Game: Piranha Pedro

Thread: Rules for Asmodee edition?

Jonny5 — 2008-07-23T19:49:46+00:00

I see the Asmodee edition is played with tiles and has no game board. How does this work? Is it simply impossible to 'jump off the edge' as in the Goldsieber edition? And how are the piranhas placed? I can see there being a lot of debates about whether or not a particular move causes Pedro to jump on a piranha or not.

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Toynan — 2008-07-19T12:50:19+00:00

Close up on the title

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Toynan — 2008-07-18T23:10:17+00:00

Rocks

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Toynan — 2008-07-18T23:09:04+00:00

You can be affraid Pedro !!

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Toynan — 2008-07-18T22:29:56+00:00

Players cards

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Toynan — 2008-07-18T22:29:17+00:00

Back of players cards

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Toynan — 2008-07-18T22:27:57+00:00

The three rocks trays

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Toynan — 2008-07-18T22:27:31+00:00

Starting island tray

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Toynan — 2008-07-18T22:26:25+00:00

Back of side island tray two

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Toynan — 2008-07-18T22:25:05+00:00

Front of side island tray two

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Toynan — 2008-07-18T22:24:36+00:00

Back of side island tray one

Thread: DIY Game Board for the Asmodee Edition

ikiru — 2007-12-30T03:05:46+00:00

I won Piranha Pedro in the BGG math trade, but it was the Asmodee Edition that is more of a free form version of the game (i.e. no game board).

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I really wanted the older version, so I decided to make a board. Here is what I created!

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I made it out of 1/8" presentation board, an Epson color printer/scanner, my wife's scrapbooking supplies, and Avery full page labels.

-ikiru

*enjoy the sauce*

Thread: Re: Bluffing at its best

sevorges — 2007-11-22T23:42:31+00:00

I have played 4, 5 and 6 player games and I prefer the 6. It does make it a real party game as you have little idea where Pedro will be by the time you move him but the player order shifts reasonably quickly so you'll be first player before long. I think the beauty of this game is that you get "poker" type players who think they can read other players moves and the odd random player who makes moves that are a mystery to everyone possibly including themselves.

I think the most original and important thing to keep in mind about this game is that there is only one loser. There is no team play strategy, just a desire to not be THAT player. The only disappointing thing I've found is that while it looks like a kids game, children are very predictable and therefore don't make the best opponents in this game. And as one drunk loser of Pedro slurred, it's a "stupid F'in game" and he was right - but its fun.

Thread: TVB - 5P - Warming up to chaos, but then not so much.

RPardoe — 2007-06-08T06:30:16+00:00

Dave, Lawrence, and Ben arrived to play games. Wanting a quick warm-up, we agreed to Sabrina's suggestion of Piranha Pedro...a game that last appeared the last time we played games a few weeks ago. With 5 people, we expected a bit of chaos in the game and that was quickly confirmed when Ben ran out of stones during his move in the second round...1 Piranha to Ben.

We restocked our stones. Some of us gaining the maximum 6 stones (having only spent our 3 move cards) while a few others got 4 or 5 stones. Ben had walked off the stones at the very top edge and Pedro flirted with that edge as folks made their move. But tempting danger is not a good thing as Sabrina found Pedro walking off the edge after another two rounds....1 Piranha to Sabrina.

Again we restocked our stones with most of us gaining 4 to 6 stones as only a few cards had been played. It looked like our game was going to be just the right warm-up, ending rather quickly. Pedro moved away from the edge, but toward the deep water of the suns. Would we end after 2 rounds again? We played a round, and another, and another. And Pedro was still standing on stones. All those stones gathered after the first two splashes were being used up, but there were a lot to use. In fact, we then proceeded to go through all 12 cards in hand. On the last play of the cards, Sabrina ran out of stones and caught her second Piranha. (When the other cards were revealed, Ben would have walked off the edge if Sabrina had that one extra stone to save Pedro.)

So our quick game was over, but in not such a quick fashion. (Well, it was really only 20 minutes total, so relatively quick, but I have had games end much, much sooner.) But the game served its purpose. It is a nice, lighter game with some consideration for moves. But the group think can impact the game as we saw here. How did Pedro survive for so many rounds? Quite a few moves were move 3 north followed by move 3 south perfectly balancing the moves. While the game looks simple, it is times like these that one would like to throw in an unexpected move just to break the overall rhythm. But don't think that this is a deeply analytical game at all.

It is a game that plays a large number of people quite nicely filling a short time slot when folks just want to warm-up and get into a gaming mood.

Thread: TVB - 6P - Splish, splash, Pedro goes down fast.

RPardoe — 2007-05-17T06:06:52+00:00

A full house with 5 arriving for games. Ben, Lawrence, and Dave were the first to arrive, so we set up a quick game of Piranha Pedro. This is a game Rich (and Dave) had played a few times on BSW, so we knew it would be easy to explain and short enough to play to fill the time while we waited for others to arrive. But no sooner had the rules explanation finished when Kris and Lisa arrived. As the game was set-up, we just explained the rules again and played 2 quick games.

In PP, each player has a hand of 12 cards that send the eponymous Pedro in one of 4 directions moving 1 to 3 spaces. In a movement round, each player plays a card face down in front of them and then in turn, Pedro is moved according to the card. The trouble is Pedro is moving from a very small island out into piranha infested waters. Should Pedro be moved onto a water space, players need to play a stepping stone from their supply (they start the game with 4). As there is an obvious first player advantage, the first player moves around the board. Also, once played, a movement card can't be replayed this movement round. Movement continues until Pedro is either moved off the board, onto a piranha, or onto water and the player is out of stones. Once Pedro is "ker-splunked", there is a replenishment phase where players can gain more stones and they get to refresh their hand back to the 12 original cards. A game continues like this until a single player has "ker-splunked" Pedro twice. That player is the loser, everyone else wins.

Obviously, the last player each round has the least control, so there is quite a bit of non-control in the game. But even the first player can have some fun. Do they make a safe move, or do they move in a different direction hoping to catch one of the later players off guard. Not much strategy, but a light game that plays very quickly.

In our first game, Kris moved Pedro towards the map edge thinking we were trying to get Pedro to escape the Piranhas. This did cost him 3 of his stones, but it was Lisa who did move Pedro off the edge towards the green jungle to gain the first Piranha. After replenishing stones, we found that we had all selected to move Pedro up the board towards the village. With Pedro making a beeline for the opposite edge, it was Kris who had the bad card gaining a Piranha as a result. As we had only played a single card each, we were all due (it appeared) for a large replenishment of stones, but then noted in the rules that the stones in the game were limited. (We were using glass beads, and Rich had gone to grab another colour. This makes sense as it prevents the board from getting covered in stones.) So without enough stones to go around, we skipped replenishment, and then proceeded to move Pedro one after another in another straight line to the waterfall. Again it was Kris that was the unlucky player to dispose of Pedro gaining his second piranha and the loss for the game.

With the game played quickly (less than 15 minutes), we decided to play it again. Rich would go last and thought Pedro would end up towards the suns, so he played the opposite direction (the waterfall), but had his plan thwarted when Pedro barely moved at all as he would move in one direction then reverse back from whence he came. As a result, Rich had to use almost all of his stones. In the next movement phase, he tried a smaller move, but Pedro ended up on a finger of stones and Rich had 1 stone too few to use and gained a piranha. After replenishing stones, Pedro ended up edging to one of the Piranha's on the board. Ben moved one toward the piranha. Lawrence moved two, just stopping before the piranha. Rich continued to trend from the first game of continuing to move Pedro in the same direction and ended up on the piranha - losing the game.

A quick game. A very quick game if you play online, but might make a light lunch game or a nice group game for those few minutes between games and the like. This one did get a bit of buzz and play when it was first released, but appears to have since receded into the great obscurity of most games. Glad we could get it to the table to play it live after a few plays online.

Thread: Re: Bluffing at its best

joemillions — 2007-04-21T00:50:58+00:00

OldestManOnMySpace wrote:
joemillions wrote:
I find that the board rarely fills up with stones if even one person tends to play aggressively with their first move, trying to lead others off the board, or into piranhas (i.e. sacrifice stones occasionally to make unexpected moves to hurt the person immediately after them).

You mean there are people who don't do that?

Yes, this is an obvious strategy that most people use. However, in 5-6 player, there is not as much value in hurting your neighbor as there is in protecting yourself (compare with 2 player, a zero sum game, where they are equal). So the obvious 3, conserving stones for the next round, is usually the best move in 5-6 player games, as long as you play aggressively sometimes to keep the next guy on his toes.

Thread: Re: Bluffing at its best

OldestManOnMySpace — 2007-04-19T20:12:34+00:00

joemillions wrote:
I find that the board rarely fills up with stones if even one person tends to play aggressively with their first move, trying to lead others off the board, or into piranhas (i.e. sacrifice stones occasionally to make unexpected moves to hurt the person immediately after them).

You mean there are people who don't do that?

joemillions wrote:
And when it does fill up, and we have a boring 'shocking roulette' round, people have so few stones in the next round that the game ends very quickly.

End very quickly? But there's still a HUGE clump of stones. And now everyone has all their cards back, so you'll get another one of those rounds, that's slightly increased in length by the extra stones put down in the last round, but decreased a bit more by the fewer stones.

joemillions wrote:
If people continue playing after that to see who comes in first, you are obviously going to get some boring stone-filled showdowns.

There are people who do that? That sounds like easily the most boring thing I have heard this year.

joemillions wrote:
I concede that 3-4 player might have more tactical play because of fewer stones, but I think 5-6 player is an equally good game because the strategic decisions that you make are more varied (sometimes predicting the actions of a group rather than always predicting the actions of individuals).

I think with 3-4 players, you just plain have way much more control over the game.

joemillions wrote:
Also, the edge of the board comes in to play more often since 'groupthink' sometimes causes all players to play in the same direction, and leads Pedro right off the board!

I don't think it comes into play that much more than normal - since the island isn't precisely in the middle of the board, the game will often be led early off to either the village or waterfall edges - maybe both. While in 5-6 player games, you move to lots more places - but this also means people will be going away from the edges faster, before people have a chance to react to the new edge threat.

Thread: Re: Bluffing at its best

joemillions — 2007-04-19T13:53:27+00:00

I find that the board rarely fills up with stones if even one person tends to play aggressively with their first move, trying to lead others off the board, or into piranhas (i.e. sacrifice stones occasionally to make unexpected moves to hurt the person immediately after them). And when it does fill up, and we have a boring 'shocking roulette' round, people have so few stones in the next round that the game ends very quickly. It does tend to happen if everybody gets one piranha, but usually somebody will get two while a few players are still on zero.

Perhaps my nice experiences with the 5-6 player games stem from the fact that I play mostly on BSW. On BSW the game ends when one player gets 2 piranhas (one loser, the rest are winners). If people continue playing after that to see who comes in first, you are obviously going to get some boring stone-filled showdowns.

I concede that 3-4 player might have more tactical play because of fewer stones, but I think 5-6 player is an equally good game because the strategic decisions that you make are more varied (sometimes predicting the actions of a group rather than always predicting the actions of individuals). Also, the edge of the board comes in to play more often since 'groupthink' sometimes causes all players to play in the same direction, and leads Pedro right off the board!

Thread: Re: Bluffing at its best

OldestManOnMySpace — 2007-04-19T05:06:17+00:00

It is true that the 5 and 6 player games still have some of the strategy remaining, but my point is that the 3 and (to an extent) 4-player versions have much more of that strategy.

Also, the more players, the more stones are on the board - so sometimes you just get in a situation where everyone is just going back and forth on a huge clump of stones, and it can't really be stopped, because it's so huge that maybe 1 stone will be placed each round, and that will just make it larger. Eventually, you just get down to the situation where people have barely any cards and someone falls in after a long time of going back and forth, by which point everyone has gotten bored. The fewer players, the fewer stones - and that is one of my favourite parts of the two-player game, how stones are scarce, and every move is a brainburner.

And in the "huge clump of stones", situation, you might as well just play Shocking Roulette to decide who falls in. People will probably enjoy it more.

Thread: Re: Bluffing at its best

joemillions — 2007-04-19T03:42:42+00:00

With 5 or 6 players, it is a party game. Skill starts to go away, as there are often many players playing their cards before your card comes along. You lose the power to visualize how the board will be when your card is played, and therefore I do not suggest playing the game with 5 or 6 players. The game shines with 2 and 3 players, and 4 players at times.

hmm, I see your point, but I'm not sure that I totally agree with this. When you are one of the first players to move, obviously there is some control that you have over the game. It might seem that when there are four or five players to act before you, that you have little control, but you actually do! Obviously most of the time you are going to play 1s, but I think there are three main things you need to think about:

1) If Pedro is close to one of the edges, then people in front of you will not risk going towards that edge, and will probably move away from the edge to be safe. Especially the person immediately in front of you, who has a decision almost as tough as yours, and is likely to play conservatively. So you can move in the 'dangerous' direction, and chances are you will be safe, and won't lose a stone. If Pedro is really close to an edge, sometimes every person in front of you will move away from that edge!

2) If everybody in front of you is low on stones, and Pedro is in a dangerous position, the chances are good that someone will go kerplunk before you even play your card. If you think this is extremely likely to happen, why not play a 3? This will give you an extra stone in the next round (relative to playing a 1), and the card will never see the light of day, since Pedro will probably take a drink before it even gets to you. Obviously this strategy is extremely dangerous, but in some circumstances, it is the right move.

3) If you remember what the person in front of you has played, that person is likely to play one of their remaining 1s if they are far enough back in the turn order. If one of those 1 cards is clearly safer than the other remaining 1 cards, they will probably play it, and you should play in the opposite direction.

You don't have to predict every single move to make a safe play, only the move of the person immediately in front of you. Sometimes a late player can be even easier to predict than the first player!

Thread: Re: Pedro English rules(full) available?

pmboos — 2007-03-19T15:00:02+00:00

Has anyone made these a bit clearer? When I print these out they are pretty hard to read. and the Brettspiel rules of course doesn't have any set-up instructions (as the computer does that for you of course).

thanks!
Paul

Thread: Re: Bluffing at its best

ssmooth — 2006-12-19T09:24:41+00:00

There isn't any bluffing in Piranha Pedro. There is second-guessing, trying not to do what (you think) your opponent thinks you will do. That's not the same as bluffing.

I've enjoyed playing this game on BSW and look forward to giving it a try across a real table.

Thread: Bluffing at its best

OldestManOnMySpace — 2006-12-19T01:57:48+00:00

WARNING: Huge love for the game follows. Proceed with caution.

SUMMARY:
Piranha Pedro is a bluffing game of simultaneous action selection (SAS) designed by Jens-Peter Schliemann, and released in 2004. It won the 2005 Essen Feather. The game scales wonderfully from 2-6 players.

THEME:
The game is themed around a young Mexican named Pedro. Through the mystical arts, the dark wizard Reiner Knizia has trapped him on a distant island near the land of Puerto Rico, governed by his dread rival, Andreas Seyfarth. Unfortunately, Pedro has no way to escape. Furious demonic Piranhas owned by the dark wizard surround him, and all of the land around him is in too deep water to reach. Pedro is doomed, but he would wish to prolong it as long as he can.

Well, okay…I guess I made most of that up.

GAMEPLAY:
Gameplay is simple. All players begin with a hand of 12 cards and 4 stones. There are four directions cards can move you in: towards the village, towards the forest (or jungle), towards the waterfall, or
towards the sun. You receive three of each type of card, one moving you one square towards that destination, one moving you two squares towards that destination, and one moving you three squares towards that destination. The other players all receive the same cards. Little wooden piranhas are placed in predetermined places on the board, and Pedro is placed in the centre of an island.

One player is designated to be the Starting Player. Their card will cause Pedro to move first. The role of the Starting Player moves clockwise to the next player after each turn is over. A "turn" consists of all players choosing a card to play. Once all players have chosen a card and put it face down in front of them, the Starting Player reveals his or her card. They take the action of this card, moving Pedro the number of squares specified on the card towards the destination featured on the card. Unless that player's action results in their being gobbled up by piranhas, the next player takes the action on their card, and so on, until all cards have been resolved.

If a player's action causes them to walk over a space of open water, they must pay a stone. That stone is placed on the square of water, and is now safe to walk over. If a player has no stones to place there, they drown, and are eaten by piranhas. If a player moves onto a piranha because of their action, that piranha, no matter how many stones they have left, eats them. If a player moves off of the board because of their action, they fall into deep water and are eaten by piranhas, no matter how many stones they have left.

If a player is being eaten by piranhas, the turn stops. Any players whose cards have not yet had their action carried out are still counted as played. The player who was eaten takes one of the piranhas off the board. This is a point. The space in which that piranha was is now a plain water space, and does not give death when walked over.

When piranhas eat a player, if the game is not over yet, all players discard the stones they did not use, and then check their cards. They receive one stone for each card they did not play that moves them one square, 1/2 (rounded down) stones for each card they did not play that moves them two squares, and no stones for the cards that move them three squares. Players then receive all their played cards again, and the next round begins.

If a turn ends without anyone being eaten by piranhas, another turn is played, and so on until piranhas eat a player and the round is over. If players run out of cards to play, they receive their entire hand back - but only once they are due to play another card. This usually happens in games of the two-player variant, and can often lead to situations in which the players have no cards at the end of the round and receive no stones.

GAME END:
When one player receives two points, they lose, and all of the other players win!

TWO-PLAYER VARIANT:
In the game for two players, the starting player plays two cards, choosing one to be played first, and one to be played second. The first card is played first, then the card played by the opponent, then the starting player's second card. The game ends when piranhas eat one player 3 times, getting 3 points.

THOUGHTS:
Piranha Pedro, is, at its simplest, a random game where no one has any control over the game and cards are played randomly at best. However, there are three games within Piranha Pedro; the tactical game, the bluffing game, and the party game.

With the two-player variant, it becomes tactical. You have lots of control over the game, and you must manage your hand carefully, while bluffing all the way.

With 3 and 4 players, the game is pure bluff. With 4 players, you can start to loose control of the game, but still, bluffing is heavy. You must predict your opponents' moves, and act against them. Likewise, you must stop your opponents from predicting your moves, by doing the unpredictable.

With 5 or 6 players, it is a party game. Skill starts to go away, as there are often many players playing their cards before your card comes along. You lose the power to visualize how the board will be when your card is played, and therefore I do not suggest playing the game with 5 or 6 players. The game shines with 2 and 3 players, and 4 players at times.

If you do not like bluffing, this game is not for you.

Thread: Piranha Pedro: Session 1- Second round

not2fear — 2005-11-14T02:25:35+00:00

Players : Siu Hean, Michael, James, Keng Ho, Gladys and Terence (me)

Everyone had great fun in their first game, and were eager to play on. Apparently, the others had also caught on to my strategy of playing the 3 step cards first, which led to a really thrilling and hilarious game. Siuhean started with a 3 step card, followed by Michael with another 3 step card in the same direction and Splash! Pedro was off the map. All the other players (who had also played 3 step cards) were thus saved by Michael’s unintended sacrifice. Everyone continued to play their 3 step cards undeterred and because Pedro started at one edge, all the other players played their 3 step cards in the opposite direction. Of course, with 6 players all playing 3 step cards in one direction, Pedro fell off the opposite edge (on Glady’s turn) and the Piranhas claimed victim 2. The next two victims (Keng Ho and myself) were also caused by Pedro falling off the edge. The ‘great minds think alike’ trend here made fishbait out of almost everyone!

The game finally ended when Michael picked up his second piranha by landing on it.
An excellent game for non-gamers and casual gamers. Guaranteed for loads of laughs.

Thread: Piranha Pedro: Session 1- First round

not2fear — 2005-11-14T02:20:53+00:00

Players : Siu Hean, Michael, James, Keng Ho, Gladys and Terence (me)

This is a fairly simple game, which Michael explained in about 5 minutes. The six player version of this game is very chaotic and noone took it too seriously. Although I thought the rocks were a nice touch, I also thought it was abit strange to buy a game with rocks in it, especially when Michael had to lug it back from Essen. Imagine! Literally lugging back a sack of rocks! Gamers sometimes do the strangest things…

Anyways, rocks aside, at the start of the game, I noted that the one step and two step cards were worth more stones, and I figured that it might be a good idea to conserve stones, so I made it a point to play all my 3 steps cards first. This proved to be an effective strategy because you could only lose as many rocks as the number of steps you played, unless you hit a piranha, and near the end of the game you wanted to be in a position where you had as many rocks as possible while having a hand full of 1 step cards. The idea then, is to play your 3 step cards first, then 2 step cards and so on.

Anyway, in our first game, I seemed to be the only one to conserve the 1 and 2 step cards while the rest played theirs freely in an attempt to stay on the tiny island.

Siu Hean was the first piranha victim when he ran out of stones. James was next, when he hit the north boundary. After that Gladys and Michael became victims when they ran out of stones (notice how almost everyone else ran out of stones?). By that time, we had played down to our last card. Siu Hean was the last player, had no stones left and playing his card would earn him another piranha, so this game claimed its first victim.

Thread: 3 player alternatives

skeletodoc — 2005-05-23T18:54:42+00:00

Try playing 3 with the first to get 2 pirhanas the first loser. Then play the 2 player rule with the sombrero starter picking 2 cards to one for the opponent. Then, the first to get 2 pirhanas loses. Try playing with the rule of discarding old stones and then play where you keep them.........see which game you like better.

Thread: variant

skeletodoc — 2005-05-22T23:26:04+00:00

We played till one lost[me] by having 2 pirhanas. Then the remaining 2 players reverted to the 2player rules where the sombrero lead player picks 2 cards, playing one between the opponent's one card play. However I noticed we goofed as we kept all unused stones[should be discarded] as well as collecting new ones! When the second player gets 2 pirhanas the game ends and the third player wins. A very cute game with subtle card play.

Thread: Session Report

garrylloyd — 2005-04-16T11:34:37+00:00

This week, there were only three of us and I decided to try one or two of the lighter games from Essen. First up was Goldieber’s Piranha Pedro, which I’d tried with the family the previous weekend. The game is about playing cards to direct Pedro around the board without him falling in the water and getting munched on by the piranhas.

The board shows a central island covering about 8 squares, while the rest of the board is sea in which the piranhas live. Each player has a set of movement cards which show a direction and how many spaces Pedro must be moved with that card. They also start with a set of ten stepping stones made of … stone actually. On each turn, everyone plays a card face down and then, in turn, players reveal their card and move Pedro accordingly. If he moves onto a sea space, a stone is first placed there so he doesn’t get his feet wet. Players going later in the turn-order, therefore, have to predict where Pedro might be when it comes round to their turn so that they don’t waste their stones. Once all your stones have gone, a step in the wrong direction will mean falling in the water, ending the round and giving the player one piranha figure as a penalty. Also, if you would move into a space where a piranha is sitting, you don’t get to place a stone but pick up the piranha for your trouble. Once the round has finished, players get some stones back depending on what cards they have left and a new round starts. The first player to gain two piranhas loses the game and everybody else is declared the winners.

In our game, Mark G and John quickly depleted their piles of stones making for some very tense turns. We all managed to get bitten by one piranha but, eventually, John took the plunge and claimed a second. This is a very simple game which is ideal for families and the theme makes it good fun. There is a bit of second-guessing going on but it’s not going to keep gamers entertained for more than the odd game when they’re looking for something simple at the end of an evening. For what it’s aimed at though, the family group, it works very well.

Players Result Ratings
Mark G Win 7
Garry Win 7
John 7

Thread: User Review

creech — 2005-04-04T12:22:44+00:00

Every once in a while, you will see some cute little game popping up with interesting theme. The theme of pirana habitated water and a poor man stranded on an island, trying to escape through water did sound fun to me. Piranha Pedro, with the light theme, is actually targeted at young players and probably a family game. As such, the game play is really simple. It reminds me a lot about Dragon Delta, with its cross the water, simultaneous action movement.

The game comes in a box with the following components :

1. Board - nicely illustrated hard card board with 15x11 squares denoting the water, 7 sqaures with whirlpool for the piranna, one island that span across a few square with a little coconut tree where the game will start

2. Wooden piranna - nice organge color wooden piranna in the typical quality standard of german game component

3. Wooden Pedro - our hero of the game

4. Cards - 1 starting player card, 4 landscape cards showing village, a waterfall, jungle and the sun. 6 sets of identical movement cards (12 each)

5. A pile of stones - real stones !!

Setting up of the game is fast, Pedro is placed on the tree in the island and place one piranna on each whirlpool space. Shuffle and randomly place 1 landscape card on each side of the board. Each player is then given a set of 12 movement cards, 4 stones. Choose a starting player and the game will start rolling.

The game is interesting in the sense that you determine who will be the loser, player try not to be the first one to lose the game. Each round consist of :

1) Each player plays a face down movement card

2) Reveal the card simultaneously

3) Execute the movement

4) If no one collected a piranna, pass the starting player card to the next player clockwise

The interesting part is in determine which movement card to play. The game comes in a neat mechanism where a player is encourage to take risk and play cards that move Pedro further (3 spaces). A movement card illustrates the number of sqaure (1 to 3) to move towards a particular landscape. It also has an indication on how many stones you can collect for the next round to use if you do not play some of the cards (1 stone for 1 square movement card, half a stone for 2 sqaures movement card and zero stone for 3). Once the played card is revealed, each player take turn clockwise to move Pedro. If Pedro need to move into a water square without stone, the player needs to place a stone on the sqaure to prevent him from falling into the water, thus collecting a Piranna. The moment a player collected 2 piranna (3 for 2 player game), he lose the game. After a Piranna is collected, all players returns the stone they have not played to the central pool. They then look into the remaining cards in their hand, count the number of stones they can collect rounded down. They then collect the stones from the central pool and starts a new round.

As for all simultaneous action game, the gameplay can be chaotic as you can only guess that much about other player's action. You can simply play a card without thinking, or analyse each preceeding players on their past actions and possible new action, evaluate and plan your action. It's totally up to the player, whether taking a risk without planning or be rewarded with good second guessing other player's action. This is really that part that I think will make this a nice family game - it can be a thinking game for the adult, a good fun "take that" game for the childrens. Afterall, isn't that what a family game is made for, to have a night of fun without lefting out the childrens with the chance in winning the game.

Thread: Re:Pedro English rules(full) available?

creech — 2005-03-18T15:01:14+00:00

db3000 (#81087),
You can get the english rules from their official site, below is the url

http://www.team-annaberg.de/en_ppregel8.jpg

Thread: Session Report

garrylloyd — 2005-03-09T22:06:12+00:00

Players: Mark G, Ian, Nige, Phil, Mark K, Garry

Next up was this simple game of out-guessing your opponents that Mark G and I had played before but nobody else had.

With six players, the game is much more chaotic than with three. At least with three you stand a reasonable chance of deducing where Pedro might move. The last to go in a six player game has absolutely no chance of knowing which direction is likely to be safe, although this is compensated for by the fact that somebody else might hit the water before it gets round to your turn. The other difficulty with gamers involved is that the those playing first in the round try to make it as difficult as possible for later players by trying to do the unexpected.

I think this resulted in some concluding that the game was pure luck. However, there is an element of knowing the character of your opponents, trying to follow what direction cards have been played previously and trying to minimise your potential losses when you are playing your card late in the round. My shining talent in these regards allowed me to take the win. We scored by number of piranhas taken (fewest best) and then by number of stones left in hand (most best). Ian was again a close second, tying with me in not taking any piranhas but losing out by having fewer stones in front of him. Mark G, however, clearly had an affection for the fearsome fishies.

Result: Garry 0 piranhas / 21 stones, Ian 0/17, Nige 1/22, Phil 1/21, Mark K 1/19, Mark G 2
Ratings: Ian 5, Nige 4, Phil 6, Mark K 6, Others already rated

Thread: User Review

Eggo — 2005-02-17T17:50:19+00:00

Piranha Pedro (with a sombrero—are there piranhas in Mexico, I wonder???) sits on his little island and wants to leave it. Problem is: There are piranhas out there, and LOTS of water, which can only be overcome with stepping stones. Basically Piranha Pedro is like Sisyphos, as his journey from the island always ultimately ends in failure (= end of a round). Poor s.o.b.!
Each player has 12 cards with 1-3 stone symbols, 3 for West, North, South, East direction. They also have a pile of stepping stones in front of them (4 at the beginning, more are less after each round depending on what cards you played). Each player plays his/her card secretly and after that they are revealed in changing turn order. If a player played a 3 East card for example, Piranha Pedro would move 3 spaces in an eastern direction (actually N,W,S, E are shown as symbols corresponding to game board sides), if he passed water spaces the player playing the card would have to expand stepping stones. If the player runs out of them or if Piranha Pedro steps on the eponymous Piranha, the round is over and a new round begins, If the same player fails twice, the game ends immediately and ALL other players win, so this is a good game to build upyour self-esteem after a long series of lost “St. Petersburg” games, for example.
“Piranha Pedro” is a bit like a very simple “Robo Rallye” – you can never be really sure what the other players are up to with poor ol’ Pedro, and where exactly he is gonna end up. The beginning spaces of the island are safe havens, and you might try to move Pedro around in circles a little to avoid spending stones. A beloved tactic is to unexpectedly move Pedro to the edge of the gameboard, because then the chances rise that one of the players accidentally moves him over the edge (another death for Pedro – I guess he drowns in a glass of wine or falls from the table).
“Piranha Pedro” is lovingly crafted: The stepping stones are real pebbles, and Pedro stands proud as a little wooded figure. The rules are explained in comic book form, which is certainly an innovation (but not the first game to do so – see “Snit’s Revenge”). It is a simple game with good player interaction, and it equally works when playing together with kids. One might get tired of Pedro’s shenanigans after a while (because there is not really a lot to it), but as a quick break game this certainly serves it’s purpose.
Explanation: 2 minutes (or read the comic)
Playing time: 20 minutes
www.westpark-gamers.de

Thread: Re:Pedro English rules(full) available?

Fawkes — 2005-01-30T23:39:01+00:00

Hi Ralf;

There is no "deck" in PP, per se. Each player has his own set of 12 cards, representing 1 to 3 steps in each cardinal direction. When playing the game, players freely choose which cards to play. Any remaining cards determine how many stones the player gets for the next round (after Perdo becomes lunch).

IIRC, the rules of Pedro that come in the game box are in the form of a comic strip, which I guess explains why there is no translation text available yet.

Best I can do to help is point you to the English rules for the Brettspielwelt implementation. Should be reasonably easy to figure out how the game works from there:

http://www.brettspielwelt.de/gate/jsp/base/full.jsp?url=/en/...

If you have any questions ask away. I think enough BGGers have played PP on BSW so you'lll have people who can fill you in on rules and mechanisms. It's really a pretty simple game.

Cheers,
Fawkes

Thread: Pedro English rules(full) available?

db3000 — 2005-01-29T21:21:56+00:00

I'm wondering if anyone has the full English rules to Pedro posted anywhere on the web. Does anyone know about this? Also, how many cards in the deck?

Thread: Re:User Review

steve696 — 2004-10-28T01:17:54+00:00

Fawkes wrote:
steve696 wrote:
Also it looks like you get 1 stone (at the end of the round) for each "1" card played, 1/2 stone for each "2" card played, and no stones for each "3" card played. So you get more stones for playing "safe" cards and fewer stones for playing "risky" cards. This is backward from your description, and also backward from how I would expect the game to work.

It's backward. You get one stone for each 1 card remaining in your hand at the end of the round, half a stone for a 2 card, and zip for a 3 card. Not played, remaining.

Thanks, that makes a lot more sense. My German is pretty rusty...

I'll try it that way with the kids again soon. I think this game is fine as a game to play with my young children, basically to teach them mechanics beyond the simple "roll your dice and move your mice" type found in American children's games. But I can't see playing this with adults even though the pieces (real rocks) are pretty cool.

Thread: Re:User Review

Fawkes — 2004-10-27T23:40:45+00:00

steve696 wrote:
According to my (possibly incorrect) reading of the German rules, when Pedro falls into the water everyone gives their unused stones back. Does this happen in the BSW version?

Yes, it does.

Also it looks like you get 1 stone (at the end of the round) for each "1" card played, 1/2 stone for each "2" card played, and no stones for each "3" card played. So you get more stones for playing "safe" cards and fewer stones for playing "risky" cards. This is backward from your description, and also backward from how I would expect the game to work.

It's backward. You get one stone for each 1 card remaining in your hand at the end of the round, half a stone for a 2 card, and zip for a 3 card. Not played, remaining.

They liked the game, I found it a little boring. Of course that's true for every children's game we play.

Agree here. It's a very fluffy chaotic game. I suppose that you can play it as "choose a card that uses some of your stone to try to put Pedro in the middle of the water", but even if you do that, it's a one-trick pony with very little control. And that's with 3P. It was pure agony with 6.

Thread: Re:User Review

steve696 — 2004-10-27T21:43:18+00:00

Linnaeus (#61198),

I just got this game at Essen. It looked like it would be fun for my kids. The components look great, I like the real stones in the game. My only complaint would be that some of the stones are too big for Pedro to stand over.

But the instructions in the game don't seem to match what you described. I wonder if the BSW version is different from the actual game.

According to my (possibly incorrect) reading of the German rules, when Pedro falls into the water everyone gives their unused stones back. Does this happen in the BSW version?

Also it looks like you get 1 stone (at the end of the round) for each "1" card played, 1/2 stone for each "2" card played, and no stones for each "3" card played. So you get more stones for playing "safe" cards and fewer stones for playing "risky" cards. This is backward from your description, and also backward from how I would expect the game to work.

I tried to get around the "one player loses" issue by telling my kids (ages 5-8) that everybody wins when one player gets 2 piranhas. The 8 year old immediately responded with "yeah, except the one who has 2 piranhas!" They're smarter than I thought.

They liked the game, I found it a little boring. Of course that's true for every children's game we play.

Thread: Re:User Review

Fawkes — 2004-10-24T23:43:30+00:00

Linnaeus (#61198),

Silly, random game. However, I think that gamers in general have less of an issue with the blind action mechanism than we do. Certainly, fans of the heavier games will not be enthused about having to *guess* what other people are likely to do, but games like Adel Verpflichtet have their fans. I guess there's a certain satisfaction when you guess right. However, as you pointed out, the more players you throw into the mix, the wilder the results become. Still, with all the people who like AV with the maximum 5 (or 6 with the Hoity Toity edition), this mechanism isn't likely to disappear.

Back on topic, Pedro had a sheld life of 3 plays for me on BSW. They should release a New York themed edition of this game, with George Steinbrenner stranding Pedro Martinez on an island in the middle of piranha-infested waters in the New York Zoo. He'd charge admission, 2-6 Red Sox fans would try to save Pedro, and when he's fed to the fishes, the Yankees fans chant "Who's your Daddy?!"

Thread: User Review

Linnaeus — 2004-10-24T20:25:16+00:00

[NOTE: This review is based on BSW play only. As a result, while I will speculate on some aspects of FtF play, I cannot comment on the game's components]

Piranha Pedro is a family game for 2-6 players. Pedro is a castaway, stranded on a sandbar in a body of water (lake?) that is infested with flesh eating piranhas. The gameboard depicts his watery prison, divided into squares, with the rather tiny sandbar located slightly to the west of centre, and some of the water squares playing home to piranhas, which are indicated by Piranha tiles (more on them in a minute). Poor Pedro, lying in his bed of palm leaves (which marks Pedro's start of game location) yearns for the least taste of freedom, and to that end, he has somehow (E-Bay? You just can't look at the logic if this game too closely collected a bunch of stepping stones (the water apparently isn't too deep, but of course, there are those piranhas swimming around) that he can use to wander across the water's surface near his home base. On the horizon in each direction he can see a major landmark. To the north there is a town, to the east he can see the rising sun, to the south is a verdant jungle, and in the west is a stony waterfall.

Each player starts the game with the same set of twelve cards. There are three cards for each direction (shown by colour coding based on that direction's landmark - red for the town/north, yellow for the sun/east, green for the jungle/south and blue for the waterfall/west), with each card in a given direction allowing Pedro to move a different number of squares on the board (1, 2 or 3, indicated by the number of arrows on the card). In addition, each player has four stepping stones that they can play in front of Pedro. The players in Piranha Pedro direct the eponymous hero's wanderings by selecting and then simultaneously playing one of their set of twelve cards. Beginning with the card played by the current round's start player, Pedro moves a number of squares equal to the number of arrows on the card in the direction indicated by the colour, and then as indicated by the card of each subsequent player in sequence. After each movement round in which Pedro manages to stay out of the water, the start player rotates to the left one spot. In a two player game, the first player that round chooses two cards, one for Pedro's first move, and one for his third move, with the other player only choosing one. Cards played are flipped face down, but do not return to the players' hands, so a given direction/distance combination can only be played once until the players' hands are refreshed.

If Pedro moves onto an open water square during a player's turn, that player must play stepping stones from his reserve on the water square(s) he has directed Pedro onto. The stone remains until the end of the game, and, if Pedro crosses that square again, another stepping stone does not have to be played. If a player's direction moves Pedro across more open water squares than that player has stones left in his reserve, Pedro drops into the drink. Pedro also falls in if his orders put him on a square inhabited by a piranha, where no stones may be placed, or if he tries to move off of the edge of the board (sadly, he cannot reach any of the ground-based landmarks - I guess the water gets too deep for his stepping stones at board's edge).

When one of these conditions occurs, the current movement round ends, with the player whose card was being executed at the time choosing and taking a Piranha tile from the board. Pedro is then placed on the last safe square he moved across. All of the players then gain stepping stones based on the cards that they have played so far - none for each one arrow card played, one for each two arrow card played, and two for each three arrow card played, and then return all played cards to their hands. Play begins again with the next start player (that is, the player to the left of the start player from the last round). The first player to take two Piranhas for dropping Pedro in the water (three in a two player game) loses the game (and the game ends - there is no winner in Piranha Pedro, just a loser. More on this in a moment).

The first thing that should be obvious to anyone reading about this game is that it is about as pure a simultaneous action selection game as you can get this side of rock-paper-scissors. Most boardgame geeks are, to a greater or lesser extent, leery of simultaneous selection mechanisms, and, as you might expect, this game illustrates why rather nicely. The simultaneous selection of movement cards injects a large amount of chaos into the play of Piranha Pedro, with the amount of chaos growing based on the number of players, and players later in the order of play suffer from trying to make their plays under a steadily increasing fog. Technically, Piranha Pedro is a zero-luck game, but in practice there is so much chaos as to make concrete tactical decisions difficult, at best, most of the time. Because of this, I cannot recommend PP as a game to take to your local game group. I think that most 'serious' boardgamers will just find it too chaotic to play with other gamers, even as a filler game.

On the other hand, if you can just sit back and embrace the chaos, Piranha Pedro can be quite a bit of fun. The unfolding of the moves means there is high player interaction (direct with the players on your immediate left and right, increasingly indirect as players are furthr from you), and it leads to 'Oh crap!' (and schadenfreude) moments, and these can lead to a fair bit of laughter. Also, players can work from a 'reasonable player' hypothesis to try and second guess where Pedro is likely to be, and, from that, try to make an educated guess regarding the safest play. Of course, players early in the game will be expecting their opponents to be working from this hypothesis, and, as a result, can 'sacrifice' a stepping stone or two in order to upset these expectations, tricking later players into using up their stones. This means that Piranha Pedro is not a brain-dead, decisionless, game.

I am not a simultaneous selection 'hard-liner.' While a game would have to be brilliantly designed for me to swallow a simultaneous selection element in a supposedly deep, heavy game, I enjoy light simultaneous selection games. The psychological, second-guessing-with-the-possibility-of-bluffing element is rather engaging for me, so I have no problem playing such games as long as they aren't too rules heavy. On the other hand, I feel no urge to buy such games, nor even go out of my way to play them on BSW, going into an empty room and waiting for more players to show up. If I am asked to play, though, I will do so without qualm. In fact, I prefer this sort of light game to a lot of other light game fare such as Settlers (or games I have so far refused to play such as Carcassonne or TransAmerica). While the decisions in this type of game are always imperfect, I do find them real and engaging.

Therefore, I can recommend Piranha Pedro for the following purposes, with one reservation that I will note after:

1) I think it would be a good game for a mixed group of adults and children. Piranha Pedro is obviously intended as a family game, and on those terms I think it succeeds admirably. This is one kids can play with parents and grandparents without causing anyone to suffer any pain. Likewise, I think this would be a fun game for, say, a pre-teen sleepover, offering fast, fun, interactive action.

2) This would also make a decent 'pre-gateway' game, I think. That is, it strikes as a good game to pull out with people who respond to the mention of boardgames with 'you mean like Monopoly?' but are intimidated even by such simple fare as Settlers. In this respect, it is in somewhat the same niche as Carcassonne - the rules are very simple, but there's no rolling-and-moving, and players get to make real, but light, decisions. I believe that Piranha Pedro even plays faster than Carc (I may be wrong, though - like I said, I've never played Carc).

The one fly in the ointment for both of these purposes is the 'losing condition.' The fact that the game has one loser each game could be a problem for some, maybe even a lot, of children and non-gamers, since they are literally singled out as a loser. This game may be a poor choice for those who require psychological kid gloves.

Still, played with the right frame of mind, Piranha Pedro is a fun, light, game. My recommendation is heavily conditional, but it is real. Certainly, I see no reason not to give it a try, given the chance.