Cytosis: A Cell Biology Board Game

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Cytosis: A Cell Biology Board Game
Game data
author John Coveyou
graphic Tomasz Bogusz
publishing company Genius Games , Edinorog
Publishing year 2017
Art Board game
Teammates 2-5
Duration 60 to 90 minutes
Age from 10 years on

Cytosis: A Cell Biology Board Game is a strategic board game by the American game designer John Coveyou . It is a game for up to five players, in which the biology of a cell is simulated in the form of a worker placement game. The game was published by Genius Games in 2017 and was financed through a Kickstarter campaign. At the beginning of 2018, a Russian version was published by Edinorog.

Theme and equipment

The game is a strategic board game in the form of a classic worker placement game, in which the metabolic pathways of a cell are simulated. The players use Erlenmeyer flasks , which they place in different areas of the cell in order to preserve resources and convert them into cell components such as hormones and receptors . For the production of the components and the fulfillment of orders, the players receive victory points, which are shown as health points.

In addition to the instructions, the game material consists of:

The game includes a virus expansion that is played on the back of the game board. The following materials are added for this variant:

  • 6 additional cards with cell components (two virus attacks each from the Ebola , influenza and rhinoviruses ),
  • 2 additional destination cards,
  • 3 additional event cards,
  • 7 epigenetic modification cards,
  • 5 player boards,
  • 5 six-sided antibody cubes,
  • 15 antibody markers.

Style of play

Game preparation

To prepare for the game, the game board is laid out with the side of the basic game in the middle of the table. The resource stones and ATP tiles are sorted and placed next to the game board, the two gray Erlenmeyer flasks are placed on the spaces provided on the game board. The different types of cards are separated from each other and mixed separately. The number of event cards is adjusted to the number of players and the pile is placed next to the game board. The target cards are placed face-up next to each other above the game board, with one more target card being laid out as fellow players if there are fewer than 5 players. The top four cards of the component cards are laid out face up on the corresponding fields on the game board, then each player is dealt three of the cards face down and the rest is placed next to the playing field as a draw pile. Each player chooses two of his cards and gives back one card, after which the draw pile is shuffled again.

Each player chooses a color and, depending on the number of players, receives his Erlenmeyer flasks, 2 vesicle tiles and three tokens. One token per player is placed at the start of the scoring track. A selected starting player is determined, he gets the starting player marker and two ATP tokens and counting to the left, each additional player receives one more ATP marker. Then each player chooses any two resources from the pile of ATPs, mRNA or lipids.

Game flow

Steps per turn
  • Place the Erlenmeyer flask
  • Take action
  • optionally evaluate card

The game runs over twelve rounds. At the beginning of each round, an event card is revealed and carried out according to the instructions. Then the players come to their turn, starting with the previously drawn starting player, clockwise and place one of their Erlenmeyer flasks on the board for each turn. Depending on the respective selection, they carry out the related action, with some actions they can receive resources or take cards and with others they can put together cell components for the use of resources in order to fulfill their component cards. Each space on the game board may only be occupied by one Erlenmeyer flask.

There are correspondingly different types of action fields on the playing field, which correspond to the organelles of a cell. There are different types of actions that correspond to the steps of the metabolism. The first group of actions make it possible to get or convert resources:

In the lower area of ​​the playing field there is a row of cards in which the players can use their pistons to receive an order card. They get the first card for free, for the following they have to pay an increasing number of ATP resources. The cards can contain different orders:

  • With the resource cards a player gets the corresponding displayed resources.
  • For the cell component cards, the players have to synthesize the specified cell components from the specified resources and receive the corresponding number of health points.
  • With the alcohol detoxification cards, players receive one health point each when they perform the action in the smooth endoplasmic reticulum and pay the specified number of ATP resources.

The different types of cell components (enzymes, hormones, steroid hormones, hormone receptors and steroid hormone receptors) have to be produced in different cell areas and require different resources in order to be completed. These types of metabolic processes also take place over several steps, each of which requires the use of a piston. Synthesis sites are the cytoplasm , in which the enzyme synthesis is made using ATP and red protein resources, the smooth endoplasmic reticulum, in which the synthesis of steroid hormones begins, the rough endoplasmic reticulum as the starting area for hormones, hormone receptors and steroid hormone receptors, the Golgi apparatus as Second synthesis area for all hormones and receptors and the plasma membrane as an area in which the hormones and receptors are eliminated from the cell with the expenditure of energy (ATP) ( exocytosis ).

Order card Synthesis
path resources needed 		Rating
Alcohol detox Smooth Endoplasmic Reticulum
Resources: ATP 		A health point,
plus additional points in the final scoring according to the maximum number of cards of this type
Protein hormone First step in the rough endoplasmic reticulum with the use of the vesicle, then transport to the Golgi apparatus and finally to the plasma membrane
Resources: proteins (directly from mRNA), carbohydrates, ATP 		Health points according to the card
Steroid hormone First step in the smooth endoplasmic reticulum with use of the vesicle, then transport to the Golgi apparatus and finally to the plasma membrane
Resources: lipids, carbohydrates, ATP 		Health points according to the card
Protein hormone receptor First step in the rough endoplasmic reticulum with the use of the vesicle, then transport to the Golgi apparatus and finally to the plasma membrane
Resources: proteins (directly from mRNA), carbohydrates, ATP 		Health points according to the card, then for each synthesized protein hormone of the opponent 2 and the player 1 point
Steroid hormone receptor First step in the rough endoplasmic reticulum with the use of the vesicle, then transport to the Golgi apparatus and finally to the plasma membrane
Resources: proteins (directly from mRNA), lipids, ATP 		Health points according to the card, then for each synthesized steroid hormone the opponent 2 and the player 1 point
Enzymes Synthesis in the cytoplasm, but proteins must be produced beforehand
Resources: proteins, carbohydrates, ATP 		Health points according to the card, ascending points in the final scoring depending on the number of different enzymes

As a further action, before using their own flasks, players can buy a gray flask for four ATP resources and use it for one additional move per round. There is also an action space to get the starting player marker in the next round and to start the round. With this action, the player in question may also place one of his game markers on one of the target cards displayed above the game board, which will earn him additional points for each card of the corresponding type in the final account.

A round ends when all players have used their Erlenmeyer flasks and carried out their actions with them. Then new order cards are laid out according to the rules and all players get their pistons and vesicles no longer needed back. The new round begins with the new starting player or, if nobody wanted to take the starting player marker, again with the starting player of the preliminary round.

End of game and scoring

The game ends after twelve rounds after the round in which the last event card was revealed. When all players have finished this round, the final scoring takes place, in which the players receive additional points in addition to the health points already scored in the game:

  • For remaining resources: 1 point for every four mRNA or lipid resources, 1 point for every three protein resources, and 1 point for every two carbohydrate resources.
  • The player with the most alcohol detoxification points (ATP costs of the corresponding cards) receives 8 points, the next 5 and the third 2 points.
  • The enzyme cards are settled according to the existing sets: If a player owns 5 different enzymes, he receives 14 points (2 for two, 5 for three, 9 for four different enzymes)
  • Each player receives points according to the target cards on which he placed his scoring markers.

The winner of the game is the player who has the most health points after the final settlement. In the event of a tie, the player with the most completed cell component cards wins, and if there is still a tie, the player with the greatest distance to the starting player wins.

Variants and extensions

Rules modification for two players

The two player game differs from the multiplayer game in some details. As in the three player game, both players receive four pistons and three vesicles. Before the game, however, three alcohol detox cards are removed from the stack of cell components and two event cards; accordingly, the game only runs for 10 rounds. In some areas, not all fields can be used on the game board:

  • With the mitochondria only two of the four fields may be used,
  • In the smooth endoplasmic reticulum, only either lipid synthesis or steroid hormone synthesis / detoxification may be used

Other differences concern the re-laying of the cards at the end of each round and the devaluation of the alcohol detoxification cards (the player with the most points receives 6, the second 3 points).

Virus expansion

With the expansion Virus Expansion , several specifics of the immune defense and virus infection are introduced into the game via additional game material . The game is played according to the basic game, but the back of the game board is used and the additional game material is used according to some additional rules:

  • In preparation for the game, the additional three event cards from the expansion are mixed into the deck of event cards after a number of event cards, depending on the number of players, have been removed.
  • For the target cards, the two new target cards immune defense and virus attack are mixed into the target card set. The display is based on the number of players +1.
  • the six cell component cards with the virus attacks are mixed into the corresponding deck after each player has received three starting cards.

Each player also receives a player board and three additional light-colored marker stones, which are each set to position 0 in the depicted immune defense bar against the three virus types ( Ebola , flu and rhinovirus ).

A virus attack can now be triggered in the game in two different ways: Either when the corresponding card is drawn from the event card deck or when a player takes a corresponding card from the card display. In both cases the virus attack is carried out and all players must determine their specific immune defense. To do this, it is first determined how many dice may be used: If the player's health point marker is in the red area of ​​the scoring track (1 to 13), he may only throw one die, if it is in the yellow area (14 to 18 ) he uses two dice and in the green area (greater than 28) he uses three dice. The result of the throw is added to the current value of the corresponding immune defense bar on the player board. The results are added up and the players now compare these with each other and according to the information in the rules, depending on the number of players. As a rule, the player with the highest score gets three or four additional resources and the player with the lowest score loses one resource or one health point. After the settlement, all players are allowed to invest ATP resources for the specific virus in order to increase the immune defense for the next attack (one ATP for two immune defense points).

Epigenetic Modification Cards

In addition to the Virus Expansion, there is a set of seven Epigenetic Modification Cards that can be used both in the base game and in the game with the Virus Expansion . The cards influence the individual possibilities of the players by assigning them special abilities that apply throughout the game.

Development and reception

The game Cytosis: A Cell Biology Board Game was published by Genius Games in 2017 and was financed through a Kickstarter campaign. The game was funded by 6,650 supporters and an amount of 389,357 US dollars. A virus expansion was developed with the basic version , which was added to the game.

In 2018 a Russian version was published by Edinorog.

supporting documents

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l Cytosis game instructions on the Genius Games website; accessed on April 8, 2018.
  2. ↑ a b c game instructions Cytosis: Virus Expansion on the Genius Games website; accessed on April 8, 2018.
  3. ↑ Game instructions Epigenetic Modification Cards on the Genius Games website; accessed on April 8, 2018.
  4. ↑ a b Cytosis on Kickstarter.com ; accessed on May 1, 2018.
  5. ↑ Versions of Cytosis in the board game database BoardGameGeek (English); accessed on May 1, 2018.

Web links