Mantis

Look at the pretty rainbow….look at the pretty rainbo….WAIT!!! WHAT?? Did you just steal my cards??? Mantis needs to come with a warning. DON’T GET DISTRACTED BY THE PRETTY COLOURS! The gorgeous greens, the rich reds, the beautiful bl……NOPE! See? I did it again!

Okay, before I get myself into a technicolour tizz, I’m going to tell you about the new card game from the team behind Exploding Kittens (then I am going back to the colours…..the pretty colou….STOP IT!).

Set Up And Play

Besides Snap, Mantis is probably the simplest card game I have ever played. And when I say that, I do it without a shred of hypercolour hyperbole or criticism.

There’s a deck of cards containing 7 different coloured suits – red, yellow, pink, green, purple, orange, and (yep, you guessed it you musically minded kids), blue! It’s a veritable rainbow of gorgeousness!

On the back of each one is a mini rainbow and a circle showing 3 different colours. Note that each coloured suit also helpfully has a unique design and symbol to make Mantis non colour dependent). The front of the card will be one of the 3 colours shown on the back.

You each start with 4 cards face up in front of you (grouped together if the colours match).

On your turn, you take the top card off the deck and decide if you are going to try to use it to (a) score cards matching one of the colours also present in your area or (b) steal cards matching one of those 3 colours from an opponent. Then you flip the card.

If you have chosen to score and you do have cards that match the colour revealed, the card gets added to them and they are all flipped over to show the rainbow side. These then get placed underneath your area in your score pile. If you don’t have the matching colour, the card gets added to your area face up as another colour to be scored later (or STOLEN!).

If you have chosen to steal and your opponent does have cards that match the colour revealed, you take them from their area into yours (don’t score them yet!). If they don’t have any cards to STEAL in that colour, they get the card added to their own area (again to be scored later or STOLEN!).

The first to score 10 rainbows is the winner! That’s it! Score or STEAL!

Pretty Darn Quick

Mantis plays faster than a shrimp kicking its little leggies! Like 5 minutes and the game could be over. And of course there’s a huge luck element in terms of what colours are going to be the target on your turn. BUT! Eeeey, the push your luck feeling that get’s squeezed into each turn is as fabulous as the fiery reds…..NOPE! Can’t go to the colours yet!

Scoring in Mantis is a great feeling – a real “Yesss” moment if you have built up a solid collection of a colour and your rainbow comes through for you. Similarly with stealing other people’s cards. Not your own, of course. That is NOT nice. Bleak! Actually, scratch that. It’s great. And the more players around the table, the more choice you have on the stealing front! The back and forth between players is fast and fun, and in a few minutes its time for a rematch. Because, with a game this short, there is always time for another game. And believe me, one won’t be enough!

There are also special rules for two players which work fine too – effectively, when you steal successfully, you get to have another turn, and the winning threshold is 15 rainbows.

Final Thoughts

This game is gorge!! The box (inside and out), the cards, even the mini comic inside by the Oatmeal explaining just the amazing colour receptiveness of the Mantis Shrimp, is an explosion of colour. Each suit also has its own cutely illustrated Mantis Shrimp type – check out Mr Romantic on the pink ones! – and the inclusion of symbols means that gameplay is not affected by colour sensitivities.

But the box is big. Massive for a game that is just a deck of cards. And although that does mean more opportunity to brighten up your board game shelves, I guarantee we will only take the deck when we go to the pub or a café. And we will take Mantis because it’s a great little competitive card game that anybody can pick up and play. In fact, we have started playing a variant where we play until the deck runs out just to see who can score and STEAL the most rainbows in total!

Easy to learn, beautiful to behold, and pretty push your lucking action every turn – Mantis is a fun little filler game that lets you play the rainbow whenever the mood suits!