Zombicide: 2nd Edition

2021

Join the worldwide Zombicide craze! Cooperate as survivors in a zombie-infested world, find gear, and strategize your way through 25 exciting scenarios.

60
minutes

1 - 6
player(s)

14+

Medium

About the game

Zombicide: 2nd Edition is an exciting, immersive board game that plunges you into a thrilling world of survival in a zombie apocalypse. It’s an epic game of strategy and cooperation where you and your companions must work together to overcome the undead and reclaim your city.

The game’s setting is a post-apocalyptic city, a grim urban landscape teeming with the undead. Every turn you make, every decision you take, can tip the balance between survival and becoming a zombie’s dinner. The game’s atmosphere is further enhanced by the high-quality miniatures and artwork, which truly capture the desperation and horror of a world overrun by zombies.

Game components Unboxing the fun!

Zombicide: 2nd Edition is a cooperative board game where players work together to complete objectives while surviving against hordes of zombies. The game includes a variety of components, each of which plays a crucial role in gameplay.

1. Game Tiles

These are the large cardboard pieces that make up the game board. Each tile represents a different part of the game’s city setting, such as a street, a building, or a park. They are arranged in different configurations depending on the scenario being played.

2. Miniatures

These detailed plastic figures represent the players’ survivors and the zombies they must fight. Each survivor has a unique miniature to match their character card, while the zombies come in a variety of types, including walkers, fatties, and runners.

3. Survivor Dashboards

These are individual boards for each player that track the survivor’s experience, equipment, and skills. As survivors earn experience by defeating zombies, they level up and gain new abilities, which are also tracked on the dashboard.

4. Character Cards

Each player chooses a character at the beginning of the game, which comes with a corresponding character card. This card details the survivor’s backstory, special abilities, and starting equipment.

5. Dice

The game comes with six-sided dice that are used to resolve combat and other random elements of the game. The number of dice rolled often depends on the survivor’s weapons and skills.

6. Tokens

These are used to mark various elements on the game board, such as noise (which can attract more zombies), doors (which can be opened or closed), and objectives (which must be completed to win the game).

7. Equipment Cards

These cards represent the weapons, tools, and other items that survivors can find and use during the game. Equipment can be found in buildings, and each item has its own rules for use, as detailed on the card.

8. Zombie Cards

These cards control the spawn of the zombies. Each turn, a new zombie card is drawn to determine where and how many new zombies appear on the game board.

9. Rulebook

This book provides detailed instructions on how to set up and play the game, as well as the specific rules for each scenario. It also provides background information on the game’s setting and characters.

Game setup Lay it out, line it up, let’s go

Zombicide: 2nd Edition is a thrilling board game where players work together to defeat zombies and complete different missions. Setting up the game involves arranging the game board, organizing resources, designating player roles, and incorporating random elements. Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to set it up.

Step 1: Set Up the Game Board

Begin by laying out the game tiles to form the game board. The layout depends on the mission you choose to play. Refer to the mission guide in the game rules for instructions on how to arrange the tiles.

Step 2: Place the Game Elements

Once the game board is set, place doors, cars, and objective tokens as indicated by the mission guide. Set the zombie spawn tokens on the designated spaces.

Step 3: Define Player Roles

Each player selects a survivor to control during the game. The survivor sheets display the skills, abilities and health points of the respective characters. Hand out the appropriate colored bases and miniatures to each player to match their chosen survivor. These colored bases will help identify each player’s survivor on the game board.

Step 4: Distribute Initial Resources

Every player starts with a specific set of equipment cards. Usually, this includes a pan for melee combat. Shuffle the remaining equipment cards and form a deck. Place this deck face down next to the game board.

Step 5: Prepare the Zombie Deck

Create the zombie deck by shuffling all zombie cards together. This deck will be used to spawn zombies on the game board.

Step 6: Incorporate Random Elements

In Zombicide: 2nd Edition, the random elements mainly come from the zombie and equipment decks. The types of zombies that appear and the equipment players find are determined by drawing cards from these decks. This unpredictability adds a layer of suspense and excitement to the game.

Now that you’ve set up the game, you’re ready to play! Remember to keep the game rules handy for any clarifications needed during the game.

Game flow Round and round we go

Zombicide: 2nd Edition is a cooperative board game where players need to work together to fend off hordes of zombies. The game progresses by turns, each of which has three distinct phases. They are the Player Phase, the Zombie Phase, and the End Phase.

1. Player Phase:

In the player phase, each player, in the order of their choice, performs their actions. Each survivor has three actions they can use for different activities. The activities include:

Moving: A survivor can move to an adjacent tile.
Searching: If a survivor is in a building zone, they can search for equipment cards.
Reorganizing/Trading: Survivors in the same zone can trade equipment cards or rearrange their inventory.
Opening doors: A survivor can open a door to a building, potentially unleashing more zombies.
Attacking: A survivor can attack a zombie in their zone or an adjacent zone, depending on their weapon.

2. Zombie Phase:

During the Zombie Phase, each zombie on the board takes one action, typically moving towards or attacking survivors. The actions the zombies can take are as follows:

Attack: If a zombie is in the same zone as a survivor, it will attack.
Move: If there are no survivors in the zombie’s zone, it will move towards the noisiest zone.

After all zombies have acted, new zombies spawn at each spawning point around the board. The number and type of zombies that spawn depend on the survivor with the highest experience level.

3. End Phase:

The End Phase is the final phase of each turn. During the End Phase, the following actions are performed:

Discard: All noise tokens and extra equipment cards in the survivors’ inventories are discarded.
Pass: The “first player” token is passed to the next player clockwise.

After the End Phase, a new turn begins with the Player Phase. This cycle continues until the survivors complete the objectives of the scenario or until all survivors are eliminated.

Players'turn One turn to rule them all

Zombicide: 2nd Edition is a cooperative strategy game where players work together to complete missions and survive a zombie apocalypse. During a player’s turn, they can perform three actions from a list of possibilities. Here’s a detailed breakdown of each action:

1. Move: The player can move their survivor to an adjacent space. This action is essential for exploring the game board, escaping zombies, and reaching objectives.

Strategy: Timing your movements is key in Zombicide. Moving too hastily can lead to encountering a deadly horde of zombies, while moving too slowly can result in missing out on crucial resources.

2. Search: The player can search the space they are in for equipment cards. This action can only be performed once per turn and only in a space that does not contain zombies.

Strategy: Searching often is crucial for finding powerful weapons and helpful items. However, make sure the area is clear of zombies before you start digging around!

3. Open Door: The player can attempt to open a closed door. Doing so is noisy and will attract zombies, but it’s necessary to access new areas and complete objectives.

Strategy: Be prepared before opening a door. Having a plan for dealing with the incoming zombies can mean the difference between life and death.

4. Combat: The player can attack zombies in the same space or an adjacent one, depending on their weapon. Combat is risky, as failure can result in injury.

Strategy: Choose your battles wisely. While it’s important to keep the zombie population in check, unnecessary combat can lead to unnecessary danger.

5. Trade: The player can exchange equipment cards with another survivor in the same space. This action allows players to better equip themselves and their team.

Strategy: Regularly assess the team’s equipment. Sharing resources and optimizing each survivor’s loadout can greatly increase your chances of survival.

6. Objective: The player can perform a specific action to progress the current mission. This action varies from mission to mission, and is usually necessary to win the game.

Strategy: Keep the mission’s objective in mind at all times. While survival is important, completing the mission is the ultimate goal.

After a player has performed their actions, the zombies get a turn. They move, spawn, and attack, creating new challenges for the players to overcome. Players must work together, strategize, and use their actions wisely to survive the zombie apocalypse and complete their mission.

End of the game All good games must come to an end

Zombicide: 2nd Edition is a cooperative board game where players work together to complete objectives and survive the zombie apocalypse. The game ends under two conditions:

All players have completed all objectives.
At least one survivor has been killed by a zombie.

The first scenario represents a victory for the players, while the second scenario signifies a loss.

Victory Conditions:

All objectives have been completed: Each game of Zombicide has a mission with specific objectives. These objectives can vary from mission to mission and include tasks such as finding certain items, reaching specific locations on the board, or killing a certain number of zombies. Once all these objectives have been met, the players win the game.

Loss Conditions:

A survivor has been killed: If at least one survivor has been killed by a zombie, the game ends immediately and all players lose. Survivors can be killed by receiving too many wounds, typically from zombie attacks, or from being trapped in a space with too many zombies and no escape route.

Before final scoring, players must perform the following actions:

Verify that all objectives have been completed: Players should check to make sure they have not overlooked any objectives. This includes both the main objectives of the mission and any secondary objectives that may exist.
Count the number of survivors: The number of survivors at the end of the game can affect scoring. If all survivors are alive, players receive a bonus. If any survivors were killed, players must deduct points.
Add up experience points: Each survivor earns experience points (XP) for killing zombies and completing objectives. The total XP of all survivors is added up to get the final score.

Note: Each mission in Zombicide may have its own unique victory conditions and scoring rules, so always refer to the mission’s specific rules before starting a game.

Scoring Did you outsmart your rivals?

In Zombicide: 2nd Edition, players work cooperatively to complete missions and survive against hordes of zombies, rather than competing for points. Therefore, there isn’t a traditional scoring system based on points, but success or failure is determined by survival and fulfilling the mission objectives.

Scoring System

Survival: One of the key elements of success in Zombicide is survival. If all players survive the game and complete the mission objectives, they win. If even one player dies without completing the mission objectives, all players lose.
Mission Objectives: Each game of Zombicide has specific mission objectives that need to be completed in order to win. These objectives can range from finding specific items, killing a certain number of zombies, or reaching a particular location on the map.

Tie-breaking Rules

As Zombicide: 2nd Edition is a cooperative game, there typically aren’t tie-breaking situations, as all players either win or lose together. However, in the case of determining turn order or resolving simultaneous effects, the game uses a priority system as follows:

The player with the first player token goes first. If they cannot or do not want to take the action, it passes to the next player in clockwise order, and so on.
If multiple survivors are in the same zone and are targeted by zombies, the survivors choose the order in which they’ll fight or be attacked.

In conclusion, Zombicide: 2nd Edition’s scoring system is more oriented towards cooperative survival and mission completion, rather than accumulating individual points.

Particular Cases and Exceptions Wait… is that legal?

Zombicide: 2nd Edition is a cooperative board game with a unique set of rules, some of which may require additional clarification or are considered special/rare. Below are some of these:

1. Zombie Spawning:

When players open a building for the first time, every room inside spawns Zombies. This does not happen for buildings that are already open at the start of the game. This is an exception to the general rule where zombies only spawn during the Zombie Phase.

2. Noise:

Any action aside from Move, Search, or Hide causes noise. This includes both successful and unsuccessful actions. Noise attracts Zombies, so it’s important to keep this rule in mind during gameplay.

3. Molotov Cocktail:

Molotov Cocktail is the only weapon that can kill the Abomination, a type of Zombie. However, you need to find the right components (Bottles and Gasoline) and spend an action to create it.

4. Targeting Priority:

When survivors attack a Zone with ranged weapons, they might hit other survivors. The targeting priority rule states that you must eliminate all Zombies of the same type before targeting another type. If there are no Zombies, the survivors in the Zone are targeted. It’s important to note that the shooter can choose the order of elimination within the same type.

5. Fatties:

Fatties are a type of Zombie that are accompanied by two Walkers when they spawn. However, they only count as one miniature for game purposes, such as deciding whether a Zone is overcrowded.

6. Cars:

Survivors can use cars to move faster and run over Zombies. However, they can’t be driven if a Zombie is in the same Zone. In addition, survivors can’t exit a car if there are Zombies in the destination Zone.

7. Multiple Objectives:

When there are several Objective tokens on the board, the survivors can collect them in any order. Each collected Objective gives 5 experience points to the survivor who picked it up.

Remember, Zombicide is a game of survival. The more you understand the rules and their exceptions, the better you can strategize and increase your chances of winning.