Zelvy turtle race
Rules
Race setup
- 2–5 players join the same race lobby.
- Each player receives one random turtle color and 5 private cards.
- The game starts with all five turtle positions set to 0. Equal numeric 0 positions are separate turtles, not a stack.
- Board positions run from 0 to 11; position 11 is the finish.
On your turn
- Play one card, then draw one replacement.
- If the drawing deck is empty, the discard pile is reshuffled.
- Rainbow cards let you choose the turtle they move.
- Last-position cards restrict the choice to turtles furthest behind.
Movement and stacking
- An unmoved turtle stays at position 0 if a backward card is played.
- Once a turtle has moved onto the board, it cannot return to position 0 or below; backward movement stops at position 1.
- If a turtle lands where another turtle is standing, its stored position becomes that turtle’s color, for example
blue: "red". - A color position is resolved recursively to find the real board position.
- Turtles above the selected turtle are represented by color references and move with it.
- The game state stores only the five turtle positions; no separate stack-position map is used.
Cards
| Card | Effect |
|---|---|
| Color ++ | Move that color 2 spaces. |
| Color + | Move that color 1 space. |
| Color − | Move that color back 1 space, stopping at 1 once it has moved; an unmoved turtle remains at 0. |
| Rainbow + / − | Choose any turtle, then apply the movement. |
| Rainbow last + / last ++ | Choose a turtle from the last position. |
Finish
- The race ends when any turtle reaches position 11.
- Finish order is by position. At the same position, the bottom turtle finishes first.
- Race notes include a copyable
STATE {...}snapshot after every move.