Cascadia

Official

Cascadia is a puzzly tile-laying and token-drafting board game set in the Pacific Northwest. Players build personal habitat mosaics and place wildlife to satisfy changing scoring goals, trying to create the most harmonious ecosystem for the highest total score.

1-4 players·30-45 min·Flatout Games; Alderac Entertainment Group (AEG) (2021)

Rules

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Score wildlife types, habitat bonuses, and nature tokens

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1–4 PlayersPlayers

30–45 minTime

Draft 1 habitat tile and 1 wildlife token each turn, build your ecosystem, then score wildlife cards, habitat corridors, habitat majorities, and leftover Nature Tokens.

Build a personal landscape of Pacific Northwest habitats, populate it with wildlife, and score the best mix of animal patterns and connected habitat corridors.

How to Play Cascadia

Overview

Cascadia is a tile-laying and token-drafting game where each player builds their own Pacific Northwest ecosystem. On your turn you draft a Habitat Tile + Wildlife Token (a paired 'set'), add the habitat to your growing landscape, and (optionally) place the animal on an appropriate habitat. After 20 turns per player, you score wildlife patterns, habitat corridors, and other bonuses; highest total points wins.

Components (what matters for play)

Habitat Tiles (hexes) showing 1-2 habitat types (Forest, Prairie, Wetland, Mountain, River) and 1-3 wildlife icons.
Wildlife Tokens (Bears, Elk, Foxes, Hawks, Salmon).
Wildlife Scoring Cards: one is chosen for each wildlife type each game and defines how that animal scores.
Nature Tokens (a flexible 'currency' you earn and spend for better drafts).
Starter Habitat Tiles (each player starts with one).
Draft area: a row of 4 habitat tiles, each paired with 1 wildlife token.

Setup

Prepare wildlife tokens: Put all wildlife tokens into the cloth bag and mix.
Prepare habitat tiles (player-count dependent):
- 1-2 players: use 43 habitat tiles (remove the rest).
- 3 players: use 63 habitat tiles.
- 4 players: use 83 habitat tiles. Shuffle the tiles used and place them into one or more face-down stacks within reach.
Choose wildlife scoring cards: Randomly select 1 scoring card for each wildlife type (Bear, Elk, Fox, Hawk, Salmon) and place them face-up for everyone. (Optional: for learning games, many groups start with the 'A' cards.)
Give each player a starter: Randomly give each player 1 Starter Habitat Tile and place it in front of them. The remaining starters go back in the box.
Create the draft pool:
- Flip 4 habitat tiles face-up into the center.
- Draw 4 wildlife tokens from the bag and place one beneath each habitat to form 4 fixed pairs.
Place nature tokens in a shared supply within reach.
First player: The rulebook suggests 'most recently saw one of these animals,' or pick randomly.

Turn Structure (what you do on your turn)

Players take turns clockwise. On your turn:

1) Check for wildlife overpopulation (draft refresh rule)

Look at the 4 wildlife tokens in the draft pool:

If all 4 tokens are the same animal, you must 'wipe' them: set those tokens aside, draw 4 new tokens, and place them back under the same 4 habitat tiles.
If 3 of the 4 tokens are the same animal, you may wipe only those 3 matching tokens once this turn, then replace them with 3 new tokens (again keeping them paired to the same habitat tiles). After refilling, return wiped tokens to the bag.

2) Optional: Spend Nature Tokens (flexibility actions)

You may spend Nature Tokens to break the rigidity of the draft:

Spend 1 Nature Token to take any 1 habitat tile AND any 1 wildlife token (they don't have to be from the same pair).
Spend 1 Nature Token to wipe and replace any number of wildlife tokens in the draft pool. You can spend multiple Nature Tokens on the same turn if you want.

3) Draft (take a habitat + a token)

Normally, take one of the 4 habitat+token pairs from the draft pool.

If you used Nature Tokens to take any tile and any token, you still end up with exactly 1 habitat tile and 1 wildlife token for the turn.

4) Place the habitat tile (grow your landscape)

Add the drafted habitat tile to your personal ecosystem:

It must be placed adjacent (edge-touching) to at least one tile already in your landscape (including your starter).
Once placed, tiles do not move.
Matching habitats is not required, but connected habitat corridors are a major scoring source.

5) Place the wildlife token (optional, but usually important)

You may place your drafted wildlife token onto your landscape:

The token must go on an empty habitat hex that shows a matching wildlife icon for that animal.
A habitat can hold at most 1 wildlife token.
You may place the token on the tile you just placed or on any previously placed tile that can legally accept it.
If you cannot (or choose not to) place the token, return it to the bag.

Keystone bonus: If you place a wildlife token on a Keystone Tile (a special habitat tile marked as such), immediately gain 1 Nature Token from the supply.

6) Refill the draft pool

Refill the empty habitat slot by flipping a new habitat tile from the stack, and refill the missing wildlife token by drawing a new token from the bag. Pair them in the empty position. (Players generally do not rearrange the remaining pairs.)

Core Concepts That Drive Good Play

Two-layer puzzle: You're solving habitats (corridors and majorities) and wildlife patterns simultaneously. A 'great' habitat tile is sometimes bad if it can't host the wildlife you need.
Wildlife scoring is modular: Each game's five wildlife scoring cards create different incentives. Plan around what your current cards reward.
Nature Tokens are tempo: They convert 'close enough' drafts into 'exactly what I needed,' but spending them reduces your end-game points and tiebreak power.

End of Game

The game ends when there are no more habitat tiles available to replace a habitat tile taken from the draft pool. In standard play, this corresponds to exactly 20 turns per player. Then everyone scores.

Winning and Ties

Winner: highest total points after final scoring.
Tiebreaker: if tied, the player with the most unspent Nature Tokens wins.
If still tied, the tied players share the victory.

Common Edge Cases (quick clarifications)

You always draft one habitat and one wildlife token per turn (even if you use Nature Tokens).
Overpopulation wipes happen before you draft, so you don't get stuck with a 'dead' row of identical animals.
Wildlife tokens are optional to place, but returning them to the bag usually means you drafted for habitat value more than animal value.

Scoring Guide (and How to Record a Match)

Cascadia is a highest-score-wins game. Final score is the sum of several categories. Because the wildlife cards can change each game, the shape of scoring stays the same, but the best strategies shift.

What you score (Standard multiplayer)

You score points in these buckets:

Wildlife Scoring Cards (one card per species): score patterns of Bears, Elk, Foxes, Hawks, and Salmon in your ecosystem.
Habitat Corridors: for each habitat type, score the size of your largest connected corridor.
Habitat Majorities (2+ players only): bonus points for having the largest (and sometimes second-largest) corridor of each habitat type compared to other players.
Unused Nature Tokens: 1 point each for Nature Tokens you didn't spend.
Total Score: add everything.

1) Wildlife Scoring Cards

Each game, exactly one scoring card per wildlife type is used. That card tells you how to score that animal. Cards vary, but a few constants help you score correctly:

You score each wildlife type separately (all Bears using the Bear card, etc.).
Only wildlife tokens placed on your habitat tiles count.
Wildlife tokens must be on habitat tiles that can host them (matching icon) to be legally placed in the first place.

Recording tip: Because wildlife cards vary, your site stats will be more meaningful if you record which card letter was used for each animal (A/B/C/D). If you don't want that detail, recording total score is still valid.

2) Habitat Corridor Points

For each habitat type (Mountains, Forests, Prairies, Wetlands, Rivers):

Find your largest contiguous group of that habitat (tiles connected edge-to-edge through matching habitat edges).
Score 1 point per tile in that largest corridor.

Important nuance: many habitat tiles show two habitat types. A dual-habitat tile can contribute to corridors of either type it shows (and may effectively support scoring in multiple habitat categories, depending on connections).

3) Habitat Majorities Bonus (Standard, 2+ players)

After everyone has their corridor sizes, compare players for each habitat type:

2 players: the player with the largest corridor in that habitat gets +2 bonus points. If tied, each tied player gets +1.
3-4 players: largest corridor gets +3 bonus points; second-largest gets +1. If there is a tie for largest, tied players each get +2 and there is no second-place bonus.

(These bonuses are scored separately from the '1 point per tile' corridor scoring above.)

4) Unused Nature Tokens

Nature Tokens are earned mainly by placing wildlife on Keystone Tiles, and they can be spent during the game for draft flexibility. At game end:

Score 1 point per unspent Nature Token.

Tiebreaker note: If players tie on total points, the player with the most unspent Nature Tokens wins. If still tied, players share the win.

Recording Matches on Our Site

Minimum viable record (enough to rank the match)

Variant played: Standard / Family / Intermediate / Solo
Player list
Final Total Score for each player (integer)
Nature Tokens Remaining for each player (recommended; required if you want deterministic tiebreaks)

That's enough to determine winner(s) and handle ties.

Best record (great for analysis and 'why did I win?')

Record, per player:

Wildlife Points (total from all 5 wildlife cards)
Habitat Corridor Points (sum of the five 'largest corridor' scores)
Habitat Majorities Bonus Points (standard only)
Nature Token Points (unused nature tokens; usually equals Nature Tokens Remaining) And record, per match:
Wildlife card letters used (A/B/C/D for each species)

Common scoring mistakes to avoid

Scoring every corridor tile for a habitat instead of only the largest corridor of that habitat type.
Forgetting the majorities bonus (standard multiplayer) or applying it in Family/Intermediate where it is skipped.
Counting spent Nature Tokens at the end (only unspent count as points, and for tiebreaks).
Illegal wildlife placements (a wildlife token must match an icon on the tile and cannot share a tile with another token).
Mixing up wildlife card logic when multiple cards look similar-double-check the chosen card letter for each species.

Record each player's Total Points. Also record Nature Tokens Remaining to apply the official tiebreak consistently.