Designer – Ian Walton
Artist – Ian Walton
As everyone knows, Santa is a busy man on Christmas Eve. In just one night, he needs to visit over one billion homes, delivering presents and bringing joy to children everywhere. That means Santa needs to upgrade his operation – if he’s going to get round a billion homes he’s going to need more reindeer to pull his sleigh, more elves to make and wrap presents, more wood to build toys and more food to feed everyone. He also needs to make sure enough people believe he’s coming.
Unfortunately, legendary literary grump Ebenezer Scrooge thinks Christmas is a massive waste of time. He is going to make it his mission to spoil Christmas for those billion homes, by trying to get those same elves, reindeer, food and wood for himself. And he wants to make sure as many people as possible think like him:
“If I could work my will, every idiot who goes about with ‘Merry Christmas’ on his lips should be boiled with his own pudding and buried with a stake of holly through his heart. He should!”
Santa vs Scrooge is a worker placement game in which you are trying to expand your capabilities to be able to get around a billion homes on Christmas night by completing tasks – recruiting 4 elves, training 4 reindeer, collecting 4 food and gathering 4 wood. You start the game able to reach no homes. Your first completed task enables you reach one home on Christmas night. Then, each time you complete a task, your capacity increases by a factor of ten (so to 10 homes, then 100 and so on). The game ends when either Santa or Scrooge has completed ten tasks, and can therefore bring joy (or misery) to one billion homes.
You can gain bonus abilities during the game by telling your stories to people – these are happy (or gruesome) Christmas legends from around the world. Each time you tell stories to 4 people (by collecting them from the board), you gain an ability (like being able to take an extra action, or store more resources).
Component
- Rulebook (2 pages)
- 1 Game Board
- 108 Tiles
- 4 Player Reference Sheets
- 6 Customised Dice
- 1 Cylinder Gift Box
Additional Component Required