Expert Variant

Did you enjoy the game, but now you’re looking for new challenges and a change of pace?
Then you’re ready for the Expert variant. This variant introduces significant changes, so we only recommend playing it once
all the players have already played the base game a few times.
We’ll now explain only the changes compared to the base game. Any rules not explicitly mentioned here will stay the same.

Changes to Game Setup

1 Place the game board in the center of the table, with
this symbol showing in the upper right corner.

2 Shuffle the 12 Final Scoring cards and place them

next to the game board in a face-down pile.

3 Each player takes a Garden tableau and places it in front

of them with this symbol in the lower right corner.
In the Expert variant, each Garden is
different. You can either choose a Garden
or deal them out at random.
Be sure to try them all!

4 Your Gardener now has 3 different starting positions

to choose from. Choose 1 at random and place your
Gardener there (you can still change your mind later).
Place your second Gardener next to your Garden.
Note: Place 1 Gardener on the Victory Points track, as usual.

5 Instead of placing your Animals next to the

game board, place them directly on the Flower
beds as indicated in your Garden.
Note: The placement of the Animals is different for each Garden.

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Gameplay
1. Getting Ready
Final Scoring cards
After all players have assigned their Special tasks, deal 3 Final Scoring cards face down to each player
(including yourself). Each player chooses 1 of their cards and places it face down next to their Garden.
Return the remaining 2 cards to the pile, face down. Then shuffle the pile again.
Note: In a 4-player game, you will be dealing out all the cards. Create a new pile out of the cards not chosen.
You can look at your own chosen card at any time.

Unique Gardens 12

Every Garden is now slightly different. One of the Gardens has a slightly different Setup: 15

It has only 4 Basic tasks. When playing with this garden, assign 1 Special task to each of
16
them as usual, and return the remaining task to the tuck box.
You also get 1 additional Final Scoring card. In other words, keep 2 of the 3 cards you 3
13

were dealt.

Gardener Starting Position

As mentioned earlier, there is more than one starting position to choose from. After assigning your
Special tasks and choosing your Final Scoring card, you may change your Gardener’s starting position.
The other Gardener can take a break until Round Two.

2. Round Two
At the start of Round Two, flip over all the Flower tiles as usual.
Additionally, each player now gains their second Gardener. Place them on any empty
starting position in your Garden.
From now on, you can use both Gardeners (for more on that, see Your Second Gardener: Expert Rules sheet, p.3).

3. Final scoring
After scoring the Points for your columns, reveal your Final Scoring card(s).
Each card will score you Points for specific achievements in your Garden.
You will score Points based on how well you fulfilled the conditions shown.
Score the Points once per time you’ve fulfilled the condition.
Special case: One of the cards has no condition, and instead awards you a fixed number of Victory Points (see below).
Here you can find explanations for specific cards that might raise questions:

You score 1 Victory Point You score 6 Victory Points You score 6 Victory Points for each
for each Flower bed with for each fully planted square of 4 Flower beds with Plants
a Plant in it. row. in them. Each Plant can only be
1 6 6 part of 1 square.

You simply score You score 4 Victory Points You score 7 Victory Points for each
12 Victory Points. for each Basic task you Special task you completed.
12 have completed. (You can tell which Special tasks
4 (You can tell which Basic 7 are completed because they are
tasks are completed face down on your Garden.)
because they are covered
by Special tasks.)

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Moving your Gardener
When moving your Gardener, you now have to pay attention You move
to the paths they take. your Gardener
Unlike in the base game, some movements will cost twice.
more than 1 Coin, or nothing at all. The movement costs This costs
are shown in your garden between the footprints. 4 Coins.

If you move your Gardener with this action, it is still free.

Simply ignore the cost printed on the paths in your Garden.
? 0 As usual, 1 movement is always the most direct path from one
footprint to the next.

Your Second Gardener

You may always split your movement between You first play this card and pay 2 Coins to move
your Gardeners, to move both Gardeners. both your Gardeners a total of 5 steps (ignoring
Obviously, you still have to pay any movement the costs on the paths). Then you plant 2 level II
costs. The usual rules apply. Plants .
You can also split the Watering and Planting -2
actions. In other words, more Flower beds will 1
be within range for those actions. 5 0

2 Gardeners cannot occupy the same space. 3

Animals
As you can see, your Animals are now spread throughout the Flower beds in your Garden.
By taking care of those Animals, you can unlock additional Flower beds and significant bonuses for the rest of the game.
• When you choose the Animal action , take 1 Animal of your
You use the Animal action to
choice from your Garden and place it on its respective space.
• Important: The Flower bed with the Animal on it does not have to remove the Butterfly from its Flower
bed and place it in its space on the
be within range of your Gardener.
game board.
• The tortoise’s space is on your Garden tableau; the spaces for all
Now you can plant in that Flower bed,
other Animals are on the game board.
and get all the bonuses for the Butterfly
• Flower beds with Animals are not available for Planting until you space.
have removed the Animal.
• All Animal bonuses only count from the moment you unlock them.
Not retroactively!
Depending on which Animal you chose, you receive the following bonuses:

Bird
You immediately score 4 Victory Points. From now on, you score 4 Victory Points whenever
you unlock another Animal, and an extra 4 Victory Points whenever you score a Prize token.

Squirrel
From now on, whenever one of your columns is completely filled with Plants, you
immediately gain 6 Coins.
Reminder: Since you can never remove Plants, only replace them, you can only fill each column once.

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Butterfly
From now on, you score extra Victory Points for each task you complete.
You score 2 extra Points for Basic tasks and 6 extra Points for Special tasks.

Frog
You unlock a new path. From now on, you can access an additional end space on the Money
track. It rewards you with a 3-Point Prize token (if still available), as well as 1 level IV Plant
and 1 level I Plant .
Players who have not unlocked the Frog cannot enter this space.

Tortoise
You immediately draw 3 Final Scoring cards and look at them. Keep 1 of them and return the
other 2 to the bottom of the pile. You now have 2 Final Scoring cards.
Reminder: One of the Gardens gives its player 2 Final Scoring cards from the start, so that player would now have
3 Final Scoring cards.
You also draw 1 Garden card.

Variants
Introducing Final Scoring cards
You can also use the Final Scoring cards by themselves as part of the base game.
Alternatively, you use them as part of the Expert variant, as described above.

Important: We prefer to include some amount of random chance in the game. But if you would like more control, you can
try the variants described below.
However, you should only play these variants if everyone is already familiar with the game and all players agree. These rule
changes can make the setup time considerably longer and could potentially overwhelm players with too many choices.

Drafting your tasks

1. Getting Ready: Instead of dealing out the Special tasks directly, you can draft them. This means that all the players
simultaneously choose 1 task to keep, and pass the rest to the player to their left. Then all players again choose 1 task
to keep and pass the rest on. Continue until all the players have 5 tasks. Only then do you assign them to the Basic tasks.
You could also vary this format, for example, by picking 2 tasks during the first round of drafting, and 1 for each round
after that.

Choosing your Final Scoring cards sooner

1. Getting Ready: Instead of choosing your Final Scoring cards after you have assigned your tasks, you can first draw
the 3 cards and then assign your tasks based on them.

Garden card selection

Whenever you gain a Garden card, draw 2 (or even 3) cards and choose 1 of them to keep. Place the others on the
discard pile.
If this is your last action, we recommend telling the next player to start their turn (since you cannot play your card
until your next turn anyway). This helps to keep “downtime” short.