Tuesday 30 April 2013

Gauner (aka Crooks) translated rules


Published with permission from Nürnberger-Spielkarten-Verlag.

Florian Racky

Crooks
Players: 2-4 people Age: from 8 years upward Duration of game: approx. 30 minutes

BASIC CONCEPT OF GAME:
In the middle of the table there are laid out three rows of cards with crooks.
If crooks of the same type (same colour) are lying next to each other within any row, this counts as a group. A single crook counts as a “group of one”.
There are seven different types of crook. The numeral on the lower edge of the card indicates how many cards of this type there are in total. The most frequently-occurring type is the “yellow crook” (24 cards), the least frequently-occurring is the “grey crook” (6 cards).

Group of 2   Group of 3  Group of 1   Group of 2   Group of 1  Group of 1

PREPARING THE GAME
The 105 “crook” cards are shuffled. The player immediately to the left of the dealer gets three cards; the player next left, moving clockwise, gets four cards; all the other players get five cards. Each player takes up his cards, which become his hand.
There are now laid face up in the middle of the table three rows of cards each consisting of 10 cards.
These cards are not sorted or further shuffled. They are merely laid down, face upward, in the sequence in which they happen to be drawn from the top of the pack.
The remaining cards are placed in a pile at the edge of the table, as a pile to be drawn on in the course of the game, the faces of whose constituent cards remain hidden.
Please Note: Enough space should be left at the edge of the table next to the pile of face-down cards for the “jail” area that will also arise there in the course of the game.

Space for “Jail” Area

Pile to be Drawn On in the Game

COURSE OF THE GAME
The player immediately to the left of the dealer begins and performs one after the other, and in the following sequence, three actions:

1.) Select a group (must be performed)
The player opts for any row, chosen freely by him, and selects from this row either the entire group lying on the extreme right end of this row or the entire group lying on its extreme left end, making these cards part of his hand.
Then, he must “put in jail” the group which lies, in the same row, immediately next to the group which he has just taken up into his hand.
He takes this complete group and lays them, faces up, at the edge of the table, at just a little distance from the pile of face-down cards that is to be drawn from during the game.

Taken up into the player’s hand   “Sent to jail”

Example: Sarah begins, and decides to take up into her hand the group lying at the extreme left end of the bottom row. That is to say, she takes up into her hand the two red crooks. Then, she takes the group which is lying immediately next to this group (the two purple crooks) and places these cards, face up, at the edge of the table next to the pile which is to be drawn on during the game.

2.) Lay a group face up on the table (can be performed, but doesn’t need to be)
The player can (but doesn’t have to!) take just one type of crook from the cards in his hand and lay some cards of this one type face upward on the table in front of him. Which type of crook he chooses, and how many cards of this type he lays down, is up to him (it can only be one, if he wishes). The cards should be laid down in such a way that one can recognize how many cards it is.

Example: Sarah lays down two green crooks, face up, on the table in front of her.

Important: Once one has crooks of a specific type lying on the table in front of one, one may not subsequently add further cards to this type. Each type may only be laid out on the table one single time in total. If you want to lay out cards of the same type as another player has already laid out cards of, then one must lay out at least one card more of this type than are currently lying in front of the other player. If you are able to do this, then the cards that are laid out at that point in front of the other player are removed and are placed, face down, off to the side on a pile of cards not currently in the game. (The other player concerned may, however, afterward lay out this type of card once again in the manner described.)

3.) Laying down a card face up (must be performed)
The player takes the uppermost card from the pile that is to be drawn from in the course of the game and lays it, face up, at the same extreme end of the row as he has just taken cards from, directly next to the cards that are lying there.  

Example: Sarah takes the uppermost card from the pile (a green crook) and lays it at the far left end of the bottom row, directly next to the yellow crooks that are already lying there.

Please Note: All players should join in seeing to it that the 3rd action here – that is to say, the uncovering and laying down of the card, is not forgotten and left unperformed!  If this is more convenient, this uncovering and laying down of a card from the pile can be performed, throughout the whole course of the game, by one and the same player.

Next player: And now it is the turn of the next player, moving clockwise, to carry out the three actions just described, one after the other in sequence. The game then continues to be played in this way, moving clockwise around the circle of players.


Procedure when the pile of cards to be drawn from during the game is exhausted: Should the pile of face-down cards to be drawn from be at any point in the game entirely used up, all the cards piled up on the pile of cards not currently part of the game should be shuffled and set down as a new face-down pile to be drawn from.

Empty rows and filling of rows: In the case where there remains, at some point in the course of the game, only one group in a specific row, or no group at all in said row, then the row in question should stay, provisionally, “empty”. Cards may no longer be taken from this row. The players must, from this point on, take crooks from another row. Only when all three rows have become “empty” in this way (that is to say, only when they consist either of just one group or of none) are all three rows immediately filled up again by drawing new cards from the drawing pile, so that there are once again 10 cards lying in each row. If there is still one group present in an “empty” row, this group is pushed entirely outside it before the row is filled up again.  

Not enough cards: In the very unlikely event that it proves impossible to form a drawing pile – that is to say, if there are no longer enough cards available to fill up all 3 empty rows or to uncover a card in the course of the 3rd action, the following procedure should be followed: Each player should give up a number of random cards from his hand such that the number of cards he still has in his hand amounts to no more than 12. The pile of cards created in this way should then be shuffled and set down on the edge of the table as the new drawing pile. If no sufficient drawing pile can be created even by this procedure, then each player must give up so many cards that his hand is reduced to 6 random cards.

JAIL FULL: 6-2 OR 2-6
 NOW FOR SCORING!

In the course of the game more and more crooks go to jail.
These crooks are always laid down, face up and separated by type, in the jail, so that it is always easily recognizable how many crooks of each type are present there.

The jail is full when either six different sorts of crook are represented there by two or more crooks respectively or two different sorts of crook are represented there by six or more crooks respectively.

Please Note: The player who already fills the jail simply by the performing of his 1st action may not then go on to perform actions 2 and 3. These are now simply dropped.

All the crooks who now find themselves in jail are now distributed colour by colour to the players (first the yellow crooks, then the orange, then the red etc. etc.). Points are only given for these crooks. The crooks that the players have laid out in front of themselves in the course of the game generate no points.

Lying in the jail are 6 types of crook represented by at least 2 crooks respectively: therefore proceed to scoring!

That player who, at the time of proceeding to scoring, has the yellow crooks lying in front of him receives all the yellow crooks from the jail. He should lay the yellow crooks that he has received from the jail out in front of him in a fan pattern.
The yellow crooks that he has lying in front of him at the time of proceeding to scoring are transferred immediately to the pile of cards not currently being used in the game.
In the same way deals can be made to swap colour for colour.

Please Note: In the case where there happen to be lying in the jail crooks of a type to which none of the cards that are lying in front of the players correspond, then these crooks are transferred directly and immediately to the not-in-play pile.

-         Each player adds up the number of all the crook cards that he has received from the jail and multiplies this number by the number of different types of crook that he has received from the jail. The result of this calculation is noted down on a piece of paper.
-         
yellow + red + green = 3 types
4+2+ 1=7 cards
7x3 =21 points

Example: Sarah has received from the jail four yellow crooks, two red crooks, and a green crook. For these she gets 21 points noted down (7 cards and 3 types, so: 7 x 3 = 21).

FURTHER COURSE OF GAME, AND THE PLAYERS
After the scoring, all the crooks that the players have received from the jail are transferred onto the not-in-play pile. There are no more cards lying in front of any player!
The jail is now likewise completely empty! The only cards which the players are allowed to keep are those which they actually have in their respective hands.

The game is now continued, quite normally, in the manner already described, beginning with the player sitting to the left of the player whose move had prompted the proceeding to the scoring. The game is then pursued in this way, moving around clockwise from player to player, until a second scoring takes place.

This second scoring, the subsequent further course of the game, and finally a third scoring, are all conducted in the manner already described in the paragraphs above.

The game ends after the third scoring. Whoever has, at this point, the most points in total is the winner.

You can purchase Gauner from Advent Games.


Sunday 14 April 2013

Kakerlaken Poker: Small Card Games that packed in lots of fun! part 2

Kakerlaken poker is one card game that cotinues to bug me why so few people outside of Europe had known  about it.

Kakerlaken poker is quintessentially a bluffing game or deduction game. It takes the best from poker, putting on the poker face whilst quetly duelling with your opponents challenging them to accept your "truth" claims about a card at the same time threatening them with the possibilities of being hit by the insects and thus declared "the loser" of the game. In the spirit of fun, there is no winner in this game but only one loser... everyone else cheers.

The game contains 8 beautifully drawn rat, spider, bat, cockroach, stink bug, fly, toad and scorpions. There are 8 cards of each creatures. They are shuffled and distributed to all players.

On a player's turn, he or she can palm off a card by putting the card face down and slide it to a player of his/her choice (the opponent) by stating a claim for example " this is a spider." The opponent can accept the card by saying "true" or "false", if it turns out that the opponent judges correctly, the player who wants to palm off the card would have to take the card and place it in his/her "hit" collection.  A player will start a new round whenever one takes a card. When a player has "four of a kind" of creature in his hit collection, a display area in front the player, this player has lost- the game is over. Ok... nothing new so far.

Hang on, here is the twist: Another option for the opponent is to refuse to take a stance on the card by passing the card to another player who has not seen the card before. Before that, the opponent can take a peek at the card before stating a claim - which could be the same or different from the previous claims. The hilarity of the inconsistencies of the claims is the charming element of the game. Add to it is the fear of being eliminated when one has collected a fair share of the same creature thus becoming a target of the other players' palming off exercise.

Each palm off is a truth and dare exercise, a dueling in disguise. There is no opportunity to be uninvolved in this game. You have to read others whilst others are reading you. another condition of losing is when a player has no card in his/her hand to start a round. A player who misjudges frequently will have to start a round by palming off cards, thus draining his/her hand size - a sure way of losing the game. So this is not your usual palming off your cards games.

 Every time I pull out this game, the atmosphere in the room is transformed. You hear laughter. Suddenly the game vanishes from the players' mind, the bluffing and truth and dare exercise take over. The focus is now on the players, you are looking at the other players, their every move. Now this is what a great party game is about - the players. The game merely facilitate the interactions. Need a ice breakers - you've got it.

Kakerlaken poker royal is the new edition of kakerlaken poker with more options of gameplay. You can get a copy at Advent Games

Meeple: This is a winner!
U: Pass... this is a loser.
Meeple's friend: Pass... we are the winner.
Meeple, U & Meeple's friend: True!

Small Card Games that packed in lots of fun!

Once a upon a time ago, in a Boardgames store far far away .....

I have encounters with many small card games that had since held me hostage to the hobby. In spite of the compactness (if there is such a word) of small card games, they packed in lots of fun. They are great to be introduced to non-gamers, who somehow find card games a familiar genre, less geeky, less threatening, great in many social occasions - its simple rules with lots of players interactions are its strengths... and I can go on and on. The recent Blockbuster hit in love letter is a testament of an overlooked genre that needs a breath of fresh air, or do they really?

It continues to baffle me that the fantastic and ingenious card games from Europe just fail to get US release.  Sadly to many parts of of the world which continue to look to US for their boardgaming staples would not get a taste of these exquisite card games. As to whether you share the same affinities with the US gaming scenes or you are a hardcore strategy eurogames-philes, we owe it to ourselves and our friends to check these games out... they are great gateway games and help to expand the hobbies. They create many more opportunities for all of us for gaming and making new friends.

Let me share with you my love of these card games. What's best to start with :
Hanabi - the 2012 smash hit in Europe that the world has gone unnoticed.

Hanabi in Japanese means fireworks. Designed by Antoine Bauza (of the 7 wonder's fame), Hanabi is a 2 to 5 players co-operative card game. The goal is for all the players is to work together to complete 5 perfect suite (in 5 colors) of fireworks in correct order. In each colors there are cards numbered from 1 to 5. The distribution of the cards in ranks are three 1s, two 2s, 3s, 4s, and one 5s. Players play cards onto the centre of the table "building up the fireworks" in ascending orders by colors. The fireworks will blow up if cards played are not in order or of a duplicate numbers.


Now that sounds easy except for a twist. The rule requires that all players are to hold their cards facing the other players. You an see all other players' cards but not your own. Hence the information giving and gathering process becomes the heart of the game and the most interesting exercise in verbal and non-verbal communications. Most of the players interactions that elicit laughter and sighs of disappointments as well as coincidental correct play of cards due to misreading of clues are certainly the highlights of the gameplay.

Depending the number of player, each player will hold 4 to 5 cards facing other players. In their turns they can do one of the three actions:

1) Play a card to the table to build up the fireworks. The card stays if it is played is in the correct order,  otherwise the fireworks blow up. Players only have 3 chances of blowing up in the entire game.
2) Give a clue to one other player - you may provide a clue in numbers or in colors by pointing to the cards of the other player that of in the same colors or  in the same numbers. Remove one of the eight blue tokens from the "well." Once the well is emptied, players cannot provide any clues until more blue tokens are refilled in the well.
3)Discard a card and add a blue token into the well.

Most people I have introduced to enjoy Hanabi for its interactions and the simple rules.  Furthermore co-operative game is great to players who are new to the hobby who need a little bit of hand holding in terms of the tactical move like the consideration of players order and task occupation distributions. Hanabi does not suffer from the dominant player syndrome that plagues many co-operative games, you do see certain chemistry amongst player in action depending on the group you are playing with. The last time I have played, new players want to try again right after the game is over because they will like to do better in the final score. The score is the total of the highest card of each color suite which is then given a range rating from mediocre to extraordinary to perfect score of 25.

A good sign of good game when player are allowed to make mistakes and yet knowing that they have the potentials of doing better the next time round.

There are 2 versions of Hanabi in the market: the French version released  by cocktail games and the Abacusspiele German edition.

You can get a copy of the Abacusspiele edition at Advent Games.

U: The theme is pasted on.
Meeple: Who cares if it is counting sheeps or shooting stars... do you enjoy the game?
U: If we can co-operatively cheat the game I might just like the game.
Meeple: Well, you did the right eye brow raising thingy... kinda...
U: Ok..ok we can do better next time can't we?
Meeple: Try me...

Tuesday 15 January 2013

Monday 24 December 2012

Merry Christmas!

Just to share this article with you all ...
A lovely note from Berlin. How the real meaning of Christmas transform the way we play ...
A note from Berlin

Thursday 20 December 2012

Head to Head! Goblins at War!

 
So you want to succeed your boss who will soon be retiring? You'll get your chance if you manage to kick everyone else's Robot's rear in the mechanical-robots-of-doom contest. Unfortunately, your colleagues are not going let you get ahead of them without some grease and mud stains on your face.

So you work up the courage to ask one of your so-called Goblin comrade to join you as partner in this contest. Two robots will go head to head. Each team will control a giant robot equipped with wimpy weapons pointing at different directions coz they could not make up their mind as to where they'd like to fire and then they ... fire. The last robot standing has its controllers declared the winners.


How do you play? 
In each round of three, each team builds a robot made up of weapon, armor and decoration tiles on their own construction yard based on the blueprint card that shows the shape of the Robot.

Each player receives 7 hidden agendas, 3 of those are discarded just before the battle, the remaining agendas could potentially score points for specific tiles that fall off their opponents robots (destructive agendas), or score points for tiles that remain on your robot at the end of the combat (defensive agendas),  or score points by accurately predict an outcome of the battle. The interesting part is that your partner might not be working for the same agendas as you, in fact he/she may very well works against you.

The construction begins with one partner in each team picks up and look at 5 tiles from the face-down common pile and swap with each other 2 of those tiles. As they are building the robots with tiles, the other partners pick up  tiles and swap. So the tiles selection and tiles placement actions continue alternately until all the empty spaces on the construction yard are filled up with tiles. After that, each player places 2 goblins in the cockpit. They represent the hit points of the robot.


Three tactics cards with various dice modifying abilities and special abilities are turned up before the combat begins. One player from each team will take the role of tactician by secretly choosing one of these tactics card. The other players become the Pilot who secretly determining the angle the robots rotate and the directions their weapon will face. Each teams gets to roll as many dice as their weapons pointing at the opponent's robot. Each dice roll represent a hit on the correspond rows indicated on the constructions yard. The battle lasts the maximum 4 turns. If both robots are still standing, the robot with the most tiles and goblins on board wins.

If your team won, you score 2 points for each of your goblins and 1 point for each of your partner's goblins. And everyone gets to score their hidden agendas. Yes, you'd heard right, everyone, including the losers.



Introducing U and Meeples Review:
Meeple is a family gamer who loves ... hmmm of all the games who would have thought- Carcassonne, and Ticket to ride. She prefers a lighter rule set and games that last around 30mins to an hour.

U is gamer who likes games with little more "depth", not necessarily heavier rules set. Games that he would break out once in a while to annoy others.

 
How do we feel?
Meeple: Now this is Galaxy Trucker on steroids. You are not struggling against some unknown elements but the robot right in front of you. You are trying to survive against their direct attacks yet at the same time trying to crush them. Yes, this is not a passive aggressive euros but full frontal confrontations. I find myself second guessing where my opponents' robot will turn, and to position our robot to gain the maximum hit on targets that will yield the most points for yours truly only. Even during the robot construction phase, I constantly watch what  the others are building. If they are so strong on the engines and the weapons front, I might consider betraying my mate by giving away the battle but getting away with points scored from my hidden agendas. 

 In sum, it's about managing the hidden mission cards along with watching your opponents robot as they are building, deducing their potential attacking facing, as well as the reaping the points from the destroyed and retained components. Lots of luck but I really like this game. It is fun, fun, fun!

U: I agree with most of Meeple's comments. However, the choices of how one should manipulate the robot is pretty obvious. You would want to have the most guns pointing at your opponent. Well, being a traitor will score you some points but not enough to compensate the points lost. The tiles drawn, the hidden agendas and the tactics cards are all random, not to mention the dice. I feel like there is very little control over what I can accomplish vis a vis my agendas. Having said that, as strange as it may sound, I do enjoy the ride; the immense satisfaction of knocking off those vital tiles that completely decimate the robot and seeing their expressions of ... (evil laughter trailing off)



Is it fun?
Meeple: We've answered that, haven't we? 

U: This is a light filler for me. Can we play Galaxy trucker now?


Meeple: Oh! Hang on! I've got something to add ... those who fear randomness and unable to cope with changing situations ... run for your lives! Avoid this at all cost. Your loss!

The day after heavy snowfall in Vancouver - pictures of Alien Adam enjoyng the snow coming up.

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