About the game

The Pokémon boardgame is a fanmade boardgame based on the Pokémon universe.

Collect your Pokémon and battle for the title as Pokémon master!

Game Object
To become the Pokémon master, you must possess the most points, denoted by the
symbol: . During your journey, there will be various events happening. The game

Pokémon
ends when the fourth global event is drawn. The player with the most amount of
points when the game ends is the new Pokémon master.

Boardgame There are also other ways of winning the game that will arise while playing. Find
out and you might become the next Pokémon master!
Master Trainer

Game Contents
About me 49 x Event cards
18 x Status cards
I am a statistics student from Lund in
17 x Gym cards
Sweden who owned the Pokémon
93 x Item cards
master trainer boardgame when I was
60 x Pokémon cards (brown)
a child. As a tribute to that game, I
61 x Pokémon cards (green)
have created this game that plays
60 x Pokémon cards (blue)
with the same mechanics, but more
58 x Pokémon cards (red)
suitable for people who are interested
13 x Pokémon cards (yellow)
in Pokémon and the Pokémon
36 x "Draw Event" cards
universe overall. This is purely for
1x Game board
private use, and it will not be
3x Damage/Experience token holders
distributed due to copyright
10 x Player tokens
violations.

Information
Skill needed Setting up the game
Place the game board on a flat surface and give each player a player token. If there
Luck needed is a dispute about who gets what token, the youngest player goes first, because lets
face it, older players are too cool to play Pokémon anyway.
Fun Take out the brown Pokémon cards and shuffle the deck. Then give each player
three cards face down. Each player chooses one of the three Pokémon as their
Interactive "starter" and discards the other two. Each player puts the chosen Pokémon in front
of them in their roster. The discarded Pokémon cards go into a discard pile unique
to the color of the card. Put the discarded cards face up in a new pile next to the
Time required
corresponding deck. These discarded Pokémon act as the "discovered but not yet
caught" Pokémon.
Number of Players: 2-10 Put 9 each of the "Draw Event" cards into each of the brown, green, blue and red
Time needed: 120 mins Pokémon decks. Then shuffle all Pokémon decks, the Event card deck and the Item
Age Limit: 13+* card deck and put them face down on the table.
* Of course the game can be played with younger set-
tings, with different rules. Feel free to make up your
Put the Gym cards and the Status cards somewhere on the table.
own rules to suit your need.
Roll a die to determine who starts the game.
 Gameplay
Basics
Each player will take turns move around on the map, collecting Pokémon and adding
them to their own roster. A roster has a maximum limit of 6 Pokémon. When a 7:th
Pokémon is caught, one of them has to be discarded, bringing the total down to
6. If a player would collect a Pokémon in any other way (e.g hatching an egg), the
same rule applies.
Whenever a Pokémon is knocked out, flip the card over.

Pokémon Actions each turn

Boardgame The game is played in turns, each turn consisting of two steps.
1. Move your player token: In this step, you roll the six-sided die (d6) and move
Master Trainer your player token an amount of steps equal to the number of pips on the die.
So far so good, right? Yes. But you must walk in a straight line. This means,
you can not walk back to any step you have already been to on the same turn,
unless you reach a dead end. You must move your player token the entire
distance and may not stop halfway.
If any events sends you to a space without completing your full move, such as
being blacked out, the rest of the move is canceled.
2. Resolve your landing space: There are three types of spaces one can land on.

(a) Pokémon spaces: Reveal the top card of the deck associated with the
color of the space you landed on and battle. If there are any discarded
Pokémon of that rarity, you may search through the discard pile and bat-
tle one of them instead.
(b) City spaces: You may choose between the following: Draw an item card
and discard (sell) any number of item cards to get item cards equal to
half the amount of cards you discarded (rounded down) - or - battle the
gym - or - draw three Quest cards, and choose one of them to add to your
hand. Shuffle the remaining two into the quest deck.
(c) Black spaces: You find an item. Draw an item card.
Each turn may only resolve a space once, and so if an event sends a player to another
space than the one they initially landed on, draw a Pokémon card from the same pile
that the "Draw event" card came from and battle it.
If a player starts their turn in a city, that player may choose to skip their turn and
fully restore all their Pokémon.
After your turn is resolved, the turn moves to the player to your left, who rolls to
move. The game continues until the fourth global event card is drawn.

Example 1: Sebastian rolls a 5, and lands on a green space. He picks up the top
card of the green deck and reveals an event that sends him to a city space. Since he
didn’t get to battle a green Pokémon, he now takes the top card of the green deck
and battles an Eevee.
 Game Terms
In this game, there are plenty of terms used in the Pokémon universe that needs to
be explained.

Pokémon cards
A Pokémon is made up of 4 different numbered attributes, at least one ability, and an
evolution text. Basic Pokémon (Pokémon in their basic evolutionary form) have one
ability and one text explaining the evolution, and Pokémon in their final evolutionary
form instead have two abilities.
The four attributes are the following (left-to-right):
Pokémon
Boardgame
• Attack: This number is added to the damage whenever this Pokémon deals
damage.

Master Trainer • Points: This is the number of points you get from owning this Pokémon.
This is also the number of experience you get by defeating this Pokémon.

• Health: The number of damage tokens you can place on this Pokémon
before it is knocked out.
• Speed: This number decides who goes first in battles, and is also the num-
ber you need to roll above (d20) to catch the Pokémon in the wild.

All Pokémon also have an ability, that is activated once the Pokémon is owned. Wild
Pokémon does not have active abilities (however this can easily be changed with
more experienced players, see: Game variations). At the bottom of the card, you
can see how much experience (Exp) you need to evolve Bulbasaur into Ivysaur, as
well as in which deck you can find Ivysaur (denoted by the colored dot).

Example 2: Jennifer battles a wild Koffing, which has the ability Explosive. When she
finally defeats it, her Pokémon does not take two damage, since Koffing is wild, and
therefore its ability is not active.
 Evolution
In this game, experience are needed for Pokémon to evolve. experience are awarded
by defeating wild Pokémon, and battling gyms and other trainers. Whenever a player
receives experience, they can distribute them among their Pokémon however they
choose. The Pokémon that receives the experience (Exp) does not need to partici-
pate in the battle.
As soon as Bulbasaur gets its 5:th point of experience, search the green deck and
discard pile for Ivysaur, and replace Bulbasaur with it, including any damage tokens,
items or excess experience that Bulbasaur had attached to it. If Ivysaur can not be
found (if he is in an egg, or is owned by another player), the evolving player may
Pokémon transfer all the experience from Bulbasaur onto another Pokémon of their choice
immediately.
Boardgame Example 3: Jonas wants to evolve his Magikarp, so he puts 9 experience onto his
Master Trainer Magikarp but finds out that Gyarados is owned by another player. He may now
move all experience from Magikarp to other Pokémon he owns. This may only be
done once per Pokémon.

Battle
A battle between a player and a wild Pokémon is performed in 4 steps, which are
played out in order before repeating:
1. Choose one of your Pokémon to use in the battle.
2. The player goes first, and chooses between the following:
(a) Attacks the wild Pokémon by rolling a Combat Roll (CR), which is done by
rolling a d20 and consulting the table below. If the player rolls equal to
or higher than the wild Pokémon’s CR, the Pokémon hits. Once a hit has
been scored the player determines damage dealt to the wild Pokémon by
rolling a d6 and adding the attack stat on your Pokémon card. Put that
many damage tokens on the wild Pokémon.
(b) Switches their Pokémon for another one in their party.
(c) Rolls to catch (d20) the wild Pokémon. The roll must be equal to or above
the Speed of the wild Pokémon. If the Pokémon is caught it is immediately
added to the player’s roster, ending the battle.
(d) Rolls to run away (d6) from the wild Pokémon according to the table be-
low. If it is equal to or above the number, the battle is over and the wild
Pokémon is discarded.
3. If the wild Pokémon was not knocked out, it deals damage equal to its attack
stat to the player Pokémon (minimum 1).
4. If the player Pokémon was knocked out, send out another one. If that is not
possible, that player is Blacked Out.
5. Otherwise, repeat from 1.

Rarity Combat Roll (d20) Item Reward Run Away (d6)

5 1 2
7 1 3
8 2 4
9 2 5
11 3 6
Gym 7 3 -
Final battle 11 - -

Table 1: Table of combat rolls, and run away rolls needed when battling wild Poké-
mon of different rarity as well as the item rewards for defeating the Pokémon.
 When a player lands on the same space as another trainer, they may choose to
battle that trainer. A battle between two trainers follows the same logic as battle
versus a wild Pokémon, except only options (a) and (b) are allowed.
1. Both players choose Pokémon simultaneously. This can be done by counting
down from three, or by using a die and numbering your Pokémon 1-6. Then
the Speed stat of the Pokémon are compared and the one with the highest
Speed goes first and is labeled Player 1. Should their Speed attributes be
equal, they roll a die to determine who goes first.
2. Player 1 chooses between the following:
(a) Rolls CR (d20) the other Pokémon according to the table below. If the
Pokémon player 1 Pokémon hits, roll a d6 for damage and add the attack stat on
that Pokémon card. Put that many damage tokens on the other Pokémon.
Boardgame (b) Switches their Pokémon for another one in their party.
Master Trainer 3. If the Player 2’s was not knocked out, that player can now choose between
the choices in 2.
4. If a player Pokémon was knocked out, the battle is over. The winner draws two
item cards at random from the loser. experience are given to the winner with
a base value according to the losing Pokémon’s "Points"-attribute. The total
experience awarded is then given by the base value + 5.

Example 4: Isa and Otto von Bismarck are battling with their Pokémon, Electabuzz
and Exeggutor, respectively. Since Electabuzz has higher speed (17 to 16) Isa goes
first. She rolls a CR and gets a 14, which is higher than the 9 that is required to hit
a Pokémon of red rarity. She then rolls a d6 and gets a 5. Since Electabuzz has 3 in
its attack stat, the attack deals 5+3=8 damage.
Since Exeggutor already had 6 damage counters on it, it is knocked out, and Isa wins
the battle. She takes two item cards from Otto at random, and receives 6 experience
to place on her Pokémon.
 Items
Items can be used at any time, and are not considered actions in terms of battling.
Some items are placed in front of the player (e.g. eggs, incubators, town map and
others), and some are held in the hands.

Example 5: Martin is battling a Mewtwo, but his Caterpie is low on Health. He decides
to heal his Caterpie using a Potion, removing 2 damage counters from his beloved
worm. Since this is considered a free action, he can then try to catch Mewtwo again
before taking more damage.

Pokémon
Boardgame Special spaces
Master Trainer There are two special types of spaces on the game board, water passages and cave
passages. In order to move through these spaces, the player needs a Pokémon with
Surfer (water passages) or Illuminating (cave passages). There are items that grant
these effects.
If a player loses their last Pokémon with the corresponding effect while on a wa-
ter passage or in a cave passage, or if those Pokémon are knocked out, they are
instantly Blacked Out.

Gyms
A Gym battle works the same way as battling a wild Pokémon. Table 1 shows the
combat rolls and item rewards corresponding to battling a gym. It is not possible
to run away from a gym challenge.
If a player defeats a gym, they gain the Gym card. Other players may challenge
your gyms by landing on the corresponding city space. In this case this works as a
regular Trainer vs. Trainer battle. As an additional reward, the winner also receives
the corresponding gym card.

Events
The event card deck consists of three different types of cards. Local events (white),
Global events (white with a G in the bottom right corner) and Quests (orange).
A local event only applies to the player who drew the card, unless specified other-
wise.
A global event is placed face up and immediately applies to all players. Whenever
the 4:th global event is drawn, the game is over.
A quest is personal and does not need to be shown to other players. It can be kept
face down by the player who drew it until they finish the quest. Rewards are given
as soon as the requirements are met.

Example 6: Stephanie owns both Dragonite and Zapdos. When she ends her turn
on a red space, she draws an event card, activating the global event "Legendary".
Since she already meets the prerequisites for this win condition, she immediately
wins the game and becomes the Pokémon master.
 Blacked Out
A trainer is blacked out if they lose all Pokémon, or get stuck in a cave or on a water
passage. The trainer is then moved to a city where they own a gym (their choice).
If they do not own a gym they are moved to New Bark Town or Pallet Town.
A trainer who is blacked out lose one Pokémon at random. Number your Pokémon
from 1 to up to 6. Then roll a die until you roll a number that corresponds to one of
your Pokémon. You can not lose your last Pokémon.
They need to spend the next turn reviving all remaining Pokémon. The turn after
that, they can resume their adventure.

Pokémon Card clarifications

Boardgame Here you can find explanations of cards that might need explanation.

Abilities
Master Trainer
• Barrier: See Hard Shell.
• Blaze: This is active as long as the Pokémon with Blaze is the only one alive in
the party.
• Blob: The Pokémon that the ability is copied from does not need to be alive.
• Flying: You can of course always fly to New Bark Town or Pallet Town.
• Foul Odor: This can not be used when players want to battle your gym.
• Future Sight: This includes Pokémon cards, item cards, event cards, player
quests and eggs.
• Hard Shell: Damage reduced by this can not be less than 1.
• Roots: See Hard Shell.
• Swarm: The extra damage is of course reset after each battle.
• Sweet Scent: If a "Draw an Event" card is drawn as one of the two cards,
resolve the event before replacing the card with another Pokémon. Multiple
event cards can be drawn in sequence. Resolve them all before drawing an-
other Pokémon card.

Items
• TM-and-HM-cards: The number in the parenthesis is the CR-roll required to
hit. Instead of rolling a d6 as damage, the effect of the attack says on the
card. This does not replace the original attack, but can be used instead of a
"normal" attack at any time in a battle.

Events
• Roadblock: Place a Roadblock token on the space where this was drawn. Play-
ers can no longer pass through that space.
 Game Variations
Wild Abilities
For more experienced players, one can add the rules that wild Pokémon have their
abilities active. The following abilities are then affected:
• Ancient
• Angry
• Aqua Jet
• Barrier
Pokémon • Burning
Boardgame • Cold Aura

Master Trainer • Darkness

• Destiny Bond
• Evil
• Explosive
• Grounded
• Hard Shell
• Ice Cold
• Lava Body
• Lightning Speed
• Roots
• Sharp Claws
• Skyward
• Smog
• Spider Web
• Spores
• Static
• Trickster
• Venom
• Yawning