally has an ability you can activate once per visit.

Before each ruler’s statement, you may activate up to one ally by turning the card 90 degrees, exhausting it for the current visit.

Follow the instructions on the card exactly, and fully resolve the whole ability.

Abilities reset after each visit, so use them freely.

Ending the visit

After completing a dialogue or fully resolving an ability, if either your hand or the deck is empty, the visit immediately ends.

You can’t end visits early, nor can you activate abilities after the visit ends.

1. Once the visit ends, count the number of cards in the score pile.
   • If it’s exactly equal to the fief’s target score, the ruler is now friendly. Slide their card

downward a bit to cover the number and show the little “For Northwood!” cheer. You may call them to substitute starting from the next visit.

1. • If it’s not equal to the target score, your discussions have unfortunately failed. Remove that ruler from the game and flip the fief facedown.
2. If you brought in any substitutes, remove all of them from the game, whether you used their abilities or not. In the next fief visit, you’re back to your starting allies unless you bring in new rulers.
3. Reset all exhausted allies by rotating them back face up.
4. Shuffle all dialogue cards back into a new deck and draw eight new cards. Choose the next fief to visit.

Game End

Once you’ve visited all eight fiefs, the game ends.

Each friendly fief gives you victory points equal to the number of stars on their card. Friendly fiefs give points whether their ruler is still on their card or was called in to substitute.

Add the total victory points to get your final score.

You win with a score of 16 or higher.

FAQ

• You are free to look through the discard or score pile at any time, but you may not rearrange their cards.
• If you activate an ability and there is at least one valid way to execute it, you must perform the ability. If there is no valid way to perform the ability, it does nothing.
• When moving multiple cards at the same time (e.g., ‘discard two cards’), you may choose the order to move them.
• If an instruction tells you to draw or move cards from an empty pile (e.g., ‘draw three cards’ when the deck only has two), do as much as possible and skip the rest.