Rufstock — Rules Manual

We are organizing lines of dogs for the biggest canine music festival in the world, Rufstock!
Each combination of dogs you manage to beat and place in the Vehicles brings you closer to victory.
Rufstock is a game for 2 to 5 players, where whoever manages to board all the dogs from their hand is the winner!

COMPONENTS
52 dog cards
2 vehicle cards
1 boarding ticket
5 player aid cards

OBJECTIVE OF THE GAME
At the end of 2 rounds, the player with the most points wins.
Points are earned by emptying your hand of cards:
- The first player to run out of cards receives 4 points.
- The other players receive 1 point fewer than the previous player, as they empty their hands.

SETUP (SEE FIGURE I)
- Vehicle cards (a): place the two cards side by side in the center of the table.
- Dog deck (b): shuffle and deal 8 dog cards per player. These cards MAY NOT be rearranged in hand.
- Waiting line (c): place 3 dog cards above the vehicles. This waiting line can be used by players to help with their combinations.

HOW TO PLAY - NORMAL MODE
Attention! For the 2-player mode, go to the corresponding section later in this rulebook.
The player who most recently went to a rock concert is the starting player, and will have the boarding ticket card in front of them.
On your turn, you may play up to four cards from your hand, as long as they are side by side in the order they are arranged, without moving or rearranging the cards in your hand (see Figure II).
Cards must be played to one of the vehicles, always beating the combination already present.

GLOSSARY
- For practical purposes in this rulebook, we will call the “Perua” vehicle with number 1 simply “Kombi,” and the Bus (which has number 8) simply “Bus.”
- When a number in [ ] is referenced, it means the cards with that number.
For example: [1] means the dog card with number 1.
Another example: [5][6][7] means 3 cards: card 5, card 6, and card 7 together.

Vehicles
Vehicles have preferred passengers, which means they follow different rules (see Figure III).
- Kombi (1): priority is lower numbers (see Figure III; items a and b).
- Bus (8): priority is higher numbers (see Figure III; items c and d).

Combinations
To place passengers in vehicles we must make combinations, which can be:
- Set: composed of equal cards (see Figure III; items a and d).
- Sequence: composed of consecutive numbers (see Figure III; items b and c). There is no difference between ascending and descending sequences, and you cannot play a sequence with shuffled numbers like [1][3][2].

Playing combinations to the vehicles
Before either vehicle is occupied, choosing which type of combination to use is a strategic decision. After all, each vehicle may have only one single type of combination. This means that, if the player places a sequence of cards in the Kombi, then the Bus can only receive sets of cards (see Figure IV).
Important: Regardless of the chosen combination, a combination with more cards ALWAYS beats one with fewer cards, for either vehicle. Even the Kombi, which prefers lower numbers, will be beaten by a combination with a greater number of cards, regardless of values (see Figure V).

Figure I: Setup
Figure II: Play only cards that are side by side in your hand.
Figure III: Vehicles and combinations
Figure IV: Playing combinations to the vehicles
Figure V: More cards always wins

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Game Design: Arthur Lacerda, Bruno Liguori Sia
Game Develop: Thiago Castro, André Ruz
Art & Illustration: João Luciano, Dandi
Graphic Design: Dandi
Layout: Marcel Lambertini
Editing: Igor Raposo, André Ruz, Thiago Castro, Vinícius Figueiredo
Playtests: Thiago Castro, Vinícius Figueiredo, André Ruz, Joka Jr
Do you have any questions?
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RULEBOOK
Figure VI: Cards from hand and waiting line
Figure VII: Wild Rocker Mode example
When a player achieves a better combination in one of the vehicles, they simply remove the combination that was there and replace it with theirs. At that moment, the boarding ticket passes to that player.
Important: the boarding ticket only passes to the player if they managed to place a better combination in one of the vehicles.
Waiting line
A player may use cards from the waiting line to complete or improve their combination. The player just takes the cards from their hand exactly as they are (without reordering), places them on the table showing them to all players, and then inserts the waiting-line card(s) at any point in the combination they laid down from hand.
Example (see Figure VI): the player chose to lay down [6][7] from hand and use [8] from the waiting line, because that way they would remove more cards from hand than if they used only their [3] together with [1] and [2] from the waiting line.
Passing
When a player decides to pass (either for not having a better combination, or by strategy), they may:
- Draw a card: draw one card from the waiting line or from the draw deck, and place it anywhere in your hand.
- Reorder one card: move one card in your hand to another position.
- Pass without doing anything: take no action and pass.
Whichever option is chosen, the player does not take the boarding ticket, and turn order passes to the player on their left.
When players pass, and it comes to the player who has the boarding ticket in front of them, it means that player was the last to play a valid combination and no other player managed to beat the combinations on the vehicles.
In this case, all dog cards on the vehicles go to the discard pile. The player with the boarding ticket may play any combination to any vehicle, and the round flow restarts.
END OF ROUND
The first player to run out of cards in hand receives 4 points, the second to empty their hand receives 1 point less (3), and so on.
Therefore, if playing with 4 players, the last player gains 1 point. With 5 players, the last player gains 0 points.
At the end of the round, shuffle all cards again, redo Setup, and play another round.
The starting player will be the player to the left of whoever finished their cards first in the last game. This player receives the boarding ticket and plays first.
END OF THE GAME
After 2 rounds, the player with the most points wins!
2-PLAYER GAME
For 2 players, only one vehicle will be used. Start the game with the Bus.
The 3-card waiting line works the same way, and so do the combination rules. If one player plays a sequence, the other player can only beat it with a sequence, and likewise for sets.
When a player cannot beat the combination on that vehicle, discard the cards on it, switch vehicles, and the player with the boarding ticket in front of them restarts with any combination, in the same way as the rule for more players.
WILD ROCKER MODE
In this mode, we present a new way to play Rufstock.
Players may play any type of combination to both vehicles, respecting the limit of at least 1 card and at most 4 cards. That is, both vehicles may contain the same type of combination, while keeping the rule of preference for higher or lower values.
Another change is that in this mode, a set beats a sequence if they have the same number of cards.
Example: Kombi: [1][2][3] — Bus: [6][7][8]
A player may beat either vehicle with a [2][2][2] combination (see Figure VII).

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