Gamehelpenemyanemone

Story

Look, this is a trick taking game featuring cards with numbers. There's not really a lot of theme here. But you've got to admit the name is pretty fun to say. Anyway, let's get to the game.

Components

60 creature cards (6 suits, ranked 1-10) and 9 Anemone cards

Setup (3-6 players)

Choose one suit per player. Put any remaining cards back in the box. Shuffle the deck together and deal 10 cards to each player. Set the 9 Anemone cards within reach. The player who is reading these rules is the start player.

(At 6p, remove the 1s and 10s from each suit and deal 8 to each player.)

Game Play

The start player plays one card face up in front of them. Every other player in clockwise order must play a card face up in front of themself in a suit that has not yet been played into the trick. If a player cannot play a suit that has not been played, they discard a card from their hand into their score pile. The highest card played wins the trick and takes all cards played into their score pile. The lowest card played takes an Anemone card, which can be added to a card in a future trick to increase its value by 1 (multiple Anemone cards may be added at once). If there is a tie for the highest or lowest value, the latter played breaks the tie.

At the end of the hand, once all cards have been played, players score one point per card taken. The 3s, 5s, and 8s of each suit are worth an extra point.

The player who has the lowest score at the end of the hand gains one +1 Anemone card. All Anemone cards carry over to the next hand. The Anemone cards are +1 on one side and +2 on the other. If you have a +1 and would take another, flip it instead. It now has to be played as a +2. In a 6 player game, the lowest takes a +2 and the second lowest takes a +1. If they ever run out and a player should take one, the player with the most Anemone cards must give that player one of theirs.

The player with the highest score starts the next round. Play 4 rounds and the highest score wins! In case of a tie, the player with more Anemones remaining wins.

2 Player Variant

Use 4 suits. Remove the 1s and 10s. Shuffle and deal 8 cards to each player and place the remaining cards in a central deck.

Players take turns playing one card each into the trick until 4 cards have been played. All other rules apply, with each card needing to be a different suit.

Both players draw 2 cards into their hands before playing the next trick, until the deck is empty. If there are no cards to draw, skip that step and continue playing out the rest of the hand.