Hickory Dickory Victory Points
Those sweet, sweet berries!
Hello, and welcome back to another Hickory Dickory preview! This week we will be discussing the various ways to score points and drive your team of furry friends to victory!
It’s Going to Take a Lot of Berries!
The juicy little berries that mice love are the victory points of Hickory Dickory. The mouse team that earns the most berries by the time the clock strikes midnight, will gain Lord Cuckoo’s favor and the bragging rights that come with sweet, sweet victory! Let’s take a look at the different ways to score points in Hickory Dickory.
A Royal Scavenger Hunt
There are several different ways players can score points. The main way is to use your mice to collect tiles, then turn those tiles in for points. The tiles represent shiny objects, novelties, and other odds and ends that mice and cuckoo birds love. The way you gain tiles is by having your mice visit spaces around the clock. Each space will have a single tile available on the clock’s outer leaves. The first mouse to visit a space gets to take that tile for free, put it in their pouch, and then perform that space’s special action. At the end of each round, new tiles are set out on the empty leaves to replace those that have been snatched up.
The Six and Eleven spaces on the clock face are always Delivery action spaces. When a mouse with tiles in its pouch lands on one of these spaces, they can turn in some, or all, of the tiles in their pouch and score immediate points. The more tiles you turn in at once, the more the delivery score is increased! Here’s the breakdown:
First, you automatically earn 1 point for each tile turned in. Then you earn 1 additional point for each matching item type in the largest group of matching item types. Then you earn 1 additional point for each matching tile color in the largest color grouping.
Here’s an example:
Donald’s Scavenger is turning in a full pouch of five tiles. Three of those tiles have matching feather symbols, and three match green in color. This is the score for Donald’s delivery:
5 berries for the five tiles total.
3 berries for the three matching feather symbols.
3 berries for the 3 green tiles.
11 berries total! Donald moves his score marker up 11 points on the score track!
To help calculate your delivery score, we have created a free handy turn-in calculator you can use from the browser on your phone. Go to score.hickorydickorygame.com and check it out!
Lord Cuckoo’s Relics
There are three relics in the search bag that are worth extra points. Lord Cuckoo has misplaced his royal relics and is offering a reward for finding them. These special tiles are turned in at the twelve o’clock space and earn you five points apiece! (You also gain a Favor Card, but we’ll cover those in another article)
Cuckoo Quests!
Lord Cuckoo likes to keep things interesting. He is offering additional berries to mice who can find specific combinations of items. These quests are represented by quest cards that are displayed on the left hand side of the board. When turning in tiles at a delivery space, if the tiles your mouse turns in match the combinations shown on a quest card, you can immediately discard that quest card and add the additional points listed to your delivery total.
Wild Tiles
When turning in, if any of your tiles are wild, they count as any color and any type of tile at any time. You can obtain wild tiles by trading with Itsy Bitsy, the eight legged proprietor of Itsy Bitsy’s Market. To visit the market, a mouse must land in a market action space and have a couple of tiles to trade.
Now What?
So, you’ve just delivered tiles and scored some immediate points, but there’s a whole lot more to consider. After you’ve scored your delivery, you can now place the tiles on your hunt board but only if there’s a matching slot. However, once a tile is placed on your hunt board it cannot be rearranged at any time. Any tiles that don’t match, go back in the search bag. You want to fill up as many rows and columns on your hunt board as possible. This score won’t be tabulated until the end of the game where you will earn a valuable 5 points for each completed row or column!
As you’re sending your team of mice out to gather tiles, you should always keep in mind which tiles will help you fill your hunt board most effectively. A well positioned wild tile could make all the difference.
Don’t Forget Your Scaler
One other way to earn points is to have your Scaler mouse climb up the clock weight chains. Some action spaces on the clock have the chain symbol. When one of your mice lands on a chain space you’ll move your Scaler up the listed number of chain slots on the clock weight chains. If a scaler lands on or passes a chain link with a berry next to it they gain the amount of victory points noted in the berry. When a Scaler gets to the top, they immediately score the number of points shown by the clock weight token, then go back to the bottom. The clock weight token is moved up to the next lower reward level. The next Scaler that reaches the top, repeats this process, but for less points each time. It pays to get your Scaler climbing early in the game!
Planning Your Win
Players who plan best for how to grab points will ultimately be rewarded with higher scores. Getting a mouse with a full pouch to a delivery space is not as easy as you think. It requires exploiting moments to trade amongst your mice, observing player order and the cadence of actions, avoiding being thwarted by opponents, and being cognizant of all scoring opportunities at all times. If you master these strategies, you might just squeak out a victory!
Okay, that’s all for this week. Join us next week when we will be discussing round structure and C.H.I.R.P! Hickory Dickory is currently available for pre-order and will be available in stores and online in January.
And if you're going to be at PAX Unplugged this week make sure to swing by Booth #3322 for a demo of Hickory Dickory!
