In each round, scoring occurs after all players reveal their cards. The player with the highest score in the round collects points equal to their score and should move their Dinosaur meeple along the Escape Route on their player board accordingly. The player with the lowest score adds the face-up Disaster card to their Disaster Area. If a player adds a Disaster card to their Disaster Area, they may discard a card from their hand. A player’s base score equals the point value of the face-up Point card in front of them, but that score can go up or down based on bonuses from Dinosaur Traits, Point card effects, and Instant card effects (which will be explained in the subsequent sections). Meteor cards can count as any of the three disaster colors. Meteors only count as a single disaster, but it will be the disaster that has the most negative impact to the cardholder. For example, if you have 1 green Disaster card and 2 red Disaster cards and then get a Meteor, it will count as a red. If you have 1 green and 1 red, it will count as a blue. If you have NO disasters, it will count as any of the three colors until you have a disaster for it to line up with. If you somehow get 3 Meteors and no disasters, that’s the same as getting 3 disasters of the same color or 1 of each color (AKA, you’re out!). There are mini Meteors that act the same way but they flop between 2 of the colors instead of all 3. The two colors depend on which mini Meteor it is, as they are noted on the cards themselves. Also, the ONLY Player whose Dinosaur Trait is active during a Meteor (or mini Meteor) is Stego.

After all of the players have played a Point card face down, the players will reveal their cards at the same time. The players will then score their cards to determine who won and lost the round. Scoring in Happy Little Dinosaurs Should you play the Score Inversion card during scoring, you will invert the highest and lowest scores. See the Inverting Scores section above for more details. Score SapperMeteor cards are unique Disaster cards because they act as each of the three types of Disaster card. Therefore if you collect a Disaster card, you are eliminated whenever you have two other Disaster cards. Here are two example of how you can be eliminated due to drawing a Meteor! card. The top player collected three Disaster cards of the same type (the Meteor! would act as a green card) so they would be eliminated. The bottom player is eliminated because they have a Disaster card of all three types (the Meteor! would act as a green card). The Happy Little Dinosaur might look like an innocent party game. It is perfect for small children with its cute designs and colors. But its design is a little deceptive because the game involves a lot of strategies and planning.

Well, we all know what happened to the dinosaurs, don’t we? Every time you lose a round, you’ll collect a disaster card. These come in three colors: red, blue, and green. If you collect three cards of the same color, you are eliminated from the game. When you play the Flaming Chainsaw card, you will ignore the effects printed on all other Point cards. Grappling Snake In general, if a player crosses the 50 point finish line during the same part of the turn as another player, they are tied for winning and they don’t have to die alone.

These disaster cards are so fun to read. Here are my favourites!

While Disaster cards are mostly bad, at the end of each round you get to move your dinosaur meeple forward one space for each Disaster card in your Disaster Area. Winning Happy Little Dinosaurs The player that scored the least points, takes the Disaster card revealed at the beginning of the round. They will add this card to their Disaster Area. Since they acquired a Disaster card, they can choose one of the cards from their hand to discard. This player played the lowest card so they lost the round. They add the Disaster card from the round to their board. If players play multiple cards with inversion, you will apply inversion for each card. For example if there are two inversions; the points will be inverted and then inverted again. In this example all of the players will have the same points as they did when they first played the cards. Resolving Ties