Morels

About this board game

Morels is a strategic card game for two players, designed for a play time of about 30 minutes. In its old-growth forest, players collect mushrooms, decide when to sell them, and cook sets to earn points toward victory.

The game uses two decks: an 84-card Day Deck containing ten mushroom varieties plus baskets, cider, butter, pans, and moons, and an 8-card Night Deck featuring mushrooms that can be foraged by moonlight. The forest is represented by a changing row of eight face-up cards, creating a shifting selection of opportunities.

• Forage strategically: Choose cards from the forest while managing your hand-size limit.
• Sell mushroom sets: Selling two or more matching mushrooms provides foraging sticks, expanding your options and enabling offensive or defensive plays.
• Cook for points: Prepare sets of three or more matching mushrooms, using butter or cider when the set is large enough.
• Watch the decay pile: Each turn, one forest card moves into a temporary discard area that remains available only briefly.

After every turn, the Day Deck refills the forest from the back. This creates the feeling of walking through the woods: some tempting cards are collected, some are passed by, and others wait farther ahead. Poisonous mushrooms add danger, while the changing tableau makes each decision matter.

With selling, cooking, moonlight foraging, and careful card selection all competing for attention, Morels offers a focused two-player contest in which the best path through the forest changes from game to game.