Welcome back to Quedlinburg, the setting for the bag building, push your luck game, Quacks of Quedlinburg. But this version of Quacks is not quite as we know it. For we have had Herb Witches invade the market place, trying to sell their wares. With components for a fifth player, and coins to spend, let’s dive into how to play this expanded world. We’ll cover the base game just in case, but feel free to skip ahead to the expansion content later.
Base Game Set Up
Place the scoreboard in the middle of the table, with the yellow droplet token on the one spot on the round tracker. Leave nearby the bonus die and a number of white one-value ingredients equal to the number of players. Place the rubies to the side of the play area. I find a Gu pot works well here.
Each player chooses a colour and receives a player board featuring that colour and choose which side you want to play with. Each player also receives a flask and two tokens in their chosen colour, each featuring a droplet and rat symbol.
Place the droplet token on the zero spot in the middle of the pot and the rat token in the wooden bowl on the bottom-right. The flask resides filled-side-up on the plate to the right the rat token. A third token with no symbol is placed on one of the four spots beside the 50 spot on the score tracker. Underneath these tokens, place the cardboard score tokens with the zero-side face-up. If you’re playing on the advanced side of the player board, place the fourth token with another droplet symbol on the track at the bottom.
Afterwards, choose the set of ingredient books to be used for the game. The number of bookmarks that appear on the bottom of an ingredient book shows which set it belongs to if you want to play with a particular set, or you can just randomise it all. The orange ingredient book will always be the same regardless of the set chosen. Black ingredients, despite only having one book, will vary depending on the number of players. Choose the side that references ‘the other player’ for two-player games, and the other side for three and four-player games.
Next, place the ingredient books matching the chosen set near the scoreboard. Leave the purple and yellow ingredient books aside for now; these will come into play later. Organise the ingredient chips alongside their respective books.
Finally, give each player a drawstring bag and the following starting ingredients:
- Four white one-value chips.
- Two white two-value chips.
- One white three-value chips.
- One orange one-value chips.
- One green one-value chips.
Pop these in your bag and you’re good to go! First player doesn’t really matter too much, so pick someone randomly. Once this has been decided, give them the fortune teller deck.
How to play Quacks of Quedlinburg
Perhaps unsurprisingly, you’re aiming to get as many Victory Points as possible. The symbol for victory points is the numbers inside beige boxes. You’ll see these in your pot. The number inside the box represents the number of points in that scenario. Most of your points will come from progressing along the track in your pot.
There are two main phases in each round: the preparation phase and the evaluation phase. The first step in a round is to draw a fortune teller card. The current player draws the top card of the fortune teller deck, reads it aloud and sets it aside. Fortune teller cards generally offer bonuses to all players (not just the player who reads the card). There are two types of cards: immediate effect cards (purple), and round-long effect cards (light blue). Purple cards resolve immediately, while the effects of blue cards remain until the end of the round.
If a card says to move your droplet, move the droplet token in your pot forward that many spaces. If a card mentions yellow or purple ingredients despite them not being available, ignore that section of the card. Some cards refer to ‘rat tails’; these do nothing in the first round of the game. Once the card has been resolved, the preparation phase begins.
The Preparation Phase
In the preparation phase, players will, in their own time, draw ingredients one-by-one from their bag. Each drawn chip is placed a number of spaces away from the previously placed chip equal to its value. After a chip is drawn, the player can choose to continue drawing or stop and wait for the evaluation phase.
If a player draws a coloured chip, their effect happens immediately. Refer to the ingredient’s booklet to determine what the ingredient does.
Players also must keep track of the accumulated value of white ingredients they’ve placed so far. If the total value of white ingredients ever exceeds seven, they must immediately stop. Their pot has exploded, which will affect the evaluation phase later.
You have a lifeline though, which is the flask. You can use this to place a drawn white ingredient back into the bag. To do so, flip the flask to the empty side immediately after drawing the ingredient. This cannot be done if the drawn ingredient would cause an explosion.
The Evaluation Phase
Once each player has stopped, the evaluation phase begins. Underneath the round tracker is a sequence of steps that occur during the phase.
The first step of the evaluation phase is the bonus die roll. Only players whose pot didn’t explode are eligible for this step. Each player checks the large number in the spot directly after their last placed ingredient. The player with the largest number gets to roll the bonus die. In the case of a tie, the player who started the round closest to the centre of the pot rolls the die. If there’s still a tie, both players get to roll the die. (Personally, I hate this rule because it only benefits the person who’s winning anyway. My house rule is, if you didn’t explode, you get to roll the die.)
The bonus die offers the following bonuses: One VP, Two VP, a ruby, an orange ingredient, or moving your droplet forward. When moving your droplet forward, if there is an ingredient in the way, set the ingredient aside.
Afterwards, the effects of green, black and purple chips activate in each player’s pot. Check the effect of each of these ingredients, then inspect your pot to see if you’re eligible. For example, in Set One, green ingredients activate if they’re the last or second-to-last ingredient in your pot.
In the next step, each player checks the space directly after their last-placed ingredient. This space is considered the player’s scoring field for the round. If that space displays a ruby symbol, they collect a ruby from the common supply. Rubies reside in the sack on the bottom-left of the player board.
The following two steps involve earning VP and buying ingredients. Players whose pot didn’t explode are eligible for both of these steps. If a player had theirs explode, they must choose to participate in either the VP or the buying step, but not both.
During the VP step, each eligible player will earn the amount of VP shown in the scoring field’s beige box. In the buying phase, each eligible player can buy up to two ingredients from the supply. The large green number is the amount that player can spend to buy ingredients this turn.
If two ingredients are purchased, they cannot be the same colour. The cost of each ingredient is listed in their respective books. Purchased ingredients go into the player’s bag immediately.
The final step of the evaluation phase is the ruby exchange. Each player may trade in two rubies to either move their droplet forward one space or refill their flask. This can be done multiple times, as long as a player has enough rubies.
Once the round is over, check the round tracker to see if any events occur next round. In Round Two and Three, the yellow and purple ingredient books are placed respectively. In Round Six, each player receives an additional white one-value ingredient.
Once done, discard the current fortune teller card and move the yellow drop to the current round. Ensure that each player has placed all their ingredients back into their bag. The previous current player passes the fortune teller deck clockwise to the next player.
Rat Tails & The Final Round
The catch-up mechanism of rat tails comes into play from Round Two onward. After the fortune teller card is read aloud and resolved, check the score tracker. Each player counts the number of rat tails between their marker and the marker of the first position player.
If at least one rat tail is present, they place their rat token that many spaces ahead of their droplet. This gives these players a head start, as they’ll now place ingredients starting from the rat token.
The ninth and final round of Quacks involves each player revealing their ingredients simultaneously in the preparation phase. Each player pulls an ingredient from their bag and puts their fist in the middle of the table. All players then open their hand to reveal the ingredients within. Players then place their ingredient and resolve any effects if necessary. This continues until all players have stopped drawing. If a player wishes to stop drawing, they reveal an empty hand with no ingredient.
Players can no longer purchase ingredients in the buying phase of the final round. Instead, eligible players divide the scoring field’s value by five and earn that much VP, rounded down. Pairs of rubies may also be traded in for One VP in the ruby exchange step. The player with the most VP is the winner!
A little note for the advanced side of the board. We mentioned in set-up that you placed a second droplet marker. Each time you have the option of moving your droplet forward, you can choose which droplet token to move. Moving the test-tube droplet token immediately earns the bonus shown on the space it moves onto.
Herb Witch Expansion Set Up
This expansion also adds in a new ingredient (locoweed), two new sets of ingredient books, which you can shuffle in with the others, a new ingredient book for the orange pumpkins, and an overflow bowl for each player. Finally, you have the meat of the expansion – witch stuff! There are four witches of each colour and three different colours of witch pennies.
Each player should be given one witch penny of each colour, and then shuffle the three different witch colours, dealing one to the centre of the table.
How to play Herb Witch Expansion
With the Herb Witches, gameplay is pretty much the same, but you have an additional option in your turn. During the specific phase stated on the witch, you can spend your penny of the respective colour to trigger the ability on the witch card. Multiple pennies can be used in a round, and multiple players can trigger a witch in the same round. If you choose to never spend a penny, you will score an additional 2 victory points.
The Overflow bowl is used for when the player passes 33 in their pot. The chip drawn is placed into the overflow bowl. If this chip has an action, you ignore that action. Further chips can be placed into the bowl as well, but coloured chips will not trigger their action. White chips will still count towards causing an explosion. During scoring, the player received 15 victory points and 35 coins, as printed on the player board, and will also receive half the total value of their chips in the overflow bowl as victory points. All players who reach the overflow bowl, without exploding, can roll the bonus die at the end of a round.
