Gamehelpescapethecurseofthetemple

Summary and object of the game

Escape is a real-time board game. Instead of playing the game in rounds, each player rolls their five dice as quickly and as often as they can without waiting for their teammates!

Players have only ten minutes to escape from the collapsing temple. Every second you delay brings you a step closer to being entombed. While searching for the exit, the players will discover new chambers – but they’ll need the right combination of adventurer, key and torch icons to enter and explore gems these chambers. Some chambers contain magic gems, and players must use their dice to activate as many as many gems as possible in order to break the curse blocking the exit. The sooner they find the exit chamber and the more magic gems they activate, the easier it will be for them to escape.

Watch out, though, as twice during the game a gong will sound throughout the temple heralding a countdown. Hurry back to the starting chamber as only this location is guaranteed to be safe. Fail to make it back in time, and you lose one of your precious dice. Be sure to coordinate your actions and look out for one another as some tasks can be completed only collectively. What's more, even if only one player fails to escape the temple in time, all of you have lost the game!

The actions

1. Enter a chamber - A player may enter a chamber only if its entrance is not blocked. In order to enter a chamber, the player must roll the icons shown in a red frame inside the new chamber.

2. Discover a new chamber - A player inside a chamber with one or more unblocked entrances that don’t already connect to other chambers may discover a new chamber. A player must roll two adventurer icons in order to draw one new chamber from the draw pile

3. Activate magic gems - A player inside a chamber containing one or more magic gem icons must roll the required number of torch or key icons in order to activate the number of magic gems shown. After a gem has been successfully activated. Several adventurers inside a chamber containing one or more magic gem icons may join forces in order to obtain the required number of key or torch icons. If at least one of a chamber’s gems has been activated, no adventurer may activate any further gems inside this chamber.

4. Escape - A player can escape only if they are inside the exit chamber. In order to escape, a player must roll as many keys as the number of gems in the gem depot plus one. Each player must roll the required number of key icons by themself! After a player has escaped, they no longer need all of their tools, so they can give one of their dice to any adventurer still inside the temple. This adventurer may use the die immediately.

5. Provoke a turn of fate - If there are too many accursed dice in play, players may transfer one of the two gems lying next to the depot to the depot. Then, all adventurers may re-roll all of their accursed dice (black masks). Players must reach this decision unanimously! A turn of fate can be provoked only twice during the course of the game.

End of the game

The game ends after 10 minutes – that is, at the end of the third countdown. If any adventurer is inside the temple when it collapses, then all players have lost the game!

Variants

Jumping of the shallow end: less 2 magic gems.

Experts: 3 additional magic gems.

Professionals: 6 additional magic gems

Module 1: Curses - for a harder game - gain curses as you discover chambers that hinder your escape

Module 2: Treasures - collect treasures to aid your escape