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Gamehelptheloop
The LOOP
The LOOP is a quirky, cooperative, time-traveling strategy game where 1 to 4 players become temporal agents working together to thwart the evil Dr. Faux, a mad scientist creating chaos across the space-time continuum. Using quirky yet powerful Artifact cards, players must complete missions, destroy clones, and manage time-rending vortexes before it's too late.
Core rules
These rules cover S.A.B.O.T.A.G.E., which is the basic scenario. Three more scenarios which build on these are available; in addition, each scenario can be played at three different difficulty levels. See below for details.
Objective
Victory: Complete four missions to destroy Dr. Foo's Machine and save spacetime!
Defeat: The agents lose immediately if any of the following occurs:
- A second vortex is placed in any single Era.
- A fourth vortex is placed anywhere on the board.
- Dr. Foo completes his third cycle (21 turns).
The board
Spacetime board
The board shows the 7 Great Eras of Spacetime, which are naturally arranged in a loop: Dawn of Time → Medieval Era → Renaissance Era → Industrial Era → Globalization Era → Age of Robots → End of Times (which connects back to Dawn of Time). Each Era is associated with a color. The next Era is the one clockwise, and the previous Era is the one counter-clockwise. Both of these are considered adjacent Eras.
In the middle of the board is Dr. Foo's machine. It rotates as Dr. Foo travels through spacetime; the Era that it's centered on is Dr. Foo's Era.
Missions
Around the edge of the spacetime board are mission tiles (one per Era). Two missions are active at a time. Once a mission has enough progress cubes on it, it will be completed as soon as an agent ends their turn in its Era. A mission can also be failed if a vortex is created in its Era.
When a mission is completed, each agent gets an Attendance Reward (even if they didn't do anything to help complete the mission)!
HQ board
The HQ board shows
- A scenario reference card.
- The Huge Deck of Artifacts. You can click on the deck to see what's in it (though not what order they're in).
- The pile of destroyed Artifacts. If the Huge Deck ever runs out, these are reshuffled.
- How many times Dr. Foo has cycled through spacetime.
- Which Eras Dr. Foo has already visited on this current cycle through spacetime (as icons below the board).
Agents
Each of the five agents has their own special ability and a deck of six unique starting Artifacts. Each game is played with between two and four agents. In solo mode, or if the multi-handed option is enabled on a table, one player can play as multiple agents.
Each agent has a hand of three Artifacts, which is discarded at the end of their return. (Then, they and all other agents will draw back up to three cards.)
Cards in hand are either ready (normal orientation) or exhausted (turned sideways after use). Exhausted cards can be readied again if the agent does a LOOP!
Dimensions
Each Artifact belongs to one of four Dimensions. Spiral, star, and stripe are Elementary Dimensions; the fourth, the Black Hole dimension is different from the others because it's impossible to do a LOOP in it (which means that those cards can't be readied again once exhausted).
Clones
Dr. Foo will create clones of himself. Each clone comes from a particular Era (its Paradox Era) and will be immediately destroyed if moved back to that Era. The more clones there are in play, the more rift cubes Dr. Foo's machine will create each turn, and that can be a problem!
Clones are drawn from a bag of 28 clones (four from each Era); if the bag is ever empty, clones won't be spawned.
Clones can be pushed (moved from their current Era to an adjacent Era), pulled (moved to a target Era from their current, adjacent Era), and carried (moved along with an agent) by Artifact effects.
Energy cubes
Green energy cubes can be used to power moves and LOOPs. There's no limit on how many energy cubes can be present in an Era.
Rift cubes
Dr. Foo's machine creates red rift cubes as it tears through spacetime. Each Era can safely hold three rift cubes, but a fourth will create a vortex! If a vortex would be created in an Era that already has one, the agents lose.
Vortexes
When too many rift cubes accumulate in an Era, a vortex is created. All rift cubes are removed from the Era (even if there were more than four).
Any available artifacts in that Era are destroyed, and if there's a mission tile in that Era (active or not), the mission is failed and the tile is removed from play.
Once a vortex is in play, there's no way to repair it. If there are ever four vortexes in play at the same time, the agents lose.
Turn Structure
I. Foo Phase
- Dr. Foo randomly picks an Era of spacetime that he hasn't visited in the current cycle, and uses his machine to travel there. The machine will rotate to point at that Era.
- An Artifact drawn from the top of the Huge Deck becomes available in its Origin Era.
- Dr. Foo creates a number of clones
A) Add Clones and Reveal Artifact: Based on the current Cycle track position, draw Clone tokens (placing them in their designated Eras) and reveal Artifact cards (placing them in their Origin Eras).
B) Resolve Faux Card:
- Reveal a Faux card showing which Era Dr. Foo travels to
- Rotate Dr. Foo's Machine to point at that Era
- Drop Rift cubes into the Machine: 2 base + 1 per Clone in that Era
- Place fallen Rifts in the Rift slots of the Eras where they land
- If an Era cannot hold all its Rifts, it becomes a Vortex
II. Action Phase
Perform any combination of these actions in any order:
A) Move: Spend 1 Energy from your Era to move to an adjacent Era.
B) Use an Artifact: Use a ready Artifact's ability, then exhaust it (turn sideways).
C) Do a LOOP: Spend Energy from your Era to ready exhausted cards of one Elementary Dimension:
- 1st LOOP costs 1 Energy
- 2nd LOOP costs 2 Energy
- 3rd LOOP costs 3 Energy (and so on)
- Black Hole cards can never be readied via LOOP
Free Move: Once per turn, move to an adjacent Era without spending Energy. Flip your Agent tile to show you've used this.
III. Acquire Artifact
You may take one available Artifact card from your current Era and place it on top of your draw pile.
IV. Complete Mission
If there's a revealed Mission in your Era with all required progress slots filled, you may complete it:
- Remove the Mission tile and place it in the completed pile
- Return all cubes on it to the supply
- Reveal a new Mission
- Attendance Reward: Reveal (players + 1) Artifact cards; each player chooses one to add to their deck, destroy the rest
V. Refresh
- Flip your Agent tile back to charged (if used)
- Place all cards from your hand into your discard pile
- All players draw until they have 3 cards in hand
- If the Faux deck is empty, start a new Cycle
Vortexes
When an Era becomes a Vortex:
- The Mission there is permanently failed and removed
- Place a Vortex tile in that Era
- Return all Rift cubes from that Era to the supply
- Destroy any Artifacts there; no new Artifacts can be placed in this Era
Vortexes cannot be removed once placed.
Clones
Dr. Foo's Clones have a fatal weakness: each Clone has a Paradox Era shown in its monocle. If a Clone ever enters its Paradox Era, it is immediately destroyed and returned to the bag.
Clones are primarily moved using Artifact abilities with Clone icons (Pull, Push, Carry, or Destroy effects).
Missions
- There should always be 2 revealed Missions on the board
- When a Mission is completed or removed by a Vortex, reveal a new Mission in Dr. Foo's Era (or the next clockwise Era with an unrevealed tile)
- Progress is tracked by placing cubes on Mission slots when conditions are met during your Action Phase
- A Mission can only be completed after finishing your actions while standing in that Mission's Era
Cycles
The game lasts up to 3 Cycles. Each Cycle consists of 7 Faux cards being revealed. When the Faux deck empties:
- Shuffle all 7 Faux cards
- Place them on the next Cycle track space
- If there's no next space (end of 3rd Cycle), the game is lost
- Your Era: Where your Agent pawn is located
- Adjacent Eras: The two Eras on either side of any Era (End of Times and Dawn of Time are adjacent)
- Next Era: Adjacent Era clockwise from your position
- Previous Era: Adjacent Era counter-clockwise from your position
- Dr. Foo's Era: The Era the middle chute of Dr. Foo's Machine points to
Artifact Ability Icons
- Energy: Add Energy cubes to Eras
- Rift: Remove Rift cubes from Eras
- Movement: Move Agents between Eras
- Artifact: Draw, discard, reveal, acquire, or destroy Artifact cards
- Clone: Pull, push, carry, or destroy Clone tokens