Zen Garden War

Introduction
In a world where so much of society often gets lost in the next great fad, a group of neighbors
have wrapped themselves up in a rather trivial gardening competition. The neighbors, Jack,
Bob, Steve, and Kyle, live in a 13 floor apartment building that recently unveiled a community
roof garden. Kyle (the instigator) responded by inciting a feverish competitive spirit amongst the
group and Bob (the asian culture savant) suggested they compete to see who can grow the best
zen garden. Jack and Steve (who didnt have much to do because the cable was out) joined in
as well.
Contents
Event cards
Conditions
Zen tokens
Dollar tokens
Retaliation markers
Plant pots
Bamboo
Lantern plants
Growth level cards
Quick reference cardsqty. 4

qty. 38
qty. 10
qty. 15
qty. 20
qty. 4
qty. 10
qty. 10
qty. 20

Objective
Grow 5 plants to maturity before your opponents. Maturity is achieved when a plant gains its
second and final level of growth.

Plant Pot -> level 1 -> level 2 (example image)

Set-up
To start the game each player receives 3 Zen and 3 Dollars. Place the plant pots and all
remaining zen face up somewhere all players can reach, this area will be the market. These
plant pots and zen represent quantities available in the current game, once they are gone no
more can be received or purchased. For three player games start with only 7 lantern plants and
2 zen in the market.

Set-up diagram (example image)

Gameplay
Play begins with the tallest person and continues in a clockwise fashion. At the beginning of
each players turn a card is drawn from the event deck. The card drawn will determine the
number of actions available that turn as well as an event that must be resolved before play
begins.
Actions may be used to do any of the following.
-work
-meditate
-purchase plant
-water plant
-sabotage
Work
When a player uses an action to work they gain one dollar from the draw pile. Dollars never run
out so if the pile is empty be sure to keep a running total.
Meditate
When a player uses an action to meditate they gain one zen. There are a finite amount of zen
tokens so this action may only be performed if there are zen available in the draw pile.

Purchase Plant
Plants are purchased from the market. Buying a plant costs one action and requires a player to
pay the amount shown below.
-Bamboo (1 dollar)
-Lantern Plants (2 dollars)
Players cannot own more than five plant pots at one time. Once a plant pot is purchased it is
placed near the purchasing player but is considered to have no growth levels. Multiple plants
may be purchased during the same turn.
Water Plant
When you use an action to water, choose a plant and add one growth level to it. A single plant
may not grow twice in one turn. However, a plant may be bought and grown in the same turn.
More than one plant may be watered in a turn but the added stress of multitasking costs that
player a zen token. This is a flat rate and covers any number of plants watered that turn
(remember that you will still need an action to water each plant). Once each of your 5 plants
reaches their second growth level you win the game. Plant pots themselves do not count as a
level of growth.
Note: Your plants do not grow if you have no zen. As a result, you may not grow more than one
plant in a turn if you have only one zen (as spending that zen to water multiple plants would
bring your total zen to zero). Since zen is required for successful watering it is a good idea to
make sure you keep an eye on how much you have.
Sabotage
When an action is spent to sabotage, the acting player spends one zen and chooses an
opponent. That opponent immediately loses one bamboo growth level and receives a retaliation
token from the draw pile. After any player receives a second retaliation token that player
immediately discards the tokens and chooses an opponent to lose a growth level.
Note: Sabotage actions may only target bamboo growth stages but retaliation actions can target
any plant in play.
Example: On Steves turn he chooses to spend one action and one zen to perform a sabotage
action against Jack. Jack loses one bamboo growth level. Jack then notices that he now has
two retaliation tokens (having already accumulated one in a previous turn). He discards both
tokens and chooses Bob to lose a lantern plant growth stage. Jack spends no actions and no
zen to perform this action as it is in retaliation. Bob accumulates no retaliation tokens from this
turn of events.
Conditions
Conditions are gameplay modifiers that override specific rules. A new condition is flipped each
time someone draws a Shaking it up! card. Each condition remains in effect until another
Shaking it up! card is played. No more than one condition can be active at any given time and
each new condition replaces the previous one.