Oceans Solo Mode: Nautilus

A design by Marcy Leiman

In this solo mode for Oceans, you will face the challenges of aquatic
life against an AI robotic opponent, which we will refer to as “Nautilus.”
It will act as a timer for you to get points quickly. Every game is a new
puzzle. Try to win with the best possible score!

Table of Contents
Pg. 3 Additional Components
Set Up

Pg. 4 Rules Differences From Multiplayer

Pg. 7 Nautilus Actions

Pg. 10 On Your Turn

Pg. 11 On Nautilus’ Turn

Pg. 13 Game End

Pg. 14 Solo Scenarios Guide

Pg. 15 Deep Card Guide

Pg. 16 Quick Rules Reference

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 Additional Components
24 Nautilus’ Action tokens
2 Nautilus’ Action Boards
3 Player Scoring Bags

Set Up
Nautilus Set Up:
1. Randomly place Nautilus’ two Action Boards horizontally across the
table.
2. Choose any Player Scoring Bag to be Nautilus’ Action Bag. Place
Nautilus’ action tokens in the bag and shuffle it around.
3. Place the “Incoming Tokens” tile in front of the Action Bag.
4. Choose another bag to be Nautilus’ Stomach. This bag does not
count as a Scoring Bag in play.
Action Bag Nautilus Stomach

Incoming Tokens Tile

Game Set Up:

1. Place the Reef and the Ocean board in the center of the play area.
Stack the species boards nearby.

2. Place the Cambrian Explosion card on the 1st Ocean zone.

3. Shuffle the Scenario cards and put 1 random Scenario card on the
shelf of the 1st and 2nd Ocean zone. Return the rest of the Scenario
cards to the box. Check the Solo Scenarios Guide in this rulebook to
set difficulty (pg.14). Return the rest of the Scenario cards to the box.
4. Shuffle the Deep deck and place two random cards face-up to form
the Gene Pool.

5. Place the Reserve population tokens in the “reserve” zip-lock bag.

These will get used in the last round of the game.

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 6. Create a supply of 100 population tokens and return any unused
population tokens to the box. Roughly divide the supply of
population tokens into 4 piles and place each pile into the 4
available locations: the Reef and the 3 Ocean zones. These piles do
not need to be exact.

7. Reveal the top card from the Surface deck, and place it face-up to
form the discard pile. Look at the Migrate number on the bottom
left of the card, and move that number of population from the
Reef into the 3rd Ocean zone, and move that number from the 1st
Ocean zone to the 3rd Ocean zone.

8. Take a Scoring bag for yourself. You start the game. Do not give out
bonus tokens.

Reef Variant: If you haven’t played Oceans before it is reccomended

that you use the Reef Variant. Do to so, place the Cambrian Explosion
card Reef Variant side up, remove the deep cards from the game, and
choose easy scenarios.

Discard
Pile Random Scenarios Gene Pool
Action Bag
Nautilus Stomach

Incoming Tokens Tile

Player Hand

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 Rules Differences From Multiplayer

Before going through these rules, it is recommended that you read

through the base game’s rulebook in its entirety. You will learn the
basics of the game from there. This book will teach you the differences
for the solo game.

Differences Between Nautilus and Player

• Nautilus has no hand and does not play cards. Instead Nautilus pulls
tokens from an Action Bag, which strengthens its abilities. These
tokens aren’t considered traits.

• Instead of Species Boards, Nautilus has 2 Action Boards. They are

named the Shark Board and the Whale Board. The Shark Board will
attack and leech, and the Whale Board will forage and gain. The
Action Boards are considered two separate species.

• The tokens are pulled at the start of your turn to give you insight
into how Nautilus will strengthen its boards. Put these tokens on
the table near the Action Bag. They will be placed on Nautilus’ turn.

• Nautilus’ boards receive no penalty if they cannot age fully, and

cannot go extinct.

• Only you are affected by Scenarios. Nautilus’ boards will not be

affected by Scenarios by any means. See Solo Scenarios Guide
when picking one to modify your difficulty level (pg.14).

Interactions With Nautilus

• When attacking or leeching from either of Nautilus’ boards, treat
it as a separate species you may attack or leech. Take from its
population sitting on the board. The Nautilus can defend it’s boards.

• Nautilus’ leftmost and rightmost boards are considered adjacent

to the left of your leftmost and the right of your rightmost species
respectively.

• Your trait abilities could trigger during Nautilus’ turn (i.e. Shark
Cleaner, see below). When Nautilus performs the specific action
that triggers your ability, check Nautilus’ Action Board and count
the total value of tokens associated with that action to determine if
your ability is triggered.
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 • Attacks by the Shark Board, or Forages by the Whale Board, only
trigger the one Cleaner nearest to Nautilus (In case of a tie, you
choose).

• If an action board cannot feed any amount, it does not trigger your
abilities.

• Nautilus’ Whale board may Gain during your turn if your species are
being targeted by its tokens.

Cambrian Explosion
• After the Cambrian Explosion starts, Pull an additional token
for Nautilus at the start of your turn. It also Scores an additional
population per board on its turn.

• If this is triggered during your Play Cards step, Pull an additional

token immediately. If this is triggered any time during Nautilus’ turn,
do not Pull an additional token.

Deep Deck
• When drawing from the Deep deck, draw 3 and pick 1, leaving the
unchosen Deep cards on top of each of the cards in the Gene Pool.
Then draw an additional 2 face-down Deep cards and place them
face-up in the Gene Pool.

• When drawing from the Gene Pool, draw 1. Then draw an additional
2 face-down Deep cards and place them face-up in the Gene Pool.

• While playing the game, you may encounter cards in the Deep deck
that doesn’t seem to work with the Solo Mode. Check our List of
Deep Cards that we reccomend removing on page 15.

• In some cases, a rule on a card may not work against Nautilus but is
still usable only within your own engine.

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 Nautilus Actions
Feeding
When checking an Action Board’s total value of a Feed, count only
the value of its respective ability token, not its shell tokens. Any and all
population it takes from a forage or attack is placed onto its respective
Action Board.

Forage
Nautilus’ Whale forages up to its value as much as
possible from the nearest Ocean Zone with population.
It never forages from the Reef. If it cannot forage up
to its total value from a zone, it may then forage into
the next available zone with population, continuing on
until it has taken its total value.

Attack
Nautilus’ Shark will always attack your species
following Attack Priority. It tries to take as much
population as it can after subtracting the defense value
of the attacked species. Only if none of your species
are valid to attack, it may attack the Whale Board. If that
board is also invalid to attack, it does nothing.

Attack Priority Order

1. Attack your species that will take the most population from.
2. The Leftmost among any tied Species.
3. Its Whale Board (Ignoring its Defense).
4. Do Nothing.
When choosing a priority, Nautilus assesses your species. It will check
all of your species starting with its highest priority for that action
and then going down the list if a tie in priority exists. It breaks ties by
removing options based on the higher priorities in the list until one
valid option remains. It will always perform the final priority in its list if
no other options are valid.

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 Nautilus Defense

When Nautilus’ board’s population is being affected by your actions,

check the affected Action Board to determine its defense value.
Subtract your Attack/Leech value from Nautilus’ matching defensive
value.

Defense against Attacks

When you Feed off Nautilus’ Shark or Whale boards, add
all the Shell tokens on that board. This defense value
works identically to Shell icons on cards such as Inking.

Defence against Leeching

When you Leech off either of Nautilus’
Action boards, check the Leech tokens
targeting your leeching species. Subtract the
token’s leech value from your leech value
to determine the amount of population you
leech from Nautilus’ board.

Example: Your species with 2 Parasitics trait

tries to leech 4 from Nautilus. The Parasitic
species has 1 leech token targeting it, so you
only leech 3 from Nautilus.

Targeting

Targeting is a new key term only for Nautilus’ tokens. This will refer
to the act Nautilus takes when placing a Gain or Leech token on your
species, rather than on their action boards. The only action tokens that
target are Gain and Leech. A species being targeted is at the risk of the
effects of that specific token. A species may be targeted by any number
of tokens.

These tokens may never be taken off of a species directly. If a species

goes extinct with tokens on it, retarget them by moving those tokens
onto another of your species in Target Priority for each (if more than
one type). If your last species goes extinct with tokens on it, place those
tokens aside and target them onto the next species you create.

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Leech
Leech tokens that target a species behave identically to
how leeching works on cards such as Parasitic. Before
it feeds, it leeches population from every species with a
Leech token on it up to the total leech value of tokens
on that species. All population Nautilus leeches goes to
their Shark Board.

When you evolve a new species, Nautilus

checks for any Leech tokens that are not
on your left or rightmost species. Those
tokens move onto another of your species
in Target Priority.

Example: If a targeted species has 2 leech

tokens on it, Nautilus leeches 2 population
off of that species and places them on its
Shark Board.

Gain

Gain tokens also target your species. When a species

with Gain tokens on it gets population during a feeding
in any way, the Whale board Gains population equal to
the total value of Gain tokens on that species.

Gain tokens can only trigger once per feeding per

species. Even if a species gets population from multiple sources in
a single feeding (i.e. a species Attacks and triggers its own Bottom
Feeder) the Gain token still only triggers once, though with multiple
feedings per round they can trigger more than once per turn.

Population gained in this way comes from the nearest Oceans Zone to
the Reef with population.

example: If a targeted species attacks and takes population, The Whale

Board Gains the total value of Gain tokens targeting that species.

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 Target Priority Order
1. Your Outermost Species (Leech Only).
2. Your Species with the Most Population.
3. The Leftmost among any tied Species.

When choosing a priority, Nautilus assesses your species. It will check

all of your species starting with its highest priority for that action
and then going down the list if a tie in priority exists. It breaks ties by
removing options based on the higher priorities in the list until one
valid option remains.

On Your Turn (Solo Revised)

Playing Cards
Before the Cambrian Explosion:
• Pull 1 token from Nautilus’ Action Bag & Play 1 Surface card
.
After the Cambrian Explosion:
• Pull 2 tokens from Nautilus’ Action Bag & Play 2 cards: Surface or
Deep.
Place the Nautilus Action Tokens on the Incoming Tokens Tile. These
will be the tokens the Nautilus plays on their next turn.

EVOLVE: Play a trait on a new or existing species.
MIGRATE: Move population from any one location to another location
(Reef or Ocean zone).

If you evolve a new species that makes Leech tokens no longer

adjacent to one of Nautilus’ Action Boards, move those tokens onto
another of your species in Target Priority.

Feeding
LEECH from the adjacent species in the direction of your leeching trait.
Nautilus defends against leeching by subtracting its leech value on the
tokens targeting your leeching species total leech value.

Choose 1 of your species to feed:

FORAGE to take population from the Reef
ATTACK a species to take from its population.
When you Attack Nautilus’ Shark or Whale boards, add all the Shell
tokens on that board. Subtract that board’s defense from your attack
value to determine how much population to take.
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Nautilus’ Gains may be triggered each time your targeted species take
on population from any source. This may occur multiple times.

Aging
Before the Cambrian Explosion:
Score 1 population from each of your species.
After the Cambrian Explosion:
Score 2 population from each of your species.
A species goes extinct if it cannot age the full amount.

If a species with tokens on it goes extinct, move those tokens onto

another of your species in Target Priority for each.
If your last species goes extinct with tokens on it, place those tokens
aside and target them onto the next species you create.

Discard & Draw

You may draw 1 Deep card:
• Draw the top face-up card from a Gene Pool pile. If a Gene Pool pile is
emptied, flip the top card of the Deep deck face-up to form a new pile.
- or -
• Draw 3 cards from the Deep deck. Choose 1 to keep in your hand, and
place the others face-up on each Gene Pool pile.

Then flip two more deep cards from the top of the deck to form the
new Gene Pool.

Draw Surface cards until you have a total of 6 cards in your hand.

On Nautilus’ Turn

On its turn, perform the following steps:

Placing Tokens
Take the tokens on the Incoming Tokens Tile and..

Place:
• Forage and Green Shell tokens onto its Whale Board.
• Attack and Red Shell tokens onto its Shark Board.

Target:
• Leech and Gain tokens onto your species in Target Priority.

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 Feeding
1. Leech From species targeted by Leech tokens.
2. Resolving from left to right, feed its Action Boards:
• Shark ATTACKS in Attack Priority.
• Whale FORAGES into nearest Ocean zone(s).

Your species Gains may trigger. Nautilus’ Gains may trigger if your
targeted species Gain.

Aging
Before the Cambrian Explosion:
• Score 1 population from each Action Board.
After the Cambrian Explosion:
• Score 2 population from each Action Board.

Nautilus’ boards receive no penalty if they cannot age their full amount.

Attack Priority Order

• Attack your species that will take the most population.
• The Leftmost among any tied Species.
• Its Whale Board (Ignoring its Defense).
• Do Nothing.

Target Priority Order

1. Your Outermost Species (Leech Only).
2. Your Species with the Most Population.
3. The Leftmost among any tied Species.

When choosing a priority, Nautilus assesses your species. It will check

all of your species starting with its highest priority for that action
and then going down the list if a tie in priority exists. It breaks ties by
removing options based on the higher priorities in the list until one
valid option remains. It will always perform the final priority in its list if
no other options are valid.

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 Game End
The game ends as soon as the last round triggers.

Last Round Triggers:

The last round triggers when both Ocean Zones are empty. Add the
reserve fish into the 3rd Ocean Zone as soon as this happens. The
game immediately ends at the end of either yours or Nautilus’ turn,
whoever triggered the Last Round. Then add up your score.

Player’s Score:
1 point for each population in your score pile.
1 point for each population on your surviving species.

Victory Table
50-54: Mudskipper
55-59: Flounder
60-64: Clownfish
65-69: Octopus
70-74: Swordfish
75-79: Dolphin
80-84: Humpback Whale
85-89:Great White Shark
90-94: Kraken
95+: Leviathan

Write down your score and try to beat it next time. Set your highscore
as the new bar for victory!

Name Date Scenario Difficulty # Score

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 Solo Scenario Guide

Add up the numbers between your two scenarios to choose your

difficulty setting. Different combinations of scenarios can lead to easier
or harder experiences.

1 2 3 4 5
Protective Inhospitable Contagious Contagious Paradigm
Growth Environment +1 Outbreak Proximity Shift
Long Haul Food Surge Population Solar Asteroid
Migration Explosion Radiation Impact
Thermal Degenerative Epizootic Inhospitable
Currents Virus Environment +2

Genetic Detritus Shallow

Diversity Gene Pool
Protective
Shells
Pathogenic
Immunity
Large
Predators
Biodiverse
Reef
Prosperity
Abundance
Fertile

Promo Scenarios
1 2 3 4 5
Horizontal Shallow Evolutionary Radiation Uber Inhospitable
Gene Transfer Reef Arms Race Blast Environment

Prescient Coral Snowball Hostile

Mutations Bleaching Earth Environment +3

Parallel
Universe

Incopatible Scenarios, remove and redraw if you draw any of these:

Lazy Creator, Mass Migration, Hostile Conditions, Schadenfreude,
Aggressive Environment.
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 Solo Deep Card Guide

Due to the structural differences between Oceans and Oceans Solo, not
every deep card designed for the base game works with Solo. Here is
our list of Deep Cards that we think should be removed:

• Advanced Eyes
• Behemoth
• Coprophagia
• Cthulhu Leech
• Electric Discharge
• Electroreception
• Flight
• Invasive Predator
• Migratory Exodus
• Vestigial Limb

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 Quick Rules Reference
Once you’ve internalized these rules, use this page for a quick reference.

Nautilus Turn (pg.11):

1. Placing Tokens
• PLACE Forage, Attack, and Shell Tokens onto their respective boards
• TARGET Leech and Gain Tokens onto your species in Target Priority.

2. Feeding
• LEECH From Species Targeted by Leech Tokens.
• Resolving from left to right, feed its Action Boards.

3. Aging
Before the Cambrian Explosion:
Score 1 population from each Board

After the Cambrian Explosion:

Score 2 population from each Board
Nautilus receives no penalty if it cannot age the full amount.

Attack Priority Order (pg. 12)

1. Attack your species that will take the most population.
2. The Leftmost among any tied Species.
3. Its Whale Board (Ignoring its Defense).
4. Do Nothing.

Target Priority Order (pg. 12)

1. Your Outermost Species (Leech Only).
2. Your Species with the Most Population.
3. The Leftmost among any tied Species.

Targeting (pg.12): Place Leech and Gain tokens on your species. If a

species goes extinct with tokens on it, move those tokens onto another
of your species in priority order for each.

Defend against Leech (pg.8): Check the Leech tokens targeting your
leeching species. Subtract the tokens leech value from your leech value
to determine the amount of population you leech from Nautilus’ board.

Drawing from Deep Deck (pg.4): You may draw 1 Deep card: a face-
up card or from 3 face-down cards. Discard any unchosen Deep cards
face-up to the gene pool. Whichever you choose, you then draw
another 2 face-down cards and place them face-up in the gene pool.
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