Game Tips for Rattus

9

Marvin K. {Avid Gamer}

Aug 31st, 2011| Rule

23 of 24 gamers found this helpful

“But I LIKE Dracula”

If you like the game you can end up with a LOT of characters-The original characters + The Rattus characters +the Essen Promo Characters + a single Essen character promo + the BGG promo. While it is fun to see what weird interactions can occur from randomly drawing characters we use the following House Rule. The players choose the characters(limited to 1 of each category). We determine 1st player and “snake draft” the characters. For those unfamiliar with snake drafting choice in a 3 player game is as follows- Player 1 then 2 then 3 then 3 again then 2 then 1. For 2 player it is 1,2,2,1,1,2. For 4 player it is 1,2,3,4,4,3. Player 1 and 2 usually get their favorite choices and 3,4 get two choices. alternatively you can make the last 2 choices random from the appropriate choices.

8

Andr0ss {Avid Gamer}

Jan 24th, 2014| Strategy

11 of 11 gamers found this helpful

“Don't take any roles.”

Hello team,
So I demoed Rattus today at work a few times, and by my second game of the day I decided to play around with the design. I decided to play my next few games against the grain and not take a single role for the entirety of the game. I played 5 games today in total using this strategy and won 5 times.

I was a little shocked that this strategy worked so well, but it could also be because all the other players spammed the other roles and were annihilated by the plague and end game. While in no way am I implying that this is the best strategy and that you will win every time, I do feel it is a viable strategy and one worth trying.

9

Granny {Avid Gamer}

Aug 19th, 2011| Strategy

38 of 42 gamers found this helpful

“Clumping Versus Spreading ~ A Rattus Strategy Tip”

There are many “strategies” to Rattus due to the varied card powers and combinations whatever combination you choose to use throughout your game. But, what about your overall board strategy?

Most people don’t have a real board strategy. They concentrate on a card combo they like, and take the path of least resistance to try and hold as many regions as they can with enough cubes to withstand the plague. This is fine, as you give yourself an opportunity to win, but you will be doing the same thing everybody else is doing… and rely on tactics to beat your opponent.

Some people like to clump… putting all their cubes in a few regions and weathering any storm that comes their way through pure numbers. This can work as long as nobody notices those regions with 6 or 7 cubes stacked inside of them.. or choose to ignore it. Tough chance… but it still can work if you play your cards right.

Me… I like to really spread out… thinner the better. I keep spreading throughout the game, trying to slip under the radar until the end is near. Does it work? Yes. Why? I think it works because no one sees me as a threat. In the end… I don’t always win, but I’m always close, as I’m rarely attacked and can retain a good portion of my cubes. I try to have the Merchant Card near the end, so I can move cubes as needed.

The rest of the game is pretty tactical…reacting to what others are doing and keeping my head down. In Rattus… I am a turtle.

Of course, now I’ve let the cat out of the bag. 🙂

Happy Gaming!

4

Gojira {Avid Gamer}

Aug 21st, 2011| Tip

15 of 16 gamers found this helpful

“Essen 2010 Bonus Cards”

If you’d like this 4 card set send a payment of $10 US via Paypal to sales AT zmangames DOT com. Price includes shipping. Specify that you want the “Rattus Essen 2010 Bonus Cards” and your shipping address in the comment field. You wont get an order confirmation or anything they just send the cards. I just got mine on Sat 8/20/2011. The cards are pretty cool.

Merlin(magic)
Joan of Arc(church)
Dracula(royalty)
Robin Hood(chivalry)
The cards come on a single unpunched sheet, shrink wrapped with instructions.

Not sure how much longer they will be available. If you’re comfortable with the casual order procedure they are pretty neat cards. I’m sure when Zman runs out these will become hard to find.

Note: Zman is the publisher so you are ordering these cards directly from the publisher. I am not the one selling these.

6

ElGordo {Avid Gamer}

Feb 6th, 2012| Rule

17 of 19 gamers found this helpful

“Spicing up the 2 player game”

Although I like Rattus as a 2 player game well enough, Rattus really shines with 3-4 players. In a 2 player game, it seems that areas are often not populated enough to be affected when the plague hits, even with the Knights plus 2 cubes effect.

In order to make things a bit more interesting, we replace the five purple edged 4+ starting rat tokens, with random 1+ or 2+ general tokens. This increases the chance that the Plague will affect any given area.

7

Dolus {Avid Gamer}

Aug 23rd, 2011| Strategy

20 of 23 gamers found this helpful

“Abusing the Witch”

Of the base cards, I have found the witch to be the most difficult to handle.

There are two excellent strategic moves to take with the witch, which you should pick between based on your and your opponents’ board positions:
1.) Exchange rat tokens in your region with harmless rat tokens. If you can fille your country with 3 rat tokens that will only harm role cards, and they are role cards you don’t have and don’t plan on picking up, then you have a free country to keep populating until the plague man visits. If other players try to populate there as well, then they’re under heavy threat of when the plague man visits because you’ll have raised the population so high.
2.) Target highly populated regions with deadly rat tokens. Find the players whose population is growing out of control and needs to be dwindled down. Find the rat tokens that will kill a lot of their units, and move those rat tokens there.

Also, make sure you keep track of what rat tokens you’ve looked at and where they are. This is difficult as it’s like an advanced memory game, but it’ll help you if you want to move the token later or so you don’t accidentally look at the same token twice.

9

Granny {Avid Gamer}

Aug 18th, 2011| Rule

32 of 38 gamers found this helpful

“You MUST take a Power! ~ A Rattus House Rule”

There is no rule that says you must take a power. In fact, if you don’t, and everyone else does, you may just win as you don’t lose any points in the end. We had a player win several games this way. It’s possible to beat it, but we decided taking powers is more fun (a big part of the game), and revoked his privilege to be powerless. Majority House Rules Again! You must take a power from the start.*

*We do remove the rule from time to time to make him happy… and he usually wins if we don’t play optimally.

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