Baobab

About this board game

Baobab is a 20-minute dexterity game for 2–4 players in which you build a growing tree from 108 cards while trying to finish with the fewest cards.

The cards are dealt at random, and players cannot look at the cards in their decks. On each turn, announce that you will play one to three cards, then reveal them one at a time and add them to the tree trunk, which serves as the game container in many versions.

Each illustration creates a different placement challenge. Foliage may go anywhere, while flowers and monkeys must hang over the edge so the ground shown on the card has no part of the tree beneath it. Other cards demand even more precision:

• Place the snake between two other cards.
• Toss the toucan onto the tree from a foot away.
• Drop the leopard straight onto the tree from a foot above.
• Close your eyes before extending your arm over the table to drop the bat.
• Keep the beehive covered only by foliage and flowers.
• Have the chameleon copy the card previously played.

If cards fall while you are adding a card, those fallen cards, along with any cards still waiting to be played that turn, go into your personal penalty pile. This makes every placement a risk: a bold move may help clear your deck, but a collapse leaves you with more cards to count.

As soon as a player places their final card, the game ends. Everyone counts the cards remaining in their deck together with those in their penalty pile, and the player with the fewest cards wins. Baobab combines hidden information, unusual placement rules, and physical precision in a compact contest of controlled chaos.