New Rule

Introduction: They say “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure.” In Quisquilian, you take this to heart, competing for prime pickings of that most uncommon yet everpresent of treasures… the trash. Players race to complete their collections by looting the cards they need and burying those sought by their opponents while sifting through an ever changing board of discarded cards.

Players: 3-8

Materials:

• One standard deck of playing cards. If more than four players are playing, use two decks shuffled together.
• One six-sided die.

Setting Up: Draw the first nine cards and place them face-up in a three-by-three grid in the center of the table: these are the starting trash cards. Deal six cards to each player, setting aside the remainder into a draw pile. Roll off to determine the first player, and play proceeds to the left.

How to Play: The objective is to construct a complete numerical set—Ace (low) through King—by collecting and playing runs, defined as three or more cards of the same suit in numerical order (ex: 2-3-4 of spades). Three cards are the minimum to play a new run (there is no maximum), but single cards may also be played on existing runs if they continue the sequence. A complete set is built by stringing together separate runs that link together from Ace to King, or by expanding on an already-played run until it is complete, or both, with one caveat: a complete set does not need to be a single suit. Players may play runs of different suits as long as the numbers fit together into the correct sequence. For example: a player with two spade runs, 2-3-4 and 9-10-J, may play 5-6-7-8 of any suit and link the two spade runs together into a sequence from 2 to Jack. Each new run must still agree on suit, however, and single cards played on existing runs must also agree on suit.

On their turn, players first add to the discard board in the following manner: they roll the die and discard cards from their hand equal to the number shown, placing each discarded card on top of one of the nine showing trash cards of their choice. Players may not place more than one discarded card on any existing trash card per turn.

Digging the Trash: Once the discard is complete, players may play runs by combining any number of relevant cards from their hand and/or from the discard board; played runs are laid out face-up in front of the player. If the player draws a trash card from the board to form a run, the revealed card beneath it becomes the new active trash card for the spot, immediately available to be used in a run. If no cards are left beneath a trash card, the spot remains empty until another player chooses to discard there. When the player chooses to stop or there are no more runs possible, they refill their hand to six cards from the draw pile and the turn ends. Players may pass their turns if they are unable or unwilling to form runs.

Clearing the Yard: If at any point the draw pile is exhausted and each player has passed in turn, the board is cleared in the following manner: the nine showing trash cards remain in place and all cards beneath them are reshuffled into a new draw pile. Players’ retain their hands and played runs, and resume play with the new draw pile.

Winning the Game: The first player to complete a run or sequence of runs from Ace to King is the winner.

Next: Designing “Quisquilian”

The third in my Grandiloquent Game Design series, it took a while to find a good word this week. There are many excellent choices, but some spark a game idea more readily than others, and after the mental toil I went through last week trying to make a game about good manners, I decided I could do with a more natural fit. Thus, our word of the week:

quisquilian - consisting of trash and rubbish.

Honed as my designs have been lately towards playing cards, I immediately thought of a game centered around the discard pile. Of course, the definition of a discard pile is cards that are no longer in play, and if the discard pile becomes a source of active play, then the distinction is purely semantic: it is, for all intents and purposes, not a discard pile any more. However, I felt that if the essential function of a discard pile was maintained (i.e. a place to hold cards dealt out of players’ hands), then it could function as such despite the fact that the cards there are no longer inactive; the appearance of a discard pile would suffice.

Treating the discard pile as active, then, naturally gave birth to a mechanic of collecting other players’ discarded cards. Many card games like Gin and Rummy have mechanics like this. In my case, I decided it would offer the players a bit more strategy if they had a field of discarded cards, rather than just a stack or a train. It allowed players some leeway to form the sets they sought, and to track other players’ goals and move to block them more effectively. Especially with four or more players, the turnover on a simple stack or train would be far to quick to allow for tactical play. With a board of nine the play surface still changes, but with much less volatility, allowing for a more ebb-and-flow play dynamic (I hope).

Finally, I reinterpreted the win condition from one of the melds allowed in Rummy into forming a full numeric sequence from multiple runs. I opened it up to be multi-suit because, with a long-term objective and each player’s progress exposed to the scrutiny of all others, it would be far too easy to block a particular player from getting cards of a certain suit, especially as they near completion and are waiting on particular numbers and cards that are likely to be scarce.

And so it is! After the success of Tower Siege thanks to the efforts of enthusiastic readers, I am curious to see how this game (also featuring a mutable play board and ebb-and-flow dynamics) turns out.

Tags: Game Design //