recursal/Fanatic-Fandom huggingface dataset:
Sea Goat

## Ability

### Ability

**Sign of the Tides****(Play)** If played next to Capricorn, your Signs of the Zodiac cards, wherever they are, gain +8 Power permanently.

## Did You Know?

Under what circumstances might you require the upper body of a goat, and the lower body of a fish? Probably none, but for Pan, the wilderness god, that moment came when he was being attacked by the monster Typhon. Seeking a quick escape in the river, he quickly transformed his legs into a fish’s tail and was forever immortalised in the form of a constellation we call Capricornus. Given that the constellation is located in an area of the sky often called ‘The Sea’, the fish tail thing makes sense.

On the back of this Ancient Greek tale, many stories of the legendary ‘**Sea Goat**’ were conceived over time and appeared across many different cultures. No one actually believes the sea goat is real, but it’s a fun character nonetheless.
Silky Shark

## Ability

### Ability

**Persistent Hunter****(Play)** For every Sharks! card you have played this game, up to a maximum of 6, your Sharks! cards in hand gain +5 Power this turn.

## Did You Know?

If you get close enough to a **Silky Shark** to touch it, let us know if its name is accurate. Attacks on humans are rare, but this species is not shy and will attack when provoked. Also known as the Carcharhinus Falciformis, these slender sharks can reach up to 3.5 metres in length (that’s two Napoleons, for context).

They are so-called for their smooth skin, which comes as a result of densely packed dermal denticles, small bristle-like structures designed to decrease drag and turbulence for the shark so it can swim faster and more quietly. No wonder the silky shark is great at hunting, and an extremely acute sense of hearing certainly helps when locating prey such as tuna, octopuses and squid.
Sandbar Shark

## Did You Know?

The Sandbar Shark is a member of the Requiem family of sharks, which dates back as far as the Cretaceous period. That's quite a dynasty.

This particular species is fairly common in Western Atlantic waters, from Chesapeake Bay to the shores of Brazil. But don't worry if that's where you live - they are considered one of safest shark species to swim with.
Sigmund Freud

## Ability

### Ability

**Psychoanalyse****(Start)** A random card in either player's hand gains +10 Power and a random card in either player's hand loses -10 Power this turn.

## Did You Know?

The founder of psychoanalysis, **Sigmund Freud** was the first to develop the theory of unconscious processes and how they affect our conscious minds. According to Freud, we don’t always know why we do what we do, but if you happen to be female - it’s probably because you have penis envy.

In his theory, Freud argued that penis envy was a necessary part of female development, and that this jealousy grows over time, manifesting in a daughter’s love for her father and the desire to give birth to a son. Of course, Freud's theories are over a century old and are based on outdated conceptions of the brain and incomplete evidence, so most institutions today wouldn’t cite him as a credible source. Probably because they’ve got penis envy.
Rusty-spotted Cat

## Did You Know?

The rusty-spotted cat is a wild species of feline living in the forests of Sri Lanka and much of India, with rare sightings in Terai and Nepal. Measuring at 35-48cm in body length, these teeny tiny wild cats can easily fit into your palm, just like an, erm Tamagotchi? Remember those?

Although at home in the canopy, they are nocturnal predators that hunt on the forest floor and use their excellent climbing abilities to escape from predators. If you want to meet a rusty-spotted cat but don't want to travel as far as India, the good news is that Berlin Zoo has just completed a successful breeding programme. Glückwunsch!
Siamese

## Ability

### Ability

**Soul Vessel****(Draw)** Gain +12 Power/Turn this round. **(Return)** Gain +6 Power/Turn permanently.

## Did You Know?

In modern times, **Siamese** cats seem to have acquired a bad reputation, but hundreds of years ago, this breed of cat was beloved by royal families in Thailand for their distinctive look and beautiful eyes.

The royals even believed that when they died, a Siamese cat would adopt their soul and spend the rest of their lives being pampered by the family of the deceased in hopes of bringing blessing to the royal line – not a bad gig for a cat.
The Big Splash

## Ability

### Ability

**Coalescent Debris****(Draw)** Your The Moon card, wherever it is, costs -2 Energy permanently.

## Did You Know?

A lot has changed in the last 5 billion years. Namely, the existence of our Earth and Moon. But how was the latter formed?

Well, according to the Giant Impact Hypothesis, also known as **The Big Splash**, a collision between Earth (when Earth was just a swirling ball of gas and dust), and a Mars-sized planet created an orbiting ring of debris. About half of that debris eventually formed together to become the Moon, between one and 100 years after the impact.

Although the Big Splash is the dominant theory for the formation of the moon, some questions remain. For example, why Venus – which experienced similar giant impacts during its formation – doesn’t have a moon as Earth does.
Sapphire Devil

## Ability

### Ability

**Sergeant-Major?****(Draw)** Your Innovations of War cards in hand cost -1 Energy until played. **(Play)** Your Logan Sapphire card, wherever it is, gains +24 Power this round.

## Did You Know?

The name and appearance of the **Sapphire Devil** are misleading. In fact, this species of fish isn’t actually blue at all – it simply appears blue because of the rainbow cells on its body that reflect blue light. It can even change its appearance, switching from a light blue to a dark blue hue as a means of communicating with other sapphire devils.

However, the ‘devil’ part of its name is totally accurate. This feisty fish has a fierce temperament and is remarkably aggressive compared to other fish of its size and environment. As they age, their aggression grows – and, although they are popular aquarium fish, their hostile nature means that they shouldn't be housed with more peaceful fish, as the sapphire devil is known to bully its tankmates.
Salmoneus

## Ability

### Ability

**Hubris****(Play)** If your deck contains Thunderstorms, your Greek Mythology cards in hand gain +10 Power this turn.

## Did You Know?

Unfortunately, we can’t all be Zeus. But surely, being a king is good enough? Not for **Salmoneus**, apparently, who demanded his people worship him as the god Zeus. In Salmoneus’ defence, he went to lengths to convince his people he was the real deal. He impersonated the deity by driving around in a chariot dragging bronze kettles to make thunder and casting torches in the air as faux-lightning. That’s a lot of effort - but naturally, Zeus wasn’t best impressed.

Even before impersonating the deity, Salmoneus had refused to undertake the sacrifices and festivals expected of him. For the sin of hubris, Zeus eventually struck Salmoneus down with his thunderbolt and destroyed the town. If that wasn’t bad enough, the deceased Salmoneus was sent down to Tartarus for eternal punishment.
The Moon (XVIII)

## Ability

### Ability

**Instability****(Draw)** If you are winning the round, your cards in hand gain +18 Power permanently and if you are losing the round, your cards in hand lose -18 Power permanently.

## Did You Know?

So, your fortune teller just turned over **The Moon XVIII**  tarot card. Here’s the bad news: an upright moon means deception and uncertainty loom. It could be a complicated romance, confusion in your career path or a lack of clarity in financial decisions.

The good news? They’re paid to say ominous things, and the Tarot is no exact science. Still, you might want to pay a little more attention to your dreams, as your subconscious might be sending you signals about some information you’ve missed.

When pulled in reverse, The Moon card could indicate your release from negative energy, or that secrets are about to be exposed. But first, you’ve got to confront your demons. Or, you know, just chill and hope for the best.

Thanks Countershade for the card idea!
Sand Cat

## Ability

### Ability

**Nothing to See Here****(Draw)** Your opponent's cards in hand cost +1 Energy this round.

## Did You Know?

Although obviously completely adorable, with their big fluffy ears and soft little paws that just make you want to smoosh their chubby little faces, the **Sand Cat** is actually one of the most fearless predators of the desert.

The aforementioned soft little paws actually help the sand cat to traverse extreme desert surface temperatures ranging from 31 to 124 degrees, while the extra "floof" also makes them impossible to track, as they don’t leave their pawprints in the sand.

So, if you ever find yourself in the desert looking to adopt a new feline friend, you might be tempted to listen out for a tell-tale meow, but you’d be better off listening out for a chihuahua - as the mating call of the sand cat has been likened to the yelp of the small dog.

However, as these ferocious hunters are known to take on venomous vipers for lunch, we’d suggest maybe getting a tabby.
Snowshoe

## Ability

### Ability

**Nine Lives****(Draw)** If your deck has 9 or more Cute Cats cards, your Cute Cats cards, wherever they are, cost -1 Energy until played.

## Did You Know?

♫ No one knows what it's like / To be the bad cat / to be the sad cat / Behind blue eyes… ♫ But where does this striking eye colour come from?

It turns out that the **Snowshoe** cat has quite a convoluted origin story. Initially, they were bred by crossing American shorthairs with Siamese cats. However, as time passed, the breeding combination evolved. Today, breeders of the Snowshoe prefer the Oriental Shorthair and the older types of Siamese. That’s how they get their stocky build and blue eyes.

So what’s with the name? Although Snowshoe kittens are born completely white and develop their markings later, the name ‘Snowshoe’ was given by a breeder named Dorothy Hinds-Daugherty who discovered three kittens in a Siamese litter that had white feet and socks.
Sack Man

## Ability

### Ability

**Christmas Bogeyman****(Play)** If you have played at least 1 Festive Traditions card this game, your Mythical Creatures cards, wherever they are, gain +20 Power until played.

## Did You Know?

If you see an old guy carrying a sack at Christmastime, don’t get too excited: it might not be who you think. Instead of the jolly gift-giver known as Santa Claus, you might be looking at the psychotic child-kidnapper known as **Sack Man**.

This frightening bogeyman occurs in many cultures and countries worldwide: in Scotland, he’s a demon called Lammikin who stabs and bites small children to wake their mothers. In Spain, he’s ‘el hombre del saco’ - a mean and ugly old man who eats the misbehaving kids he collects. In Chile and Argentina, he’s "El Viejo del Saco" ("The old man with the bag"), and he stalks the neighbourhood at suppertime kidnapping children in plain sight. In any case, your best bet is to steer clear of sack-wielding strangers.
Robot Companion

## Ability

### Ability

**Science's Little Helper****(Start)** A random Science card in your hand gains +12 Power until played.

## Did You Know?

Friends come and go, but a **Robot Companion** is for life. While doomers say robots will rise up and enslave us, sci-fi has done a lot to convince us that they’d make for great pals. Just look at R2D2 from Star Wars, (our favorite) Marvin the Paranoid Android from Hitchhiker’s Guide or TARS from Interstellar.

While man is yet to need robot assistants for deep space travel, tech companies are currently exploring the potential they have in the fight against social isolation. Models like <link="https:>Pepper</link> and <link="https:>Buddy</link> are proof that robots can be more than mechanical servants, recognising faces and basic human emotions. There’s even a robot companion called <link="https:>Professor Einstein</link> who can answer science questions and tell jokes. Move over, dog: man just got a new best friend.
Smoking Jacket

## Ability

### Ability

**Loungewear****(Start)** Your Fancy Fashions cards in hand gain +6 Power until played.

## Did You Know?

Oh I do say, old chap, don’t you think I look dapper in my **Smoking Jacket**? It’s perfect for lounging around the house, posing for portraits and protecting all my clothes from my terrible smoking habit.

In the 1800s, as travel to other countries became more popular and more exotic goods made their way to Europe, a new trend became ever more common in Britain. And that was smoking. Nothing says I’m super rich and fancy like breathing poison into your lungs.

However, there was a downside to smoking (besides the numerous health risks) - it could ruin your expensive clothes. While silk dressing gowns were all the rage at the time, they also didn’t help protect your clothes from the smell of tobacco or falling ash. So the Smoking Jacket was born. It kept your expensive clothes nice and kept you from smelling like an ashtray. But equally important was that it was comfortable. And that’s part of what kept it fashionable with celebrities like Cary Grant and Frank Sinatra, right up into the 1950s.
Snapdragon

## Ability

### Ability

**Garden Dragon****(Draw)** If your deck has 6 or fewer Mythical Creatures cards, your Mythical Creatures cards, wherever they are, cost -1 Energy permanently.

## Did You Know?

It may not breathe fire, but the Antirrhinum flower is commonly known as a **Snapdragon** because of the flowers’ resemblance to the face of a dragon that opens and closes its mouth when laterally squeezed. In the Netherlands, snapdragons are called “lion’s lips”, while in Asia, these flowers are called “rabbit’s lips”.

Indigenous to the Mediterranean region, snapdragons love spots of full sun exposure but are equally partial to cool weather. When in bloom, these flowers come in yellow, orange, red, pink, purple and white. Butterflies, hummingbirds and humans all share a love for the Antirrhinum flower, which can be added to salads in small quantities. According to folklore, snapdragons can even protect you from witchcraft: just walk around one three times counterclockwise and curse be gone!
San José

## Ability

### Ability

**The Sunken Armada****(Play)** If played between two Riding the Waves! cards, up to 6 of your Lost Treasures cards, wherever they are, gain +33 Power until played.

## Did You Know?

It’s been called the Holy Grail of Shipwrecks - and with good reason. When the Spanish galleon **San José** sank in battle at Baru Island, it was carrying gold, silver and emeralds worth about $17 billion.

Built in 1697, the San José and its twin ship, the San Joaqín, were part of the Spanish treasure fleet during the War of Spanish Succession. On its final voyage, the 62-gun, three-masted Spanish galleon went down on June 8th, 1708, leaving only eleven of 600 survivors.

Before you get your diving gear on, it’s worth noting that the legendary wreck has since been found off the coast of Cartagena, Colombia, on Nov. 27, 2015, by a team of international scientists. To preserve the wreck and its contents, the exact location of the ship is classified.
Slow Worm

## Ability

### Ability

**Blind Faith****(Play)** A random card in either player's hand gains +20 Power this turn.

## Did You Know?

The first thing you should know about the **Slow Worm** is that it’s not a worm. Nor is it a snake. It is, in fact, a legless lizard – its identity is given away by its ability to shed its tail and blink with its eyelids.

One of the biggest threats to slow worms are domestic cats, against which the garden-dwelling lizard has no defence. One day it’s soaking up the rays of the British summertime, the next it’s a plaything for Felix.

Still, if they manage to steer clear of danger, slow worms can live about 30 years in the wild and up to at least 54 years in captivity. Like other reptiles, slow worms hibernate, usually between March and October.
Sheep

## Ability

### Ability

**Baby Don't Herd Me****(Play)** Your Alpaca and Llama cards, wherever they are, gain +20 Power until played.

## Did You Know?

You probably don’t remember the last **Sheep** you saw. But there’s a small chance that it remembers you. Not only are sheep able to recognise up to 50 sheep faces and distinguish between different emotional expressions, but they’re also capable of remembering human faces.

That sheep are used as a metaphor for people who aren’t “awake to the truth” is pretty unfair on the species, given their intelligence. Sure, they have a herd mentality, but their cognitive abilities allow them to form deep and lasting friendships with each other. Like (some) humans, sheep stick up for one another in fights and grieve when they lose a friend. Unlike humans, they have scent glands on the front of their eyes and feet!
Sonic Boom

## Ability

### Ability

**Thunderclap****(Draw)** Your opponent's Brilliant Human Body and Super Structures cards in hand cost +2 Energy for 2 turns. **(Return)** Your Awesome Aviation cards, wherever they are, gain +8 Power permanently.

## Did You Know?

Until Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier on October 14, 1947, it was a commonly held belief that doing so would destroy an aircraft. But it didn’t. Instead, the constant expansion and contraction of air created a shockwave that sounded like thunder called a **Sonic Boom**.

Why? Because when an aircraft travels through the air, it produces sound waves. If the plane is travelling slower than the speed of sound, the sound waves can propagate ahead of the plane. But if the aircraft flies at supersonic speeds, the sound waves can’t get ahead of it because the plane is keeping up with the sound waves. All the while, the aircraft is creating more sound. Eventually, it all piles up and makes a big boom which can be seen with the naked eye.
Santa Claus (1898)

## Ability

### Ability

**The First of Many****(Play)** If it's the first turn of a round, your Stage and Screen cards, wherever they are, gain +16 Power this round.

## Did You Know?

This Christmas, show your family <link="https:>you’re a superior film buff</link> by veto-ing Muppet Christmas Carol and making them watch **Santa Claus (1898)**. While they squint at the screen and ask to put ‘Frozen’ on instead, point out that this is cinema’s earliest known example of parallel action and one of the most visually sophisticated British films of the time.

Directed by George Albert Smith, a former magic-lantern artist, the film features Santa Claus visiting a house on Christmas Eve, filling the stockings with gifts and trimming the Christmas tree. Since filmmaking of the time was very much a family affair, the mother and infants in this film are played by Smith’s wife Laura Bayley and their two children, Harold and Dorothy.
Sol and Mani

## Ability

### Ability

**Your Chariots Await****(Return)** Your The Sun and The Moon cards, wherever they are, cost -3 Energy until played.

## Did You Know?

When you’re born at the creation of the cosmos, it may not be totally clear what your purpose is in the great scheme of things. According to the Poetic Edda (a collection of Old Norse poems), that was the case for **Sol and Mani** – a brother and sister who rode through the sky on horse-drawn chariots.

As their names suggest, the siblings’ roles were related to the sun and the moon, but it was not until the gods sat down together and set out the rules for the day and night and phases of the moon that their true purpose was revealed. The two would be responsible for pulling the sun and the moon across the sky every day and night to light up the world below.
Rocket Lab Electron

## Ability

### Ability

**"It's a Test"****(Play)** If it's the first turn of a round, this card gains +18 Power this turn.

## Did You Know?

It’s the second most frequently launched U.S. rocket annually and is capable of reaching speeds of up to 28,000km an hour once it escapes Earth’s atmosphere: **Rocket Lab Electron** is a two-stage launch vehicle developed to launch small commercial and government satellites into orbit. In total, the rocket stands 17m tall and is capable of lifting payloads of 150kg to a 500km sun-synchronous orbit – meaning the satellites it launches will always visit the same spot at the same local time.

Electron’s first flight, known as “It’s a Test” failed due to a glitch. However, successful follow-up missions including “Still Testing”, “It’s Business Time” and “This One’s for Pickering”, delivered multiple small payloads into low Earth orbit.

'The Electron Rocket' by Fac-tory-o (Source: Wikimedia Commons) is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0 (original image resized, cropped and altered)
Sacred Heart Cathedral of Algiers

## Ability

### Ability

**In the Round****(Draw)** If your deck contains Pi, three random cards in your hand gain +14 Power until played.

## Did You Know?

**The Sacred Heart Cathedral of Algiers** gets mixed reviews. According to one visitor on TripAdvisor, it’s the ugliest church in the world. According to another, it’s an exceptional structure with a beautiful view over Algiers. Still, both would agree that this Roman Catholic church is like no other.

Built in 1956 by by Paul Herbé and Jean Le Couteur, the ‘Cathédrale du Sacré-Cœur d'Alger’ became the new cathedral in the capital after the Cathedral of Saint Philip of Algiers reconverted into a Muslim Ketchaoua Mosque. Unlike traditional cathedrals, this church is entirely constructed of concrete slabs in the shape similar to that of a nuclear plant. Honestly, if Catholics of yore saw this, they’d have a major meltdown.

'The Sacred Heart Cathedral of Algiers, started to built in 1956.' by Ps2613 (Source: Wikimedia Commons) is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0 (original image resized, cropped and altered)
Sandwich Theory

## Ability

### Ability

**A Squash and a Squeeze****(Play)** Your other cards in hand gain +30 Power this turn and this card loses -30 Power this turn.

## Did You Know?

Sandwiches are delicious, but it turns out they’re also pretty useful when it comes to figuring out the limit of a function. As per the **Sandwich Theory**, a function that sits between two functions approaching the same limit “L” much also approach “L”. Think of the middle function as the filling, and the two functions approaching the same limit as the bread.

So, if both “bread” functions have the same limit, the “filling” function would also have to have the same limit. Since the “filling” function sits between the other two functions, this theorem is also known as the “Squeeze Theorem”. It was first used geometrically by the mathematicians Archimedes and Eudoxus in an effort to compute π.

All this thinking is enough to make you hungry. Sandwich, anyone?

CRAFTING CLUE BELOW!

- Some kind of virtuous rooster's story?
Sleigh Bells

## Ability

### Ability

**Jingle All The Way****(Draw)** Gain +10 Power/Turn for 3 turns and your opponent's cards in hand **Burn** (10) for 3 turns. **(Play)** Your Coal card, wherever it is, gains +50 Power until played.

## Did You Know?

**Sleigh Bells** ring, are you listening? Well, you should – it might be someone on a nearby sleigh telling you to move out of the way. Hundreds of years ago, sleigh bells were fastened to horses to signal the arrival of someone important or warn pedestrians of an approaching vehicle – after all, sleighs aren’t easy to bring to a halt, so it’s only right to give plenty of warning before stopping.

Back in 1965, astronauts about to board the Gemini 6 thought it would be funny to smuggle in some sleigh bells and a harmonica onto their spacecraft to play Jingle Bells for mission control during the festive season. And they did exactly that, making sleigh bells one of the first instruments played in space.
Siamese Fighting Fish

## Ability

### Ability

**Betta Not Miss****(Return)** If you won the turn, this card gains +19 Power permanently.

## Did You Know?

Known as “**Siamese Fighting Fish**” or “labyrinth fish,” the Betta Splenden gets its name from the aggressive tendencies that the males of the species have when it comes to protecting their territory. In the wild, male bettas are devoted fathers who make bubble nests with their mouths to protect their babies from predators. Females are far more peaceful than male bettas, and can even be kept in groups, called a sorority.

Siamese Fighting Fish are native to Asia, where they live in the shallow water of marshes, ponds, or slow-moving streams. Having been domesticated for at least 1,000 years, the species now comes in a wide variety of colours and fin-styles, earning them the nickname “designer fish of the aquatic world.”
Muskox

## Ability

### Ability

**Seasonal Rut****(Return)** If your deck has 14 or more Paleontology cards, your Ice Age cards, wherever they are, gain +34 Power this round.

## Did You Know?

Known to some as “bearded one” (“umingmak” in Inuktitut) and others, less favorably as “ugly moose” ("mâthi-môs" in Woods Cree), today we’ll simply refer to them as the mighty **Muskox**. It’s times like this when we wish we could offer a scratch and sniff card variation, as it's their… unique(?) smell that they emit during breeding season that gives them this name.

The muskox is a pretty sizable boi, but it’s the thick layer of body fat and the long shaggy coat to make the arctic conditions more bearable that makes them look so hench, with their second layer of fur measuring up to two feet long.

Historically the muskox has sadly been victim to overhunting, as their method of defense to form an outward circle to rush attack predators falls short when faced with human long-range weapons. The entire Alaskan population was wiped out at roughly the turn of the 20th century, but thanks to hunting regulations there is now thought to be a total population of between 80,000 and 125,000.
SOFIA

## Ability

### Ability

**Clear View****(Start)** Your non-Limited Nebulae cards in hand gain +10 Power for 4 turns. **(Play)** Your Nebulae cards in hand gain +30 Power for 2 turns.

## Did You Know?

It might look like the kind of plane you could jump on for a weekend getaway to Paris but you’d actually wind up with a terrible view of the Eiffel Tower from where it’s going. **SOFIA** - or Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy, if you want to use her Sunday name - is actually a creation of NASA and the German Space Agency, used as an airborne observatory. Nope, she’s not going to Tenerife anytime soon.

If we’re going to get all technical (which we probably should), SOFIA is a Boeing 747 SP aircraft with a telescope strapped to it, which allows for increased mobility and means that scientists can observe events happening where telescopes couldn’t be placed before (like the middle of the ocean). Some amazing sights that SOFIA captured include an eclipse of Pluto and Titan, the moon of Saturn.

In September 2022, SOFIA made its last flight but it’s not done with teaching us things just yet. Both SOFIA and SOFIA-related artifacts will be heading off to Pima Air & Space Museum in Tucson, Arizona, where members of the public will get to check out this amazing piece of technology.
Shapley Supercluster

## Ability

### Ability

**Quite Attractive****(Play)** Your cards adjacent to this lose -10 Power permanently and this card gains +20 Power permanently.

## Did You Know?

The idea that we’re the only intelligent life form in the universe is hard to defend, especially when you learn about the **Shapley Supercluster** - the largest concentration of galaxies in our nearby universe.

Discovered in the 1930s by American astronomer Harlow Shapley, this remarkable supercluster is a dense collection of approximately 20 major clusters of galaxies, containing over 8,000 individual galaxies probably teeming with aliens of all shapes, sizes and intentions.

In total, the supercluster has a mass more than ten million billion times the mass of the Sun. In fact, it’s the most massive structure within a distance of about a billion light-years from our Milky Way. The Shapley Concentration is so big that it’s pulling our home supercluster, Laniakea, towards the constellation Centaurus.
Snub-nosed Monkey

## Ability

### Ability

**Snubbed****(Return)** If you lost the turn, this card gains +45 Power until played.

## Did You Know?

Adored by the internet, the **Snub-nosed Monkey** is nature’s ventriloquist. When studying the creature, primatologists found that the species are capable of vocalising without any visible sign of them doing so, likely because of their large nostrils. The evolutionary advantage of this is unclear, but we can only assume it allows the species to gossip without getting caught out in monkey society.

A rare genus of Old-World monkey, the Snub-nosed monkey is named after its unique facial features. Like Lord Voldemort, they lack nasal bones and have upturned nostrils. But, unlike the dark lord, they’re highly sensitive to rain. A few drops in their noses can trigger a sneezing fit, so the snub-nosed monkey tends to tuck its head between its knees on drizzly days.
Sistine Chapel

## Ability

### Ability

**Masterpiece****(Play)** Your Legendary cards in hand gain +26 Power this turn.

## Did You Know?

You've seen the photo; it's like that, but much bigger. So much has been written about this building and, the creative force behind its decoration, that there's not much more I can add.

The **Sistine Chapel** is in Vatican City, around 250 meters from the McDonald's on Borgo Pio, one of the finest and best located fast food establishments that border the Pope's residence. Sure, it has a pigeon problem, but location location location! Anyway, I digress.

The Chapel is named for Pope Sixtus IV, who undertook extensive restoration work on both the exterior and interior of the building (just so there's no confusion; he coughed up the dough and didn't actually get his hands dirty). Incredibly, even before Michelangelo got his mitts on a brush, the Chapel had already had the likes of Botticelli and Pinturicchio do some of the decorating.

As Popes often do, Pope Sixtus died and in marched Pope Julius II with the potential to be a forgettable sequel but he only went and commissioned the 33-year-old sculptor Michelangelo (Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni) to do up the ceiling, thus ensuring he got his own Wiki page.

Contrary to popular belief (and perhaps because of the Charlton Heston movie), Michelangelo did not lie on his back to paint his masterpiece, designing his own scaffolding so he could stand during its creation. That said, he moaned about the physical strain the process put on him, even writing a poem to a friend describing his misery. He should have laid down to do it.

After four years of hard work, it was completed in 1512 and remained in all its beauty for 48 years when prudish Pope Pius IV covered over all the rude bits with fig leaves. Fortunately, these leaves were subsequently removed during a restoration in the 1990s.
Softshell Turtle

## Did You Know?

The Softshell Turtle does not have a hard shell like others of its species - instead, its carapace is more leathery and flexible, covering up a layer of solid bone that protects the creature.

But that's not the only weird thing about it - take a look at that pig-like nose! Both of these features, along with webbed feet, serve to make it a more aquadynamic. That makes it uncomfortably close to being an Amphibian, but not quite and I've put this card in the Reptiles collection now so deal with it.
Skua

## Ability

### Ability

**Piratical Birds****(Play)** Your Plundering Pirates cards in hand gain +25 Power this turn.

## Did You Know?

Perhaps the most spiteful of seabird species, the arctic **Skua** doesn’t forgive, and it doesn’t forget. In an experiment, brown skuas attacked people who had previously disturbed their nests, but ignored neutral humans wearing identical clothes. Researchers think they relied on human facial features to distinguish the “bad” humans, which is pretty wild given that the birds on Antarctica's King George Island evolved without ever seeing a human.

But these predatory birds don’t just target people - they’ve also been seen chasing other large birds and harassing them into dropping fish they’ve just caught. They’ll even steal drops of breast milk from nursing elephant seals. In fact, kleptoparasitism comprises up to 95% of the feeding methods of arctic Skuas.
Short-nosed Unicornfish

## Ability

### Ability

**Unicorn of the Sea****(Play)** Your Mythical Creatures cards in hand gain +20 Power this turn.

## Did You Know?

What if unicorns are real, but we’re looking in the wrong place? Okay, so that’s a stretch. However, in the rocky shores and lagoons of the Indian and Pacific oceans, there swims a creature with a horn on its head that can change colour at will.

Known as the **Short-nosed Unicornfish** or ‘Unicorn tang’, this very real animal has a peculiar way of courting. When trying to attract females, males will change the colour of their “horn” and other parts of their body – an act known as ‘flashing’. Not to be confused with the kind of flashing that can get you arrested in human culture, this brilliant colour show used by the short-nosed Unicornfish asserts dominance amongst rivals and signals sexual prowess to potential mates.
Sabertooth Longhorn Beetle

## Ability

### Ability

**Long in the Tooth****(Return)** This card gains +30 Power and costs -2 Energy permanently.

## Did You Know?

The **Sabertooth Longhorn Beetle**, a native of the southern Amazon rainforest, is a fairly typical beetle. It's got six legs, mandibles, can be up to 17.5cm in length, tough carapa... sorry, 17.5cm in length?!

Hold out the palm of your hand; this big bad beetle bro is longer than the distance between your wrist and middle fingertip. That's including the main part of its body and its powerful mandibles.

What's amazing is that this humungous creature is still only a baby, relatively speaking. A Sabertooth Longhorn Beetle can spend up to a decade in larval stage, and when it's fully developed it's only around in its final form for a few months. Can you imagine if they kept going?
Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor

## Ability

### Ability

**Alchemy****(Play)** Your Excellent Elements cards in hand gain +10 Power this turn.

## Did You Know?

Rudolf the II held many titles over his life; King of Hungary; King of Croatia; King of Bohemia; and Archduke of Austria. Seems impressive, but when you consider he was also Holy Roman Emperor and thus controlled all those countries anyway, it's less so.

He was a devotee of astrology and alchemy, and spared no expense in his hunt to find the Philosopher's Stone (which, as it turns out, J. K. Rowling didn't just make up for Harry Potter) - a legendary substance that was said to be able to turn base metals into gold. He surrounded himself with alchemists and even conducted his own experiments to discover it, and while he wasn't successful (because it's probably not real...) he made contributions to the scientific revolution that would lead to other discoveries.

'Portrait of Rudolf II.' by Joseph Heintz the Elder (Source: Wikimedia Commons) is licensed under Public Domain (original image resized, cropped and altered)
Scale Worm

## Ability

### Ability

**Scale Back****(Play)** All cards in both player's hands with 50 or more Base Power lose -30 Power this turn.

## Did You Know?

The deeper you go in the ocean, the stranger its inhabitants look. Forget aliens in outer space – just look at the deep-sea **Scale Worm**, a short, flatworm covered in delicate scales called elytra which can be shed and regenerated in many species.

Talking of which, almost 900 species are currently recognised as belonging to the scale worm or ‘Polynoidae’ family – that makes for a lot of washing up after Christmas. In the world of scale worms, karma is a very real concept. Some species of scale worm are bioluminescent, and in a final act of revenge, they leave glowing traces around the mouths of a predator, making them more likely to be attacked in turn.

CRAFTING CLUE BELOW!

- Cool as the Ocean
Sedlec Ossuary

## Ability

### Ability

**A Bone to Pick****(Play)** Your Skeleton card in hand gains +58 Power this turn. **(Return)** Your opponent's Sue Black's In The Bones cards, wherever they are, cost +1 Energy until played.

## Did You Know?

Hey kids, wanna see a church made from skeletons? Drive about an hour east of Prague and follow the signs for the Czech Republic’s **Sedlec Ossuary**, aptly nicknamed the Bone Church.

The centuries-old Roman chapel is located beneath the Cemetery Church of All Saints and houses the remains of over 40,000 people. It all started out as part of a Cistercian monastery in 1142 – but then, in 1278, a local abbot brought back a handful of soil from Golgotha, Jerusalem – the site of Jesus’ crucifixion.

Suddenly, Sedlec’s cemetery was \*the\* place to be buried. But with the Black Death epidemics of the 14th century and the Hussite Wars, the cemetery was full. So, an ossuary was constructed to hold the excess bodies in the basement.
Supersoldier

## Ability

### Ability

**System Shock****(Draw)** If your deck has 3 or more Brilliant Human Body cards and 3 or more Futurology cards, your Science cards, wherever they are, gain +16 Power until played.

## Did You Know?

When Barack Obama announced that the Pentagon was trying to build Iron Man, people laughed. And, admittedly, the initiative was a failure. However, as technology has advanced, the possibility of a **Supersoldier** is getting closer, and much more outlandish.

Instead of building an exo-skeleton, the Pentagon is now exploring the idea of super soldiers with synthetic blood. It sounds like a Stan Lee fever dream, but the technology would effectively give soldiers trillions of miniature air tanks inside their body, allowing them to spend hours underwater.

Meanwhile, researchers at MIT are looking at ways to augment the human ankle to run all day, and DARPA is exploring how to upgrade humans so we only sleep with half of our brains at once. Anyone feel like this is a bad idea?
Snapping Shrimp

## Ability

### Ability

**Snap!****(Play)** Your Alligator Snapping Turtle card in hand gains +65 Power this turn.

## Did You Know?

You know how Pokemon have abilities that sound they're manipulating the elements around them? Moves like Rock Slide, Fire Blast, Vine Whip? Well, the **Snapping Shrimp** has a real-life Pokemon move - Bubble Bullet.

The **Snapping Shrimp** has one giant pincer called the snapper. The snapper can pinch with such immense force, that it actually launches bubbles at 105 feet per second - enough to knock out or even kill a victim!

Because of the speed at which the water was compressed to make the bubble, it's really hot in there. In the split-second that the bubble bursts, it generates nearly 8 THOUSAND degrees Fahrenheit of heat and makes a sound of more than 210 decibels - hotter than the sun, and louder than an actual gun!
River Kwai

## Ability

### Ability

**Building Bridges****(Play)** Your Raging Rivers and Super Structures cards, wherever they are, gain +22 Power this round.

## Did You Know?

The **River Kwai** (more correctly ‘Khwae Noi’) is a river in western Thailand, perhaps best known from the Pierre Boulle novel and David Lean film *The Bridge on the River Kwai*. It begins at the confluence of Ranti, Songkalia and Bikhli Rivers, and merges with the Khwae Yai River at Kanchanaburi, a town located 180 kilometres west of Bangkok.

During the Japanese occupation of Thailand in World War II, Allied prisoners of war were ordered to build a railway between Thailand and Burma so they could supply their army without the dangers of sending supplies by sea. Over 9,000 British, Dutch, Australian and American soldiers died building the bridge that crosses the Khwae Noi, which became known as the “railway of death”.
Roller Skating

## Ability

### Ability

**Roller Derby****(Play)** If played in the left or right slot, the card opposite this loses -20 Power this turn.

## Did You Know?

Whoever thought it would be a great idea to put wheels on shoes, we salute you. But perhaps you should have practised before debuting your invention at a masquerade ball. Yes, Joseph Merlin, we’re looking at you: your roller skates are revolutionary for the 1700s, but smashing into a wall-length mirror doesn’t make for a graceful entrance.

Merlin’s skates featured a single line of metal wheels, making them inline skates rather than quads. A few hundred years later, two brothers discovered an old model of inline skate in a sports shop, and thought the design would be perfect for off-season hockey training. They improved the design and manufactured the first ever Rollerblades. Yup, Rollerblade is just the name of the brand - the correct term for “**Rollerblading**” is “inline skating.”
Snowflake Moray

## Ability

### Ability

**Let it Snow!****(Play)** Your Snow Moon card, wherever it is, gains +29 Power permanently.

## Did You Know?

So-named for its white colouring and snowflake-like markings (and not because it’s easily offended), the **Snowflake Moray Eel** grows to an average length of 2 feet. If you’re planning on getting one for a saltwater aquarium, it’s worth keeping in mind that the snowflake eel is a master escape artist.

While most fish rely on water to feed in the wild, using suction to capture prey, the Snowflake Eel has an Ace up its sleeve - or rather, an extra set of jaws in their throats. As a result, they can grab and swallow prey on land without water. Being a nocturnal predator, the wild snowflake moray eel does its biddings at night, ambushing fish and crustaceans as they sleep.
Solenodon

## Ability

### Ability

**Shrewd Operator****(Start)** A random Venomous Creatures card in your hand gains +16 Power until played.

## Did You Know?

There’s more to the **Solenodon** that meets the eye. Although it looks like a small, defenceless shrew, the Solenodon is one of only a few venomous mammals and is capable of actually injecting poison like a snake through its lower incisors that have special grooves from which the venom flows.

The name “solenodon” actually derives from the Greek for “grooved tooth”, but its teeth aren’t even the most fascinating thing about it. At the base of this creature’s elongated snout is a ball and socket joint, similar to a human shoulder joint. This allows the solenodon to root around in the ground and sniff out insects, worms and other invertebrates.

Millions of years ago, venomous mammals were fairly common. Sadly, both species of solenodon are now highly endangered.

'Hispaniolan solenodon' by Seb az86556 (Source: Wikimedia Commons) is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 (original image resized, cropped and altered)
Sockeye Salmon

## Ability

### Ability

**Changing Colours****(Draw)** If you are winning the round, your Life on Land cards in hand gain +30 Power until played. If you are losing, give it to your Arts & Culture cards, and if you are tied, give it to your Science cards.

## Did You Know?

One of the smaller species of Pacific salmon, the **Sockeye Salmon** knows how to dress for the occasion. When they start their life in the ocean, these fish wear their best blue-tinged silver scales, but when they head upriver to their spawning grounds, they change into a striking red number and their heads turn a rather fetching green. When fully grown, Sockeye weigh around 5kg.

Why ‘sockeye’? It’s a bad approximation of ‘suk-kegh’, which in Coast Salish (yes, that’s a language – in case you’re as ignorant as I am) means… ‘red fish’.
Shuvuuia

## Ability

### Ability

**Mouth Off****(Return)** If you lost the turn, two of your opponent's random cards in hand **Burn**s (30) for 3 turns.

## Did You Know?

Is it a bird? Is it a lizard? No, it’s the **Shuvuuia**, a bird-like dinosaur from back in the day (way, way back in the day) that was around the same size as a chicken. Recently, scientists discovered that this species of theropod dinosaur had special sensory adaptations that allowed it to hunt in the dark like modern-day barn owls do.

As well as extraordinary hearing, the eyes of the Shuvuuia have some of the largest pupils yet measured in birds or dinosaurs, suggesting their night vision was next level. It may have been an efficient hunter, but the Shuvuuia was one odd looking creature. Below its bird-like head, the tiny dinosaur had stocky arms with a single claw on each hand and long roadrunner-like legs.

Viktor Radermaker
Songyue Pagoda

## Did You Know?

The Songyue Pagoda is the only remnant of the Songyue Temple, which originally was a leisure palace for Emperors Xuanwu and Xiaoming. The original name was Xianjü Temple which literally meant "Leisure Residence Temple".

The pagoda represents a meshing of Chinese and Indian architecture. The size of each level of the pagoda decreases as it gets higher, as seen in Indian Buddhist buildings, and each tier is dodecagonal, which comes from the Chinese style.

(Dodecagonal means 12-sided, by the way. Impress you friends!)
Siamotyrannus

## Ability

### Ability

**Tyrant****(Return)** A random Carnivores card in your hand gains +50 Power until played.

## Did You Know?

Dogs, cats, horses - they’re all inferior pets compared to the **Siamotyrannus**. A fierce carnivore that could reach lengths similar to a London bus, the Siamotyrannus wouldn’t require trips to the vets, because it would (probably) eat the vet. And that’s understandable for a gigantic hungry lizard from the Early Cretacious period.

With a name that means “Siamese tyrant”, this beast was originally thought to be a tyrannosauroid - however, as it lacks some of the fundamental features of a tyrannosaur, its position in the group is not clear. Still, it does have those trademark tiny tyrannosaurus arms. Some analyses have categorised the Siamotyrannus as a primitive carnosaur, others say it’s an allosaurid or a sinraptorid. In short, this ancient theropod is just a big question mark with sharp teeth.
South Pole Telescope

## Ability

### Ability

**Secrets of the Big Bang****(Play)** Your The Big Bang card, wherever it is, gains +80 Power until played.

## Did You Know?

Bad news: we can’t travel back in time just yet. Good news: we have built a device that can allow us to look at light that shone moments after the Big Bang, called the cosmic microwave background. Not to be confused with the mess in your microwave oven, the cosmic microwave background can only be observed with a camera that is sensitive enough to capture it.

Enter the **South Pole Telescope**. Built at the most southern point of our planet with an insanely sensitive camera, the 10m tall telescope will hopefully shed light on dark energy and tell us more about the physics of the Big Bang. Okay, so it’s not the Delorean, but it’s still pretty impressive.

'The South Pole Telescope in November of 2009' by Amble (Source: Wikimedia Commons) is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 (original image resized, cropped and altered)
Siberian Weasel

## Ability

### Ability

**Stretched Out****(Play)** If played next to any Going Underground card, your cards adjacent to this gain +26 Power this turn.

## Did You Know?

Meet the **Siberian Weasel**, Shanghai’s urban rat catcher. A master in its craft, the creature is known colloquially in China as huang shu lang, literally translating as 'yellow rat wolf.’

While they’re useful for limiting rodent populations, their eyes are often bigger than their stomach. Apparently, they frequently break into poultry and pigeon pens, sometimes killing more than they can eat.

Although they pose no threat to humans, getting on the wrong side of a weasel is a bad idea. When caught in traps, Siberian Weasels emit piercing shrieks and let loose a horrendous smell that takes a month to wash away. Plus, in Chinese folklore, the Siberian weasel is a wandering spirit that can steal and replace people’s souls, so it's best to stay away just in case.