Shifting Stones Board Game: Rules for How to Play

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Setup

Shuffle the tiles and randomly place them into a 3×3 grid. Create the grid in the middle of the table where all of the players can reach it. You should place all of the tiles so they are oriented in the same direction.
Shuffle all of the cards and deal four cards face down to each player. You can look at your own cards, but you shouldn’t show them to the other players.
Place the rest of the cards above the grid of tiles. You should place the cards so they are above the top edge of all of the tiles. The position of the draw pile indicates the top of the grid for all of the players.
Each player receives a Reference card.
The player who most recently read a history book takes the dark background Reference card. They will start the game. Play moves clockwise/left throughout the game.

How to Play Shifting Stones

On your turn you are able to take as many actions as you want as long as you still have cards left in your hand. There are three different actions you can take on your turn. You can take the actions in any order you want, and you can take the same action multiple times. The actions you can take on your turn are detailed in the sections below.

You can end your turn at any time. You do not have to use all four cards from your hand. Once you end your turn, you will draw cards from the draw pile until you have a total of four cards in your hand. Cards you have scored do not count towards the four cards in your hand.

Should the draw pile ever run out of cards, you will shuffle the discard pile in order to form a new draw pile.

If you do not want to take any action on your turn, you can choose to skip your turn. Should you skip your turn, you draw two cards. Your hand should now have six cards in it. You cannot skip your turn two turns in a row.

Shift Stones

The first action you can take on your turn is to shift the position of two of the tiles in the grid. To take the action you must discard one of the cards from your hand.

Shift a stone — This player has decided that they want to shift the positions of the blue ship in the bottom right corner with the red card to its left.

When choosing the two tiles you want to swap, the two tiles must be adjacent. You can swap two tiles that are adjacent either vertically or horizontally. You cannot shift tiles that are diagonal to each other.

Shifting a tile after discarding a card — After discarding a card, the player swapped the positions of the blue and red tile.

Flip Stones

The second action you can take is to flip over one of the tiles. Discard one of the cards from your hand. Then choose one of the tiles and flip it over to the opposite side.

Choosing a stone to flip over — The current player wants to flip over the blue tile in the bottom row.

Flipping over a tile — After discarding a card, the player flipped over the blue tile on the bottom row to the purple side.

Scoring a Card

The final action you can take on your turn is to score one of the cards from your hand. In order to score a card, the tiles pictured on the card need to match the current layout of the tiles in the grid.

For patterns that feature two or more symbols, the pattern must exactly match what is pictured on the card. The orientation of the symbols needs to exactly match.

Scoring a multi tile pattern — The card on the left features a pattern showing three tiles. The middle row of the grid matches the pattern, and can be used to score the card. The bottom row cannot be used because the tiles are in the opposite direction.

If a cards shows empty tile spaces, you can fill in the empty spaces with any tile. In order to score the card though, there needs to be a tile in the corresponding spot in the pattern.

Scoring a card with blanks on it — The card on the left shows a pattern of an orange tile, a blue tile, and a blank tile. The bottom row of the grid matches the pattern on the card. The middle column does not match the pattern because there is no tile to the right of the blue tile.

If the tiles match the pattern on one of your cards, you can play the card face up on the table. After the other players verify that the pattern matches, you will add the card face up to your scoring pile. The card is worth the amount of points printed at the top of the card. Each card is only scored once even if the pattern is in the grid in two or more areas.

You can only score cards on your own turn.

Winning the Game

The game ends when one of the players have scored a certain number of cards. The number of cards that need to be scored depends on the number of players.

Players	# of Point Cards
2	10
3	9
4	8
5	7

When a player scores the necessary number of cards, the end game is triggered. You can score more cards than the number of cards that trigger the end of the game. Players will keep taking turns until all of the players have had the same number of turns.

Once the game ends, all of the players count up how many “1” cards they scored. Whichever player scored the most 1 cards, scores a three point bonus. If multiple players tie for the most 1 cards, all of the tied players receive the three point bonus.

All of the player then tally up their scores. They will count up the points from each card they scored. Whichever player scores the most points win the game. If two or more players tie for the most points, they will share the victory.

Determining each player's score in Shifting Stones — Here are the cards that four players scored during the game. First the players compare the number of 1 point cards they scored. The player in the top left scored the most (4) so they receive three bonus points. The four players score the following points: top left-20 points (17+3 bonus points), top right-14 points, bottom left-19 points, and bottom right-14 points. The top left player scored the most points, so they won the game.

Solo Game

If you would like to play the game by yourself, you will have to alter some of the rules.

To start the game you will have to create a custom deck of cards. Choose eight 1-point cards, four 2-point cards, three 3-point cards, and one 5-point card. The rest of the cards are returned to the box.

The main gameplay is mostly the same. Should you end a turn without scoring any of the cards, you receive a strike. Should you receive four strikes, you lose the game.

You win the solo game of Shifting Stones if you score all of the cards before you receive your fourth strike.

Components

72 Pattern Cards
9 Stone Tiles
5 Reference Cards
Instructions

Year: 2020 | Publisher: Gamewright | Designer: J. Evan Raitt | Artist: Kwanchai Moriya

Genres: Abstract, Strategy

Ages: 8+ | Number of Players: 1-5 | Length of Game: 20 minutes

Difficulty: Light | Strategy: Moderate | Luck: Moderate

For more board and card game rules/how to plays, check out our complete alphabetical list of card and board game rules posts.

Written By:

Eric Mortensen

Eric Mortensen is an owner and head writer on Geeky Hobbies since 2014. He is an avid board game player and collector with over 3,000 board and card games in his collection. Since 2014 he has written more than 1,100 board game how to play guides.