Game: Trump, Tricks, Game!

Thread: Finally. Got it on the table and we're already talking house rules.

Gnomekin — 2008-04-11T17:54:52+00:00

One of the side effects of collecting games is that you sometimes have games sit around for a while before they make it out onto the table. I had owned Trick Trump and Game for over a year before I finally got it out onto the table. Card games, not have the flash factor of board games, can sometimes be harder to get people to play. Lots of pieces and big boxes tend to draw the eye, what can I say.

The other night, I taught it to Abe and Greg and we got a couple of games in. Abe was already familiar with trick taking games but we needed to teach Greg the mechanics of trick taking games.

Trick, Trump, Game is a very simple trick taking game. There is no bidding and the trumps are randomly determined. The game lasts four rounds and each suite gets to be trump once. It does have one twist, though. The tricks you take form your hand in the next round. That does mean you can only win three or four tricks in the first three rounds, with the last round allowing you to win as many tricks as you can.

Our first game was really a learning game. Greg was still getting a feeling for how a trick taking game worked. The last round, which suddenly changes from allowing you to only take four (or three if Nate had been there) tricks to as many as you can, caught us all by surprise. I did win but some of that win was simply from being the guy who already knew the rules.

Abe suggested we add one house rule. The scoring for the last round is normally one point for the wolves, two points for the moose, three points for the boars and our points for the bears. That’s all very thematic but also a bit arbitrary. Abe’s house rule was to have the suites score in reverse trump order. The suite that was trump in the last round would be worth one point per card while the suite that was trump in the first round would be worth four points a card.

Abe and Greg had a better feel for the game the second time around and I took a pounding for the first three rounds. I went into the last round thirty points behind them. However, I managed, through having cornered the high moose cards (which were not trump, by the way), to make a heavy surge.

When the smoke cleared, we were at a three-way tie with every last one of us at 130 points. We all also agreed that Trick, Trump, Game is a pretty decent little game. It will make back out on the table sometime. The fact that it fits in my pocket only increases the odds of that happening.

There are better trick taking games out there. There are, beyond any shadow of a doubt, DEEPER trick taking games out there. However, what Trick, Trump, Game succeeds at is being a very light, very accessible trick taking game that has just enough twist and flavor to still be interesting for experienced card players.

Bridge, which makes my brain hurt, is a five course meal. Euchre is a cheeseburger with fries. In comparison, Trick, Trump, Game is really just a candy bar. It does pretty good at being a candy bar, though.

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offwater — 2007-12-10T05:16:30+00:00

box

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ArtEmiSa64 — 2007-04-23T02:27:40+00:00

English Box Back

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ArtEmiSa64 — 2007-04-23T02:27:06+00:00

English Box Cover

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ArtEmiSa64 — 2007-04-23T02:22:49+00:00

Trump Cards Front

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ArtEmiSa64 — 2007-04-23T02:22:16+00:00

Animal Cards - Wolf

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ArtEmiSa64 — 2007-04-23T02:21:54+00:00

Animal Cards - Wild Boar

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ArtEmiSa64 — 2007-04-23T02:21:35+00:00

Animal Cards - Mouflon

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ArtEmiSa64 — 2007-04-23T02:21:16+00:00

Animal Cards - Bear

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ArtEmiSa64 — 2007-04-23T02:20:46+00:00

Trump Cards Back

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ArtEmiSa64 — 2007-04-23T02:20:11+00:00

Animal Cards Back

Thread: Re: Question to Trick taking

thatmarkguy — 2007-04-05T18:02:35+00:00

In most trick-taking games, TTG! included, he has to follow suit if able; if he has at least one Brown card, he is not allowed to play a non-Brown card. Failure to do so is known as "reneging", and it's generally viewed as either incompetence of cheating - it's not following the rules.

Thread: Re: Question to Trick taking

chessduffer — 2007-04-05T17:39:10+00:00

Another question:

Can someone play a trump card even if they have the same color as the lead card. For example: Green is Trump.

1st player plays a Brown Card
2nd player plays a Brown Card
3rd player has a brown card,but instead plays a green card.

Is it legal for 3rd player, or does he have to play his brown card?

Thread: Re: Question to Trick taking

chessduffer — 2006-07-10T03:29:22+00:00

Thank You,
This did make the most sense to us, but wasn't 100% sure. I'm glad we've been playing it right.

Thread: Re: Question to Trick taking

Gomez — 2006-07-10T03:22:17+00:00

The winner is the player of the highest trump, but if no trumps are played then the player of the highest of the suit lead.

In your example, the red 7 - the blue 10 loses.

Thread: Question to Trick taking

chessduffer — 2006-07-07T06:45:46+00:00

I'm kinda new to the whole trick taking games but had a question on a rule I'm not sure I understand. In this game highest card wins unless it's trumped, but not clear on one thing. Let me explain with example.
Let's say the trump for a round is Green and the following Scenario happens.

First Player plays the Trick with a 5 Red, The second Player following suit plays a 7 Red, The 3rd player does not have a Red and plays a
Blue 10.

My question is this. Does the Second Player win with the 7 red because he/she followed suit or does the 3rd player win by playing largest number eventhough it's not following suit nor is it a trump card.

Thanks
Jonas Fowler

Thread: Re: Review & possible strategies

Crockerdile — 2006-05-02T04:27:34+00:00

You are right, Dana. I guess my partners and I have invented the first Trumo, Tricks, Game variant. It was just as fun though.

Thread: Re: Review & possible strategies

themore5@earthlink — 2006-05-01T23:08:00+00:00

Thanks for the review. I also enjoy TTG, and after a half dozen plays, a winning strategy has yet to become apparent to me. I've seen runaway leaders ALMOST caught at the end, and I've seen people take the majority of tricks at the end and clean up. Good fun.

One thing though. I believe all the trump cards are placed face up at the beginning, so that you can see which color will be trump throughout. On P.4 of the rules it says:

Note: The players can see the trump colors of the next turns. Therefore they may try to collect trump cards for them.

Thread: Review & possible strategies

Crockerdile — 2006-04-30T14:10:48+00:00

Tom Vassel's review covers the rules perfectly. I would like to add to the strategies and mechanics, and subtle choices that make this simple game a winner.

The four suits each have quasi sub-sets. Card values 1 through 4 are essential for laying off (not taking a trick), which a player will find that he needs to do perhaps even more often than actually taking a trick. Cards 10 through 12 are the cards that almost guarantee you'll take a trick (assuming no trump is played). Cards 5 through 9 are the cards that have the footprints on them and are the cards used for scoring in the first three rounds. Players have a tendancy to hang on to them for too long, so the last couple of tricks taken tend to have a lot of points in them. This holds true for the first two hands (rounds).
Although the third hand (round) is scored exactly as the first two, another factor comes into play. Once trump is revealed for the third round, players immediately know what trump will be for the, yet to follow, fourth round. Ideally you would like to make a hand containing a lot of the 4th round trump. It's not easy, because everyone else could be trying the same thing. Or in the third round a cagey player could just keep going for the footprint cards and build up perhaps an insurmountable lead.

The mechanics of this game are as simple as any trick taking game in existance, but the decisions are as complex as any game that is 3,4,or 5 times the price of this little package. I believe that both gamers and non gamers will get plenty of satisfaction form "Trump, Tricks, Game".

Thread: Re: Optional rules?

matador — 2006-01-16T14:11:20+00:00

Hi,

One of my friend said same thing.
But I don't think so.

Just let's play. I enjoyed every time with option rules.
Very clever trick-taking-game, I think.
I like it!

Thread: Scoring Variant

qrux — 2005-10-21T00:10:56+00:00

We tried the following scoring variant that worked very well. (This is not to suggest that the scoring as described in the rules has any problems.) All of the pre-scoring rules are the same.

When scoring, multiply the number of paws in a given color by the number of cards taken in that color. For example: a player has 3 paws in blue and has taken 5 blue cards; his score would be 15 for blue. He would then total the scores for the other colors he has collected.

We found that different strategies are required. It makes for an interesting experience and seems a bit easier to introduce the game to new players who are familiar with trick-taking games.

Note: scores were substantially higher than in the standard game.

Thread: Optional rules?

lfisher — 2005-10-11T21:05:55+00:00

Have people tried the optional rules? They seem a little kludgy or confusing. Do people find that they add much to the game?

Thread: A couple nice twists, but won't break into the list of elite trick taking games

edroz — 2005-09-14T20:08:34+00:00

Trump, Tricks, Game! is a trick taking card game from Phalanx games and is being distributed in the U.S. by Mayfair Games. Every year new trick taking games are released by game companies. After all of these years, I'm still amazed that designers can still find new things to do with a deck of cards and the basic trick taking mechanism. We play a lot of card games during lunch at work and are pretty selective in giving a thumbs up to a new one. However, we are always looking for new games to add to the rotation so I wanted to see if this one could break into the list of regulars.

Components:
* 52 playing cards
o 48 animal cards
o 4 trump cards
* Rules manual

Trump, Tricks, Game! is played with a fairly standard deck of cards, although slightly customized for the game. There are four suits of 13 cards. Each suit has a set of cards numbered 1 to 12 and a special "trump" card. The middle cards (5 through 9) of each suit have animal footprints on the side which will come into play for scoring. The trump cards are removed from the deck and used to control the trump suit for each hand. The remaining 48 cards make up the play deck. The theme for this game is hunting animals so each suit in the deck represents a different animal. Red - Bears, Green - Boars, Blue - Wolves and Yellow - Mouflons.

The cards are very colorful and have a linen finish and should hold up to regular use fairly well. The cards pass my basic usability test for cards in that they have the numbers in each corner and the numbers are rotated 180 degrees on either end of the card. You can therefore hold the cards fanned in either direction and you do not have to rotate the cards to see the number correctly. (I hate cards that must be held in one direction to see the number correctly.) Unfortunately, even though the cards have nice big animal pictures in the middle of the card, there are no suit symbols in the corners. This may cause a problem for some color blind people who rely more on symbols than color.

Game play:
The set up is fairly easy; the main deck is shuffled and 12 cards are dealt to each player. (If playing with 3 players you first remove three cards from each suit.) The four trump cards are shuffled separately and laid out face up so the players can see the order. The game is played over four hands and each suit will be trump once. The four trump cards control the order of the trump suits so having the cards face up allows the players to see the order of trump suits over the game.

The basic card play is fairly standard for a trick taking game. Players must follow the lead card and play within suit if possible. If they are void in the lead suit they may throw off any card. The highest trump card played will win the trick, if no trump is played, then the highest card in the lead suit wins. Pretty standard stuff. Here's where this game's twists come into play. First off, for the first three hands of the game, each player may only win three tricks (four with three players). Once a player takes three tricks, the cards he plays are no-ops and do not count for taking tricks. He must follow the regular rules for following suit and when he leads his card does not set the lead suit. Why the limit? The cards you take will become your hand for the next round. The cards are not shuffled and dealt out again. So, during the hand you are trying to balance getting scoring cards and getting good cards for the next hand. Hence, knowing the order of the trump suit comes into play as you watch what you take for the upcoming hand.

Scoring in the game is another one of the twists, the first three hands are scored differently then the fourth and final hand. After the first three hands, you score points based on number of footprints you take (remember, the 5 - 9 cards). Your score is the number of footprints times the number of different footprints you collect. So this drives a desire to take tricks with footprints in different suits. Since the early tricks tend to be single suited, we found that we were all trying to delay taking tricks to get a mix of suits, hopefully with footprints, because just getting a single footprint in a third or fourth suit would have a great deal of impact to your score.

The scoring for the final hand is different than the first three. After the last hand the players score based on the number of cards they take, with each suit having a different value. Red cards are worth 4, green 3, yellow 2 and blue 1. So in the third hand of the game, you really start watching what cards you have for the last hand, because for that hand you now want a lot of trump and high cards.

Comments:
The game sounds like it has many interesting facets, but so far in play it has not lived up to its potential for our group. People quickly learned to try to avoid early tricks unless there are footprints in the trick. However, people also learn to hold on to the footprint cards unless they are forced to play a card to follow suit or they will take the trick. Therefore in the early tricks we tended to play low cards hoping to force the others to take a (hopefully) worthless trick.

You really must watch that you try to setup a balanced hand for the next round, especially with four players. If you are forced to take two tricks of a single suit you can easily get stuck with 7 or 8 cards of the same suit for the next hand. This usually means you will score only a few points in this round due to the scoring multiplier and then have a poor selection of cards in the next round. About the only time you want many cards of a single suit is getting a lot of trump for the fourth hand.

We did find that the three player game gave the players more control in that you can take four tricks instead of three. This allowed you a better chance to get a mix of cards for the next hand.

Trump, Tricks, Game! is also a card counter/tracker's dream game. After the first hand, it is possible to know exactly what each player has. I know not many people can track that amount of information, but I know that there are some that can. If not each card, I'm sure there are many that will be able to track the number of each suit each person has. (There is at least person in our group who can track this information.) People who can track this information will have a big advantage over the others. The limit on the number of tricks you can take stresses basic card counting for everyone. You do not want to make a mistake and lead a suit that no one else has if you can help it. You can easily let everyone throw off non-scoring cards on your lead and stick you with a worthless trick.

Conclusion:
As I mentioned at the start, we play a lot of card games and need a game that can present a new challenge for it to see long term play. We found Trump, Tricks, Game! to be a decent trick taking game with a couple of nice new twists. However, it was too light for our group. I can see this game being good for introducing players of traditional card games to Euro games or for a more relaxed and less taxing game that plays in 30 minutes or less. This one just doesn't provide enough control or challenging play for us to play regularly but may be pulled out when we need a quick, 30-minute filler, especially with three people.

Side note:
For comparison, our current game of choice is Tichu for four players. Other new four player games we have enjoyed lately include Control Nut and Victory & Honor. When we only have three players we enjoy playing Flaschenteufel, Sticheln and Schnäppchen Jagd.

Thread: [Review] Trump, Tricks, Game!

TomVasel — 2005-09-07T14:09:11+00:00

When I first received Trump, Tricks, Game! (TTG) (Phalanx and Mayfair Games, 2005 - Gunter Burkhardt), I must admit that I was surprised. Phalanx isn't known for making trick-taking card games, as they produce many historically-minded board games. And the name of the game sounded a bit wacky, so I wasn't sure what to expect. A cursory reading of the rules didn't allay my fears; TTG sounded like a "lite" version of Control Nut, which I already consider a light game.

But after my first game, I was hooked. The idea of TTG, the mechanic whereby the cards players win are used in their next hand, works REALLY well. The game is fairly light and much of the overall strategy becomes obvious soon on. Yet for some reason, the game is a lot of fun to play. I think much of that is because gameplay is very simple, yet offers the same satisfaction as other card games in the genre, such as Rook or Hearts. All those I've played the game with have enjoyed the game, especially those who are fans of trick-taking games.

The deck of cards is made up of four suits (green wild boar, red bear, brown mouflon, and blue wolf), each numbered one through twelve. The five through nine cards of each suit have one to three footprints on them. A deck of four trick cards are shuffled and placed upright on the table, to show the trump color of four rounds of the game. The dealer shuffles the deck and deals it out completely to the players. The first round then begins.

Whoever has the brown ten goes first and plays a card. Each player follows standard trick-taking rules, which means they must play a card of the same suit of the "led" card. If a player doesn't have the color of the led card, then they may play any card they wish. After all players have played a card, the highest card in the suit led wins the trick. If a card of the trump suit has been played, then the highest trump card wins the trick. Each player may only win three tricks (4 players) or four (3 players). Once a player has won their three tricks, every card they play does not count in future tricks. They still follow suit, etc., but the card they lead does not have to be followed, and they take no more cards.

Once all the cards have been played, each player examines the cards in the tricks that they've won. They multiply the total number of footprints they've taken by the number of different footprints (suits) to get their total for that round. The next round then begins, but players use the twelve cards they won in the last round. The first three rounds progress the same way, with the only difference being in the color of the trump suit. The fourth round is different. For one thing, players can win as many tricks as possible. Furthermore, footprints do not count for scoring, but rather players receive victory points for each card they take: (Wolf - 1, Mouflon - 2, Wild Boar - 3, and Bear - 4). Points are totaled for the four rounds, and the player with the most points is the winner!

Some comments on the game…

1.) Components: The cards in the game are of good quality, they've gone through heavy playing and have survived it well (white borders help.) The artwork on the cards is pretty nice, and the colors are very vividly different, so it's easy to tell at a glance which suit is which. The footprints are printed on the sides of the cards, and while unobtrusive, it's easy to see which cards are worth points. The deck fits into a small box with a cardboard insert. The whole package is nice; I just didn't like the corny name.

2.) Rules: The eight paged small rulebook is very nice, easily explaining the game, even if you've never played a trick-taking game before. I was able to teach the game to new players fairly easy, and trick-taking experts understood it as soon as the words were coming out of my mouth. The only odd thing is that in the first few rounds, players can only take three tricks, which is a little offsetting for seasoned Hearts players, etc.

3.) Winning Tricks: I really love the fact that a player must play with the cards they've won. It adds an extra meaning to each trick. Players must think about
- the points in the trick they win
- how many points AREN'T in the trick
- the color of the trump suit next round
- how many tricks they've already taken
- how many colors are in the trick they win
This makes for a very enjoyable game, as the decisions are not set in stone; and players play a small game of "chicken", trying to goad each other into taking tricks.

4.) Points: If one person can hold out and not take any tricks in the beginning of each round, they might acquire heaps of points as they automatically take the last couple of tricks. This is because players tend to hoard their points, not willing to give points out quickly. I notice that this happens almost always in the first round with players, and one person's score quickly jumps. The other players then (belatedly) realize that this isn't the best way to play and dole the point cards out slightly faster, rather than stockpiling them.

5.) Last Round: The last round really changes things, and the game becomes a little more normal at that point, as players seek to get as many tricks as they possibly can, preferably with bear cards. This makes the THIRD round the most important in the game, as players must balance out their point taking with taking high cards - especially that of the trump color of the fourth round. I've seen players concentrate solely on this and win the game - albeit it's not an extremely easy task.

6.) Fun Factor: TTG is a fairly fast game, playing in about half an hour. That's half an hour of good tactical trick-taking, and I really enjoyed the games I've played. Some might have a problem with the luck in the game (there is a decent amount in players' initial hands), but I had a fun time with it. I enjoyed the part as players strove actively NOT to take tricks, but to wait until one with more points came along. But another big factor for my enjoyment was the sheer simplicity of the game - I didn't have to explain anything. The only quibble I had against the game was that the point values in the fourth round are not intuitive - players simply have to remember that the bear cards are worth four points, etc.

If you like trick-taking games, I highly recommend this one. It may not be as deep as others in the genre, but it's a solid, strategic offering. Despite the goofy name, it has provided me with several fun game sessions, and I suspect several more. It's one of the best card games I've played in 2005, and that's an impressive feat. I've played other enjoyable trick-taking games this year, such as Control Nut, but Trump, Tricks, Game! Is the choice for me.

Tom Vasel
"Real men play board games.
www.tomvasel.com

Thread: Re: Trump, Tricks, Game! first look

themore5@earthlink — 2005-08-26T01:32:34+00:00

Ed,

Thanks for the well-written review. I love good trick taking games, and had high hopes for this one, since it has some new twists. I have so many of them though, that in order to add another to my collection, it really has to stand out.

Thread: Trump, Tricks, Game! first look

edroz — 2005-08-25T16:04:34+00:00

We split into three tables with Antiquity starting in one room and Thingamajig in another. I got Doug, John and Mark to agree to try out Trump, Tricks, Game! , a new trick taking game from Phalanx games being distributed by Mayfair. Yet another trick taking game with a twist. We play a lot of card games during lunch at work so I wanted to see if this could break into the rotation. I had actually played the previous week at work but with a different set of people and wanted to get other opinions.

The game is played with a fairly standard deck of cards. Four suits of 13 cards. Each suit has cards numbered 1 to 12 and a special “trump” card. The trump cards are removed from the deck and used to control the trump suit for each hand. The remaining 48 cards make up the play deck. The theme for this one is hunting animals so each suit is a different animal. The middle cards (5 through 9) have animal footprints on the side which will score you points after the first three hands of the game. The set up is fairly easy, shuffle the main desk and deal 12 cards to each player. The four trump cards are shuffled and laid out face up so the players can see the order. The game is played over four hands and each suit will be trump once. The four trump cards control the order of the trump suits so having the cards face up allows the players to see the order of trump suits over the game.

The card play is fairly standard for a trick taking game. Players must follow the lead card and play within suit if possible. If they are void in the lead suit they may throw off any card. The highest trump card played will win the trick, if no trump is played, then the highest card in the lead suit wins. Pretty standard stuff. Here’s where the twists come into play. First off, for the first three hands of the game, each player may only win 3 tricks. Once a player takes three tricks, the cards he plays are no-ops and do not count for taking tricks. He must follow the regular rules for following suit and when he leads his card does not set the lead suit. Why the limit? The cards you take will become your hand for the next round. The cards are not shuffled and dealt out again. So, you are trying to balance getting scoring cards and getting good cards for the next hand.

Speaking of scoring, the first three hands are scored different then the fourth and final hand. After the first three hands, you score points based on number of footprints you take (remember, the 5 – 9 cards). Your score is the number of footprints times the number of different footprints you collect. So this drives a desire to take tricks with footprints in different suits. Since the early tricks tend to be single suited, we found that we were all trying to delay taking tricks to get a mix of suits, hopefully with footprints. The scoring for the final hand is different. After that hand you score based on the number of cards you take with each suit having a different value. Red are worth 4, green 3, yellow 2 and blue 1. So in the third hand of the game, you also start watching what cards you have for the last hand, because for that hand you now want lots of trump.

The game sounds like it has many interesting facets, but so far in play it has not lived up to its potential. People quickly learn to try to avoid early tricks and they tend to hold on to the footprint cards. You really must watch that you try to setup a balanced hand for the next round, but if you are forced to take two tricks of a single suit you get easily get stuck with 7 or 8 cards of the same suit for the next hand. About the only time you want that is getting a lot of trump for the fourth hand. Also, getting a lot of one suit means your chances of getting a decent footprint score is reduced due to the multiplier. In our game, it was fairly even but broke down near the end. During the third round Doug had very low cards from the second hand and did not take any of the first nine trick and therefore just got all of the final 12 cards. Since no one wanted to (or could) play yellow (the trump for the last hand) early, Doug ended up collecting 9 or the 12 trump cards for the last hand, including most of the high ones. This made the last hand a landslide for Doug getting 9 of the 12 tricks. The rest of us each got 1 trick. This gave Doug a huge score for the last hand and went from last to first. I’m still holding off final judgement on this one as it may take a couple more plays to figure out the “correct” card play but I fear others may get turned off by the randomness and seemingly lack control.