Forest Shuffle Dartmoor

A standalone game within the Forest Shuffle series

Forest Shuffle: Dartmoor introduces a brand-new habitat with new species offering unique abilities and bonuses to discover. Just like in the original Forest Shuffle, players in Forest Shuffle: Dartmoor compete to create the most valuable environment by placing trees and shrubs and then attracting species to build an ecologically balanced habitat for flora and fauna.

New to Dartmoor is the introduction of TERRAIN cards, which are played horizontally and serve as homes or feeding locations for species other than trees or shrubs. Due to the nature of the terrain, species can only be placed above or below a terrain card. Deer and other species stay away from peat bogs in the moorland. They need their water, but don’t feel safe near springs or streams. Therefore, it’s important for players to pay close attention to where they place their species.

Like its predecessor, Forest Shuffle: Dartmoor has a unique back: any of the 180 cards in the deck can be placed face-up to create a bog, if the action allows. The caves in Forest Shuffle: Dartmoor are now dealt at the beginning of the game, offering asymmetrical starting conditions. Furthermore, the number of tree symbols has been reduced from eight to six to facilitate bonuses.

The gameplay remains unchanged: At the start, each player has six cards in their hand. These cards depict either a specific type of tree, shrub, or terrain, or two bog dwellers (animals or plants). These latter cards are divided into two halves (vertically or horizontally), each with a dweller on one half of the card. During a turn, you can either draw two cards—either from the draw pile face-down or from the clearing face-up—and add them to your hand, or play a card from your hand by discarding other cards to pay the cost, then placing the chosen card into play. At the end, the player with the highest score wins.