When they grow older, every kodama is given a tree of their own and it’s their job to watch over it and help it grow up strong and healthy! From trunk to twig, they must keep it green and growing to be the perfect home for flowers, mushrooms and critters of all kinds. Now it's your turn to create your own masterpiece of branches and leaves, making the forest more beautiful than ever!

Kodama 3D is a competitive tree building game in which players will grow a three-dimensional tree by using their kodama meeples to gather branch tiles from the forest. Each branch has a feature and a kodama. Whenever players add a branch tile to their tree that does not match the feature or kodama of the connected branch, they will draft a new goal card. At the end of the game, players will score victory points (VP) based on the goal cards they have successfully completed. The player with the most VP wins.

Starting with the youngest player, players will take turns. Each turn involves three steps:

1. Move a kodama meeple

2. Grow your tree

3. Draw a goal, which is optional

Over the course of the game each player will add 12 branch tiles to their tree and they’ll start by moving one of their kodamas to a new stack of branch tiles and then they’ll add one from the stack they just left to their tree. This means planning ahead is a critical component in growing your tree to met your goal cards.

Each player will take 10 turns. After which, players will add to their tree the two branch cards that their meeples currently occupy, and then the game will end.

1 .Move a kodama meeple

You will start each of your turns by choosing one of your two kodama meeples to move. You then move it any distance in a straight line to an unoccupied stack of branches. You may move horizontally, vertically, or diagonally. You must move one of your kodama meeples on your turn. You cannot move over any other kodama meeples.

2. Grow Your Tree

During this step, you will add a branch tile to your tree. The top tile from the stack you just moved from and add it to your tree by inserting the stem into one of the available connection points on your trunk or a branch tile that is already on your tree. Be careful that it’s balanced and doesn’t fall over! If it does, you will need to remove that tile and connect it to a different part of your tree.

3. Draw a goal (optional)

You will draw a goal card during this phase if The feature on the branch tile you just added to your tree doesn’t match the feature on the part of your tree you connected it to AND The kodama on the branch tile you just added to your tree doesn’t match the kodama on the part of your tree you connected it to.

When checking to see if you draw a goal card, you only look at the branch tile you just added at the part of your tree it immediately touches. 

When you draw a card, you either draw one from the top of the goal deck or choose one of the faceup goal cards in the display and add it to your hand. If you choose one from the display, replace it with a card for the top of the goal deck. Goal cards are kept secret until the end of the game and they are not limited

The game ends when each player has a total of 10 branches on their tree and then they add 2 more from the branch tiles their kodama meeple occupy to finish off their tree. No one draws goal cards for these last two branches. Then each player scores VP based on the goal cards in their hand. The player with the most VP wins the game!

Thank you so much for watching Be Bold Games. Which Kodama is your favorite one? Tell us in the comments below and don’t forget to check out our patreon. 

Be bold, play games, be you. Happy gaming!