Kingdom of Dreams — A new card game
Objective: Own the first King card to win!
Number of players: 2–4
Types of cards:
1. Coin cards (Ace, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 of all suits)
2. Trump cards (7 of all suit + one joker)
3. Attack cards (8, 9, 10 of all suits)
4. Jack cards (All 4 suit jack cards)
5. Queen cards (All 4 suit queen cards)
6. King card (One king card of any suit)
1. Basic idea:
The objective of the game is to be the first to own the only King card. You need to own some other cards before you can buy a King card though. You buy cards by picking coin cards which give you coin. Once you have enough coins, you can buy attack cards (which are the cheapest cards), through which you can attack. Attacking gives you the chance to win opponents’ attack cards, which you can sell for coins or keep them to add variety to your attack. Collecting enough coins gets you a Jack card, which is an enhanced attack card. You also need a Jack card to buy a Queen card. Once you possess a Jack card, you want to start gaining enough coins to buy a Queen card, which gives you an extra advantage (discussed later) that can help you when you attack. Once you have a Jack and Queen card, then by collecting enough coins you can have enough money to buy the one and only King card and the first one to do that wins!
2. Setup:
From a standard deck of 52 cards, make 4 piles.
1. Face cards pile (Jack, Queen). Keep them in separate piles, one for each type. Pick a King from any suit.
2. Attack cards pile (8, 9, 10 of all suits). Shuffle this pile and keep it ribbon spread (i.e. spread in one straight line) facing down.
3. Coin cards pile (Ace to 6 of all suits). Shuffle this pile and keep it facing down as one pile.
4. Trump cards pile (7 of all suits + one joker). Shuffle this pile and keep it facing down as one pile. Keep the empty card case on top of this pile to differentiate it.
3. Sequence of play:
Players have no cards initially. Start from the youngest player. A player has these options:
a) Pick a coin card from the coin pile.
b) Buy a card.
c) Attack any player using either an attack card or Jack card
d) Shuffle the trump pile.
e) See the trump pile (ONLY if you possess a Queen card.)
3a. Pick a coin card from the coin pile:
The coin cards (ace to 6 of all suits) are to hold coin. For example, if you have Ace, 2 and 3 (of any suit), you have 1 + 2 + 3 = 6 coins.
When you pick a card from the coin pile, it becomes your currency that you own. For example, if you pick up a 5 (of any suit), you own 5 coins. If you pick an ace, you own 1 coin.
The point of coin cards is to buy other cards (attack, jack, queen, king etc.)
3b. Buy/sell a card:
Each card is bought and sold with the same amount of coin, for example, if a card can be bought with 5 coins, then it will be sold with 5 coins.
Once a card is sold, it is put back onto its respective pile and the necessary coins given to the seller. You can also trade in cards to buy a more expensive card and mix it with coins, for example, you can pay 5 coins + an attack card (worth 5 coins, mentioned below) to buy a Jack card.
1. Attack card: An attack card can be bought/sold for 5 coins. You can buy multiple attack cards.
2. Jack card: A Jack card can be bought/sold for 10 coins. You need to own and show at least one attack card before you can buy a Jack card. You cannot buy another Jack card if you have one already, although you can own more than one by attacking and winning (more on next section).
3. Queen card: A Queen card can be bought for 20 coins. You cannot sell a Queen card. Also, you MUST have at least one attack card and one and only one Jack card when you buy a Queen card. You need to show them both when buying for proof. If you have extra Jack cards you have to sell them. You cannot buy another Queen card if you have one already.
4. King card: The King card can be bought for 40 coins. You MUST have and show at least one attack card, one and only one Jack card and one and only one Queen card when you buy the King card.
NOTE: You will not get any change back for the extra money you paid. For example, if you paid 6 coins to buy an attack card, you will not get the 1 coin back.
3c. Attack a player:
You can attack a player to gain his/her cards. You can use the card won to either sell them off, use them when trading for higher cards, or to stop the other player’s progress (for example if you won a player’s Jack card, they cannot buy a Queen card without buying a Jack card first).
You need to have either a Jack card or an attack card to attack another player, and similarly the player you are attacking needs to have the corresponding type of card as well. If either one doesn’t have the same type of card, then attack cannot happen. You can ask players if they own a specific type of card before attacking.
Ways to attack:
1. Attack with attack card: You can only attack the player next in turn.
2. Attack with Jack card: You can choose any player to attack.
Based on the card you choose and the player you want to attack, the following rules apply to determine who wins the fight:
1. Attack with attack card
You can only attack with an attack card if the player next in turn has an attack card. If they do not possess an attack card, you need to wait for them to acquire an attack card.
If you want to attack with an attack card (again, you can only attack the player next in turn through this), you show the card you want to attack with, and the victim (after seeing your card) chooses an attack card that he/she wants to counter with.
Two cases can arise:
1. Both attack cards belong to the same suit — in this case whoever has the higher number wins both the cards. (Example, if the attacker attacked with an 8 of clubs, and the victim shows either a 9 or 10 of clubs, the victim wins the hand and gets both attack cards)
2. If attack cards belong to different suits, then the number doesn’t matter. Only the suit matters, and the Trump pile rule comes into play. This will be discussed in the next section.
2. Attack with Jack card
If you attack with a Jack card (again, you can pick any player you want to attack with), then there is only 1 rule that applies, which is the Trump pile rule.
Trump pile rule:
When attacking through attack cards belonging to different suits or a Jack card, the trump pile rule comes into play. The trump pile is flipped, and based on the sequence of cards in the pile, the following cases arise:
Case 1: If the joker is at the top of the pile
If this is the case, then both players lose their cards (attack or jack) and both cards go into their respective common piles.
Case 2: Joker is not at the top of the pile
In this case, the priority of the suits depends on the order of the suits that exists in the pile after flipping. For example, if the 7 of Hearts is at the top, followed by clubs, diamonds and spades (joker can be anywhere, it does not matter in this case), then the priority becomes hearts > clubs > diamonds > spades.
The card with the higher priority wins. The trump pile is shuffled and put back.
Note: Always shuffle the trump pile once it has been revealed under this rule.
3d. Shuffle the trump pile:
At any point in time, a player can use his/her turn to shuffle the trump pile without looking. Since the trump pile is always shuffled after it is flipped during an attack, this will make sense once you read the next rule.
3e. See the trump pile (ONLY if you possess a Queen card):
If you possess a Queen card, it gives you an additional power to view the trump pile at any time during the game using a turn. Once the pile is viewed discretely, make sure to put it back in the same order.
It can be used to take advantage of knowing the priority order of the trump before attacking a player, since you will already know the outcome of the attack.