Gamehelpstonks

Overview

Have the most profitable stocks in your portfolio by game's end

Setup

Each player starts by picking two cards to add to their portfolio, one seen and one unseen, these will score the player points at round end

The player with the lowest seen card will start the round

Turn

This is a trick taking game

A player plays a starting card, and all subsequent players either

Play a card of the matching suit

If unable, they can play any card or a trump card, the trump card is the current company with the lowest market value

The player with the highest value card in the starting suit wins the trick, unless a trump was played in which case the highest trump card wins

If a player plays a card with the Stock Market symbol (a set of two arrows) then they also get to adjust the Stock Market as discussed below

The winner of the trick choose one of the played cards or the face-up top card flipped at the start of the trick, and adds it to their portfolio and commences the next trick

Stock Market

If a player plays a card with the Stock Market symbol (a set of two arrows) then they also get to adjust a stock in the market by one level up or down at the time of playing (This could change Trump)

Some cards have TWO Stock Market symbols, in which case both must be applied to the same company in the same direction, if this would push the company further than allowed (i.e. there is just one space left in that direction) the player has to move in the other direction or pick a different company

Whatever company just got changed will gain the black mark, a company with the black mark cannot be adjusted at the next adjustment, at which point the adjusted company will instead gain the black mark (i.e. there will always be one company which cannot be affected, but this will always be changing)

Speculation

One Speculation card can be played per round, so the first player to play one blocks that option for the remaining players

If the starting player plays the speculation, they also place a normal card face down, then card call any company to be the suit for the round

At end of round, the facedown card is revealed and scored as normal i.e. if it were the suit called (but doesn't have to be) or perhaps it were the trump suit, it has a chance at winning through highest suit. Any market exchange symbols are forfeited

If the facedown card was not from the lead suit, and no one played a suit or trump card, no one wins the trick, the cards are all discarded, and that player starts again

If a follower wishes to play the Speculation, they have to have NO Lead suit cards in hand, if this is the case they can play Speculation along with a faceup other card and make it the Lead suit e.g. a Red is lead, a player can play a yellow 13 with a Speculation and call it a red 13

A later player can counter a Follow Speculation by playing the real card, e.g. the real red 13 in the above example, which nullifies the Speculation and returns the card to its original form, a yellow 13 in the example

Regardless of how a Speculation card is used, it is discarded at the end of the current trick

Round End

The round ends when all players have 1 card left in hand, this card is discarded

Each player sorts their portfolio by company and, if they did not use their Speculation, adds it to the company with the lowest market value among the stocks they own

For each company, players multiply the quantity of cards by the market value of that company e.g. 5 cards obtained for a company with a market value of 3 results in 15 points

After scores are logged, a new round begins

Game End

The game ends after the number of rounds determined, 3 for short or 5 for long

The player with the most points, wins!

If tied, the player with the least cards in their stock portfolio on the last round wins. If still tied, the player with the least stocks wins.