Spotlight on Games > Variants
American Megafauna
Balancing Variant

[for the second edition of the Sierra Madre board game]
Wed Feb 20 17:09:08 PST 2002
Note: these rules were in the first edition, but omitted from the second and are designed to give the starting archetypes more of a fighting chance at the start of the game.

To use the variant, each player chooses starting DNA in the order shown:

mmm: one of
AP
M
PS (with max size of 5)
I (with max size of 3, recommended for first time)
mmrrr: one of
AB
BM
G (recommended for first time)
N (with max size of 1)
rm: one of
NP
S (with max size of 5; recommended for first time)
rrrr: one of
AA
AM (recommended for first time)
rr½m: one of
AAP
AMP
(the P because it has a sail)

Summary of Catastrophes

This information is also found, inconveniently, on the back of the Sequence of Play chart.

Mesozoic:

The Comet: kills > 3 AaBGHMS and/or triple S Cenozoic: The Asteroid: kills > 2 AaMS and/or triple B
The Supernova: kills > 4 AaGHINS and/or triple I
The Solar Flare: kills size > 4 and/or > 2 Aa

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