Caverna
Caverna: The Cave Farmers is a worker-placement game at heart, with a focus on farming. In the game, you are the bearded leader of a small dwarf family that lives in a little cave in the mountains. You begin the game with a farmer and his spouse, and each member of the farming family represents an action that the player can take each turn. Together, you cultivate the forest in front of your cave and dig deeper into the mountain. You furnish the caves as dwellings for your offspring as well as working spaces for small enterprises.
It's up to you how much ore you want to mine. You will need it to forge weapons that allow you to go on expeditions to gain bonus items and actions. While digging through the mountain, you may come across water sources and find ore and ruby mines that help you increase your wealth. Right in front of your cave, you can increase your wealth even further with agriculture: You can cut down the forest to sow fields and fence in pastures to hold your animals. You can also expand your family while running your ever-growing farm. In the end, the player with the most efficiently developed home board wins.
Number of players: 1 - 7
Game duration: 56 mn
Complexity: 3 / 5
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Play Caverna and 961 other games online.
No download necessary - play directly from your web browser.
With your friends and thousands of players from the whole world.
Free.
Rules summary
Food conversion
| One of | Amount of Food |
|---|---|
| 2 gold, donkey, sheep, grain | 1 food |
| 3 gold, boar, vegetables, ruby | 2 food |
| 4 gold, 2 donkeys, cattle | 3 food |
Harvest
Phase Order
- Field: Remove 1 Grain or Vegetable token from each sown Field on your Home board and place it in your personal supply
- Feed: Feed your Dwarfs by paying 2 Food per Dwarf in your cave. Offspring that were born during the current round only consume 1 Food for this round.
- Breed: If you have at least 2 Farm animals of the same type, you get exactly 1 additional (baby) animal of that type – but only if the new animal can be accommodated on your Home board.
Harvest Events
- Rounds 1-2: No Harvest
- Round 3: Harvest
- Round 4: No harvest but instead you have to pay 1 Food per Dwarf in your cave. There is no Field or Breeding phase at this time.
- Rounds 5-12: Harvest by default. 3 randomly hidden red question marks
- 1st question mark: No Harvest
- 2nd question mark: Pay 1 Food per Dwarf instead of harvest
- 3rd question mark: Skip the Field phase or the Breeding phase (your choice)
Final Scoring
- 1 Gold per Farm animal and Dog: Each animal is worth 1 Gold point at the end of the game, even Dogs. (Dogs are not considered Farm animals.)
- -2 Gold per missing type of Farm animal: At the end of the game, you should have at least 1 Sheep, 1 Donkey, 1 Wild boar and 1 Cattle. You lose 2 Gold points for each of these types that you do not have on your Home board. (You do not need to have any Dogs.)
- 1⁄2 Gold per Grain (rounded up): Count all of your Grain tokens – both those in your supply and those still left on Fields. Divide this number by 2 and round it up. This is the number of Gold points you get for Grain.
- 1 Gold per Vegetable: Count all of your Vegetable tokens – both those in your supply and those still left on Fields. You get this number of Gold points for Vegetables.
- 1 Gold per Ruby: At the end of the game, each Ruby is worth 1 Gold point.
- 1 Gold per Dwarf: At the end of the game, each of your Dwarfs is worth 1 Gold point.
- -1 Gold per unused space: Count the number of spaces on your Home board that have no tile or Stable on them. You lose 1 Gold point for each such space. The two pre-printed Caverns of your cave system are considered used. (Unfurnished Caverns are also considered used.)
- Gold for Furnishing tiles, Pastures and Mines: Add up the Gold point values on all of your tiles. Small pastures are worth 2 Gold points, Large pastures are worth 4 Gold points (regardless of the type and number of animals on those tiles). Ore mines are worth 3 Gold points, Ruby mines are worth 4 Gold points (regardless of whether they hold a Donkey or not). The value of a Furnishing tile is printed on the right of the tile, right under the name of the tile.
- Bonus points for Parlors, Storages and Chambers: Most of the Furnishing tiles called Parlors, Storages and Chambers (indicated by the yellow name tag) may be worth Bonus points depending on the condition they impose.
- Gold coins and Begging markers: Add up the values on your Gold coins and subtract 3 Gold points from that for each Begging marker you have.
Caverna Errata
Solo Game accumulating
There is a misprint in the "Refilling the accumulating spaces" section of the solo game rules on page 24 of the official PDF Rules:
Rule as written:
Before refilling the accumulating spaces, check if there are any spaces with more than 6 goods. Remove all the goods from all of the spaces where this is the case and return them to the general supply. For each Ruby you spend, you can prevent this from happening for one of these spaces. The goods on the accumulating spaces that you paid a Ruby for will be safe for another round. (This way an accumulating space may accumulate more than 6 goods.)
Corrected as:
Before refilling the accumulating spaces, check if there are any spaces with 6 or more goods. Remove all the goods from all of the spaces where this is the case and return them to the general supply. For each Ruby you spend, you can prevent this from happening for one of these spaces. The goods on the accumulating spaces that you paid a Ruby for will be safe for another round. (This way an accumulating space may accumulate more than 6 goods.)
Impact
In a solo game, if you end your turn with 6 (not 7) goods on a space. It will be cleared before being refilled unless a ruby is spent.
Source:
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/2191584/rulebook-last-page-solo-rules-problem
Grzegorz Kobiela (Designer/Publisher)
