SnowmanMeltdown

Snowman Meltdown

a game of battling blow dryers for the piecepack and an Icehouse set or piecepack pyramids

(a.k.a. Snowman Meltdown Holdup Hoedown)

Players 2-4
Length 60 mins
Equipment Required piecepack, and either an Icehouse set, or two sets of PiecepackPyramids
Designer RonHaleEvans and Marty Hale-Evans
Version 0.5
Version Date 2002-09-08
License originally GNU Free Documentation License, re-licensed CC BY-SA

Description

The Story

Far out in the Oort Belt of our solar system swings a most peculiar comet. Unlike most comets, which are simply balls of dirty ice, this one is a patchwork of colourful, tasty ices - Cherry Red, Lime Green, Lemon Yellow, Blue Raspberry, even Black Licorice. For another thing, every 23,000 years, as the comet nears the Sun, the comet melts just enough for a race of intelligent snowmen to arise from the Slush.

Well, "intelligent" may be overstating the case. Each species, or "flavour" of snowman is bent on just one thing: exterminating all snowmen of other flavours. Their choice of weapon? The hand-held blow dryer.

It's a small comet, and the snowmen can walk all the way around it, on paths carved out over millions of years. But sometimes they get stuck in traps laid by other snowmen. Fortunately, they can make a withdrawal at the local ATM, then pay a penny or two to ride the Oort Funicular out of the trap, or off the well-worn paths on the comet's surface. If they can get the pennies they need by mugging opposing snowmen, so much the better!

Eventually, despite the coin-operated force fields scattered liberally around the comet, only one flavour of snowman will be left. But as the comet approaches the Sun, even the victors will melt down and return to the all-encompassing Slush. Never fear; the very same snowmen will arise again to fight the very same dim-witted battles, in 23,000 years...

(Why snow-men, you ask? You don't think snow-women would behave this way, do you?)

Summary

Players move "snowmen" (stacks of pyramids), around a 4x4 board made of piecepack tiles. The tiles specify the directions and distances the snowmen may travel. When players land on a tile containing opposing snowmen, they must melt one down or mug one. If the mugger's victim capitulates, the mugger receives a coin that he can use to alter his movement or defend himself with a force field; otherwise, the victim is melted down one piece. Some tiles act as traps; if all your pieces are trapped, they melt, one by one. The winner is the last player with any snowmen left on the board.

http://ludism.org/piecepack/snowman.png

Rules

Reviews & Comments


CategoryGame ThemeHumourCategory MechanicStackedPyramids