Board Game - Mice vs Cat

What a stroke of luck: the homeowners dropped a whole head of cheese! It seems that the nimble little mice will be able to fill their storages with delicious treats and hold a real feast. But it’s not so easy... to drag a huge chunk of cheese into their burrow – they will have to nibble on it little by little to gather as many tasty pieces as possible. But they need to be careful, as besides other mice wishing to steal their loot, dangerous mouse traps lie in wait along the way. Moreover, the homeowners' cheese is guarded by a big ginger cat, who can catch a little mouse by its long tail at any moment! You will have to move across the game board, complete tasks from special cards, collect pieces of cheese, and avoid encounters with the cat. Overcome all obstacles and collect as many pieces of cheese as possible to become the winner!
 
Preparation for the game:
Important! Before starting the game, it is necessary to cut out the tokens along the dotted line.

Lay out the game board in the center of the table. Place the cut-out cheese tokens in the center of the game board on the big cheese head. Shuffle the cards thoroughly and place the deck next to the game board face down. Choose your tokens and place them in your burrow, which will serve as the starting point.



Game play:
All participants play as small nimble mice trying to stockpile delicious cheese treats in their burrows. Decide in any convenient way who will go first. Then the turn passes clockwise. On their turn, a player rolls the die and moves their mouse token along the path in any of the allowed directions for the corresponding number of spaces. Two players can stop on the same space, but the mice DO NOT share cheese.

Each player's task is to reach the cheese head by stopping on a space with a ladder, take the cheese, and return with it to their burrow. If a player reaches a space with a ladder using fewer points than rolled on the die, the remaining points are lost. It is difficult for little mice to carry down a lot of cheese at once, so each mouse can only take one piece. But sometimes a mouse can get lucky and, by drawing a lucky card, they are entitled to grab two pieces at once (see the card description below). To descend from the big cheese head, a mouse will need a parachute. After picking up a piece of cheese (the player places the token next to the game board), the mouse must choose which parachute to descend with. To do this, the player rolls the die and 'drops' their mouse token onto the corresponding space on the board. Now the mouse needs to return to its burrow without getting caught by the owner's cat and without losing its loot, because only at home is the honestly stolen cheese safe. As soon as the mouse gets to its home, it puts the cheese in the pantry (the player places the pieces of cheese on the space with the mouse burrow) and goes out in search of more cheese. If the player reaches the burrow using fewer points than rolled on the die, the remaining points are lost.

If the mouse has to run far to its home and wants to carry several pieces of cheese at once, the little forager can hide the cheese in temporary storage by stopping on a space with a hole in the floor (the player places the pieces of cheese on the space). It is important to remember that no more than three pieces of cheese can be in one storage, and the mouse can carry no more than two pieces at a time.

However, unlike the burrow, other mice can steal cheese from the temporary storage (in case one of the opponents has the card 'Grab the cheese', see the card description below). Therefore, when hiding cheese in temporary storage, the mouse should be careful and check for other mice nearby.

- A mouse can also encounter a mouse trap on the board, and if caught, it must skip its next turn. In this case, it does not lose any cheese it was carrying.

- If a player lands on a space with images of cards, they must take the top card from the deck. The drawn card may be played immediately or at a convenient moment, so the player must keep their cards in hand so that the other participants do not see them. Played cards are sent to the discard pile. By receiving a card, a player may either catch luck by the tail or suffer a defeat.
 
Ending the game:
The winner of the game is the participant who first collects six pieces of cheese in their burrow. If the players do not want to end the game at this stage, they can play until no tokens remain in the center of the board. In this case, the winner is the player who collects the most pieces of cheese.
 
The set includes:
- game board;
- 10 'Cheese or Life' cards;
- 6 'Grab the Cheese' cards;
- 6 'Big Run' cards;
- 6 'Double Cheese' cards;
- 36 cheese tokens;
- 4 tokens and 1 die;
- game rules.
 
Number of players: 2-4
Game duration: 30 minutes