Moderate Risk: The Storm Chasing Board Game
Moderate Risk is a storm chasing board game Matt designed, for 2 to 6 players, ages 10 and up, in 45 to 90 minutes. Chase storms across Tornado Alley, photograph tornadoes, and try not to go broke doing it. You can also play it in the browser, passing one phone or tablet around the table.
How to play
Each player starts in Norman, Oklahoma with $500. Youngest player goes first.
On your turn, roll both dice and move clockwise around the 40-space board, a chase route through Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska and Texas. Resolve the space you land on, make any purchases or decisions, and pass the dice.
Clear Skies are a safe travel day. Hazards cost you: Out of Gas, Hail Core, Blue Sky Bust, Equipment Failure. Mud, closed roads and flooded roads cost you turns. Decision points like Storm Split, Mesocyclone, Cap Break Vote, Night Chase and Outflow Boundary make you choose.
The Wall Cloud spinner
Land on a Wall Cloud space and you spin the wheel. It has twelve sections: tornadoes from EF-0 for $25 up to EF-5 for $500, a Photogenic Structure for $150, a Viral Video that collects $50 from every player, a Lightning Strike that takes all your equipment, a Bust that moves you back five spaces, and a Hail Core, which costs $300 and sends you home to Norman.
The Hail Core fills two of the twelve sections. That is where the risk in Moderate Risk comes from.
Equipment
Green shop spaces sell equipment. A Radar Upgrade shows the next two spaces before you roll. An Armored Vehicle halves hail damage. Extra Gas Cans make you immune to Out of Gas. A Storm Data Subscription gives a free re-roll each turn, a CB Radio Network shares space effects with another player, and a Professional Camera adds $50 to every tornado.
Buying early can save money over the whole game. Sometimes playing it safe in Clear Skies is the smart move.
Winning
The game ends when a player goes broke or reaches $2,000. Then count cash and add the bonuses: $300 for a Tornado Grand Slam of every rating from EF-0 to EF-5, $200 for never dropping below $100, and $150 for Most Photogenic, which the players vote on. The richest chaser wins, and ties go to whoever saw the most tornadoes.
Play it on one screen
The online version deals the game out for 2 to 6 players on one device that gets passed around the table. It rolls the dice, spins the wheel, keeps the money and runs the votes, so nobody has to be the banker.
Where the printed rules could be read two ways, the online version picks one. Reaching $2,000 or going broke ends the game once the round finishes, and then final scoring runs.