Game: Who Stole Ed's Pants?

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Terry Egan — 2007-08-18T05:43:04+00:00

Who Stole Ed's Pants: Back of the first edition box.

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Terry Egan — 2007-08-18T05:41:31+00:00

The first edition of Who Stole Ed's Pants was home-published, far less slick and professional looking than the second edition. The components in the first edition, however, were on a par with or better than in the subsequent printings.

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hederj — 2007-05-18T06:13:27+00:00

3 Player Who Stole Ed's Pants at RTGamers Game Night

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iam_emperor — 2007-01-22T06:57:43+00:00

Evidence

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iam_emperor — 2007-01-22T06:57:16+00:00

Facts

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iam_emperor — 2007-01-22T06:56:32+00:00

Rank and Witness cards

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iam_emperor — 2007-01-22T06:56:09+00:00

Rank and Witness cards

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iam_emperor — 2007-01-22T06:55:46+00:00

Rank and Witness cards

Thread: Review: Who Stole Ed's Pants?: Is this crime worth solving?

Red Wine Pie — 2006-12-24T08:50:14+00:00

I was surprised there wasn't an actual review of this card game yet. The session reports and the description on the main page do a good job of telling you about the basics of the game. I've played 4 games and don't own it, so forgive any inaccuracies. What I hope I can do is tell you what I think is good about this game, and what is less good, and whether you should buy it...

The good: Who Stole Ed's Pants? comes in a neat sized box with good blurb and presentation on the outside. The slightly off-beat hyperbolic theme got my attention. It's nice after playing games of interstellar conquest and colonisation to play a game about a small crime which the victim doesn't even care about. If that gets your interest rather than making you think... why should I bother? then this is the game for you! Carrying on from this whimsical theme are the Evidence cards and Groups of Neighbours, which still raise a smile after a few games. The combinations of evidence, once they pile up on the players can be quite amusing if you get into the spirit of the thing. This amusing, non-fantasy theme may help Ed's Pants get more interest from non-gamers.

The cards are of good enough quality, and the pictures are amusing and easy to read. It's good to see the scoring stones being included in the game.

game example You get What evidence of "clown boots", "pirate's eyepatch" and "pirate's parrot" played on you. This usually gets a laugh from the incongruity of the outfit, and then when the What fact is changed to "a pirate was seen leaving the scene of the crime" then you have two pieces of evidence against you. As you try to change the Facts, or plant evidence on others, they will be trying to change it back to a "pirate" or "clown" fact to keep you as number one suspect.

Although your hand of cards is limited, you do have a few options, listed below in reverse order of ease.

You can change the Facts (if your witnesses are "reliable enough");
you can plant some Evidence on other people (if your witnesses are more reliable than theirs);
you can move the quality of the witnesses up or down to make your witnesses more reliable, and other people's less so (this probably happens the most);
or you can discard a card if all else fails.

You then pick up a new card to make up a hand. As the cards are in Who, When and What groups you have some control over the type of card you can pick up. You can end the round if ahead or to limit damage by running down the shortest deck. So there is some strategy under the kooky theme.

There is a good feeling of desparation as the deck runs out and you are trying wildly to incriminate someone or change the facts.

The Bad:Well, the theme may not be for you. All players do not start with an equal position, as the cards you draw, and the starting facts may be much more beneficial for someone else. Perhaps a Ra style fixed starting position for each player, or a random ending to the round would help this. Over multiple rounds and games things should even out, but you may play a game and feel you had no chance from the start.

Sometimes in a game it feels like you can't improve your hand round after round, and that you have no meaningful move. This is probably the biggest problem I have with the game, but there may be options to move the reliability of witnesses bit by bit. This is probably a way of saying that there is luck in this game and the "best player" may not always win every time.

Summary: So, do I recommend Ed's Pants? I can't see myself ever buying Ed's Pants myself, as one of the people I'd play it with already owns it. If I had to play a card game of an hour I would choose San Juan for a smaller number/ more gaming friends, and Bohnanza for a larger number/ more casual friends over this game. The game does succeed in spite of some of its mechanics. Ed's Pants is fun with the right people in the right mood, and is a well-packaged game at a fair price.

Thread: Playing with one witness card

howeman — 2006-08-02T02:00:04+00:00

Instead of having one witness for who when and where, play with just one that counts for all three. That way, you can either play evidence on someone or not, and you can change a fact or not. I came across this variant upon misreading the rules twice, and found that I like it much better than the real rules. Sure, you can get stuck with a bad character, but I feel that on the whole there is more opportunity to manage your character, dueling to stay a top the credibility rankings.

Thread: Re: Session Report

howeman — 2006-02-28T22:20:51+00:00

I've played the game a few times. When I play, I try to have at least one witness card in my hand that can help me, either by changing my witness, or by changing the rankings. It's most important to have the most credible witness, for if you do, no one can plant evidence on you. If I am the most credible witness, I plant as much evidence as I can on the other players. If enough evidence is planted, then regardless of the facts, they won't be able to avoid taking a few hits. Also when I play, I try not to change the facts away from me until near the end of the round, saving the facts that are good for me until it is harder to change them.

Thread: Session Report

Ocssalg — 2005-07-05T14:38:32+00:00

I bought “Who Stole Ed’s Pants” several months ago, but my first chance to try it out came last weekend when my wife, daughter and I were at a remote cabin for the weekend. The game was not hard to figure out, but frustration level was higher than I would like. Often there was no card that could be played, or the only card that could be played had either no effect or a negative effect on the player. “Null turns” are okay in a game where play is fast, but this game didn’t move quite fast enough (hey, it was our first try). Trying to “set up” a multi-turn move (e.g. increase supporter credibility on one turn and plant incriminating evidence on the next) didn’t work as often as it did, but that’s the point of the game, too.
The credibility group ranks didn’t change much – circus performers stayed on top all game. We concentrated as much on changing facts to de-incriminate ourselves as on incriminating others, so scores were low. I ended both rounds by choosing the draw pile with only one card left (facts), because I was in a weak position both times and wanted to avoid further damage when I was vulnerable. At the end of the first round, the score was 1-1-1. At the end of the second and final round, the score was 2-2-2. The tie-breaker was the owner of the most credible witness (my wife) but that was a hollow victory. Despite these negative-sounding comments, we rated the games as enjoyable, and we will try it again at least once to see if the tie score was a fluke.

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pronoblem — 2005-05-13T18:11:59+00:00

as played at gametableonline.com

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EJKemp — 2005-03-21T13:50:31+00:00

Thread: Session Report

FlyingSheep — 2003-11-10T20:49:26+00:00

Matt + Vitas: 10
Chip + Andrew: 14

We brought out my copy of Ed's Pants (which I got at the last Unity Games), read through the rules, and started the game. Andrew and I were one team, and Matt and Vitas were the other team.
I had fun with this game, although there was a lot to keep track of. We rarely changed the rankings of the groups of people. I'd like to try this game again without partners to see if it's better that way.

Thread: Session Report

mlvanbie — 2003-10-21T13:05:21+00:00

For our final game we played Who Stole Ed's Pants. I don't think that we got the rules down right away, but playing made it clear what was going on.

We ran out of Witness cards due to heavy manipulation of the credibility line. This either caused or resulted from witness replacements. Law enforcement, originally prized by Jake and I, plummeted to just above criminals (who had their own brush with fame at one point). Circus performers moved back and forth, at one point being quite credible. Merchants moved to the top just after my diamond merchant was replaced....

Jake generally kept himself safe from evidence attacks and took the last two witnesses. This did not give me enough time to complete a sequence of moves designed to decrease my level of incrimination (originally two points worth, but a bus-related card was added to me, reducing this to one point, had it happened). A large number of water-related evidence cards accumulated in front of me. After the game Jake revealed that he had the fact card that would have sunk me, but had not played it. In the end, Alan and I were tied with three points against us each to Jake's one.

This game seemed a bit more random than I like, but the available cards to draw and the mutable credibility track did have us thinking.

Thread: Session Report

Dan Bosley — 2002-04-08T18:11:40+00:00

Who Stole Ed’s Pants? Yes, this is a question I have often asked myself. And now I finally know the answer. It was my wife. Shocking, but true. And here’s how I found out.

Who Stole Ed’s Pants? is a card game by Jim Doherty of Eight Foot Llama Games. We played the 4-player partnership game (William and I (Dan) versus Diane and Chris).

The game has 3 types of cards: Fact cards, Evidence cards, and Witness cards. The basic idea of the game is to plant evidence cards on your opponents to make them look guilty. Or to try to change the official facts of the case to either again make your opponents look guilty, or alternatively, make you look innocent. And you use the Witness cards in varying ways to make those changes.

The fact-cards are broken down into 3 types: Who-facts, When-facts, and Where-facts.

An example of a Who-fact is: “A new lead says the thief resembled a pirate.”
An example of a When-fact is: “Ed was robbed at 7:15pm”
An example of a Where-fact is: “A mime found Ed’s library card floating in the river.”

Each of the above cards has a symbol on it (pirate, 7:15pm and river, respectively).

When the game first starts, the Fact cards are shuffled up and one Who-fact, one When-fact, and one Where-fact card are turned face-up to the centre of the table. Those then become the official facts of the case, which are important to solving the case.

The evidence-cards are similar: there are Who-evidence, When-evidence, and Where-evidence cards.

An example of a Who-evidence card is: “Astute observers have pointed out your wooden leg.” This card has 2 symbols on it - a leg injury symbol, and a pirate symbol.

An example of a When-evidence card is: “Your date waited at the taco stand, buy you never showed up : 8:45 to 9:30pm”

And an example of a Where-evidence card is: “A train conductor has found your airport parking receipt.”
This card has two symbols on it: a train, and a plane.

When an evidence card is played in front of you by an opponent, you have it forever. You can’t get rid of it. And for each evidence card you have in front of you that matches an official fact-card in the centre of the table, that evidence-card gets a guilty-stone put on top of it. So the more matching evidence you have with the official facts, the more guilty-stones you have. And the more guilty-stones you have - the more likely it is that you’re the one who stole Ed’s pants! That is bad, bad, bad.

So in our example using the cards above, you would only have one guilty-stone - on top of your Who-evidence card - since your wooden leg is a clue to the fact that the guilty thief is a pirate, and lo and behold, according to the official facts, the thief resembled a pirate. Neither your When nor your Where-evidence cards match up, so there are no guilty-stones for them.

During the play of the game, however, new facts may come into play. If the existing example Where-fact was replaced with a new Where-fact card that read “Fibers from Ed’s pants were found along the railroad tracks”, you would then now get a 2nd guilty-stone on your Where-evidence card, since your Where-evidence card refers to a train conductor, and the new Where-fact card refers to railroad tracks. Thus there is an evidentiary match! So you would then have one more guilty-stone than you did before.

This also works the other way, too. If a fact changes such that evidence against you is no longer applicable, then any guilty-stone on top of such an evidence card is removed. And thus, you would have one less guilty-stone than you did before.

In addition to the various Fact and Evidence cards, there are 36 witness cards. These consist of 6 “suits” : the six different suits are:

Folks on the Street
Circus Performers
Outlaws
Household Staff
Law Enforcers
Merchants.

Each suit is numbered from 1 to 6, with the higher the number, the better the card within that suit. Or in game-terms, the better “credibility” that that particular witness has.

The suits themselves are ranked separately. There are 6 rank cards (one for each suit), that are shuffled and randomly dealt out in a row. The suit at one end of the row has the highest credibility and the suit at the other end has the lowest, with the ones in between ranking accordingly.

So what this in effect means is that all 36 Witness-Cards fit into a hierarchy. You could arrange all 36 cards in order from best to worst in terms of credibility. Thus, if the 6 suits were ranked in the order as mentioned above from best to worst, then the 6 of Folks on the Street has the highest credibility of all 36 cards. And the 1 of Merchants has the lowest. And any Circus Performer card has more credibility than any Outlaw card. And any Household Staff card has more credibility than any Merchant card. And so on.

At the start of the game, each player is randomly dealt 3 witnesses from the deck of 36 witnesses.. The 1st witness-card is your Who-Witness. The 2nd witness-card is your When-Witness. And your 3rd witness-card is your Where-Witness.

And finally, to start the game, you are dealt a hand of 5 cards consisting of 2 more witness cards, one fact card, and 2 evidence cards. Then there are 3 face down decks to draw from - one consisting of Witness-cards, one consisting of Fact-cards, and one consisting of Evidence cards.

On your turn, you first play a card, and then you pick up one card from any one of the 3 face-down piles, your choice. If you can’t or don’t want to play a card, then you discard a card instead, and then pick up one card.

You basically have a choice of 5 things each turn that you can do, and within the first 2 of those 5 things, there is a sub-choice of 3 things.

The 5 things it is possible to do are:

1) Play an Evidence card on an opponent.

You will want to do this a lot - since the more evidence cards there are against your opponents, the more chances there are that at least some of those evidence cards will match up with the official Fact cards in the middle of the table. And the more matches, the more guilty-stones...

A) You may play a WHO-Evidence card on an opponent PROVIDED that your current WHO-Witness-card has more credibility than your opponent’s current Who-Witness-card. In other words, your Who-Witness-card ranks higher than your opponent’s Who-Witness-card.

So, again using examples from above, if your current Who-Witness-card is the 6 of Folks on the Street (the highest possible ranking card in the 36-card hierarchy), then you will always be able to place a Who-Evidence card on any opponent, since the 6 of Folks on the Street beats all other Witness cards. But if your Who-Witness-card was the 1 of Household Staff, then you would only be able to beat any Law Enforcer or Merchant card (since in our example, Household Staff cards rank higher than Law Enforcer or Merchant cards).

If your opponent’s current Who-Witness has more credibility than your own current Who-Witness, then you may NOT play a Who-Evidence card on that player.

B) You may play a WHEN-Evidence card on an opponent PROVIDED that your current WHEN-Witness-card has more credibility than your opponent’s current WHEN-Witness card.

C) You may play a WHERE-Evidence card on an opponent PROVIDED that your current WHERE-Witness-card has more credibility than your opponent’s current WHERE-Witness card.

2) Change a Fact card in the middle of the table.

If you have a lot of incriminating evidence against you, then you’ll want to try and change the official facts to something else. If you have two When-Evidence cards against referring to 7:30pm, and the current When-Fact card is 7:30pm, then that means you also have two guilty-stones against you. But if you manage to change the When-Fact card to 5:00pm, then suddenly those When-Evidence cards against you are wrong - and thus the two guilty-stones are removed.
Of course, you can also change the facts to make your opponents even more guilty than they already are...

A) You may change a WHO-fact card on the table PROVIDED your WHO-Witness card is in one of the TOP FOUR suits in the ranking. If it’s one of the two bottom suits, then you can’t change that WHO-fact card.

B) You may change a WHEN-fact card on the table PROVIDED your WHEN-Witness card is in one of the TOP FOUR suits in the ranking. If it’s one of the two bottom suits, then you can’t change that WHEN-fact card.

C) You may change a WHERE-fact card on the table PROVIDED your WHERE-Witness card is in one of the TOP FOUR suits in the ranking. If it’s one of the two bottom suits, then you can’t change that WHERE-fact card.

3) Rearrange the hierarchy of Witness cards
By playing the appropriate Witness card, you can rearrange the ranking of the 6 suits.
Playing a 1 or a 2 of a suit means you can move that suit up or down one rank.
Playing a 3 or a 4 of a suit means you can move that suit up or down one or two ranks.
Playing a 5 or a 6 of a suit means you can move that suit up or down one, two, or three ranks.
So in our example above, if you played the 4 of Outlaws, that would mean that you could move the Outlaw rank card either up one or two ranks, or down one or two ranks.

If you moved it up, then the new suit ranking would be:
Outlaws
Folks on the Street
Circus Performers
Household Staff
Law Enforcers
Merchants.
And thus Outlaws would be the most creditable witnesses.

If you moved it down, then the new suit ranking would be:
Folks on the Street
Circus Performers
Household Staff
Law Enforcers
Outlaws
Merchants.
And thus Outlaws would have moved down in credability.

4) Replace one of an opponent’s Witness cards
To do this, the new witness card you are giving to your opponent must have an equal or HIGHER number than the relevant witness-card you are trying to replace. The suit is irrelevant. So obviously, you will only do this when it gives your opponent a lower ranking card in the hierarchy of 36 witness cards.. For example, replacing your opponent’s 5 of Folks on the Street with a 6 of Merchants: the number is higher, but the new card is much lower in the hierarchy of creditability.

5) Replace one of your (or your partner’s) Witness cards.
Same as #4 above, EXCEPT the number of the new card must be equal or LOWER than the old card you are trying to replace. And of course, you only want to do this when it gives you a higher ranking card in the overall 36-card witness hierarchy.

A round ends when the last card of any one of the 3 draw piles is drawn. At that point, each player scores the number of guilty-stones they have:

1 stone = 1 point
2 stones = 3 points
3 stones = 6 points
4 or more stones = 10 points.
Plus, you get 1 more point for each stone your partner had.

The game is played over 2 rounds. At the end of round 1, the current fact cards, the current ranking of the suits, and any evidence cards already played on you are kept. All other cards are shuffled up and redealt.
At the end of round 2, scoring is done again.

Whoever has the highest score is the guilty party who stole Ed’s pants. His partner is the accomplice.
The other two players automatically win. So the game’s like golf. Low score is good. High score is bad.

Because Chris had the snazziest pants, he got to go first. The game moved quite slowly at first, because we weren’t sure at first what we were supposed to do (the rules were nowhere near as clear as I’ve described them above).

At the end of round 1, William and I were pretty guilty. But then we threw in all the cards (since the rules omitted what to do at this point - after some discussion, we decided on the rules as I outlined above, and started the game over again). So that first round was just a practice round -learning the game, so to speak.

As it turned out, this was a very wise thing to do on William’s and my part. Because at the end of the new round 1, we were leading.
Diane received 4 points.
Chris got 4 points.
And William and I each got 2 points.

By the end of round 2:
Diane had 9 points
Chris had 8 points
William had 3 points
Dan had 3 points.

So Diane stole Ed’s pants. And Chris helped her do it.

Ratings:
Diane - 7
Chris - 5
William - 7
Dan - 7

Chris didn’t really care for the game. He said the only part he liked was the funny cards. Is there someone named Ed that Chris doesn’t like? Is that the real reason?

The rest of us seemed to enjoy the game more, however. The game definitely has a lot to keep track of. But none of it is overwhelming. As well, I am sure as one got more familiar with the mechanics, the game would speed up considerably. I think overall we played rather slowly.

While there is a luck factor of course, there are still a lot of possibilities of what to do with your cards each turn. It’s never an automatic no-thinking selection.

And with a few more plays, I think we would play much more quickly.

The game will never be one of those top ten games that everyone always clamours for. But I found it to be an enjoyable diversion, and would welcome an opportunity to play it again. William and Diane too indicated that they liked it and would like to play it again soon. And Chris would like to be playing something else when that happens.

Thread: Session Report

gschloesser — 2001-12-20T06:12:36+00:00

When I saw that this obscure game won tremendous accolades in the recent
Games 100 magazine, my curiosity was piqued. Then, I began hearing more
positive feedback from gamers who had played it. So, I threw it in on
my last games order, figuring all these voices couldn't be wrong. So,
when the game arrived, I was eager to bring it to the table and promptly
recruited Darren and Elizabeth
to join me in this card game of sleuthing and finger-pointing. After
one playing, my general reaction so far is: Hunh?

We all found the mechanics quite confusing and counter-intuitive. In
order for most cards to be played, a set of circumstances had to exist
(i.e., a certain combination of cards had to be in play on the table).
Otherwise, the card could not be played. Often, you would develop a
plan based on the cards you held on how to sway the game in your favor,
only to find that the necessary set of circumstances (cards already on
the table) were not present in order to play the cards you desired.
This got to be quite frustrating. This card play mechanism gave me a
very similar feeling to that I experienced with Courtesans of Versailles
... and that is NOT a good thing.

Now, in all fairness, we were stumbling our way through the rules and
mechanisms, and this confusion no doubt added to my general bad vibes
about the game. I do feel certain that with more experience, the
mechanics will feel much more intuitive and the game will flow at a
smoother pace. This will, no doubt, improve my opinion of the game ...
I'm just not sure how much. I have some concerns over several
mechanisms, including how fast the "board" situation changes from player
to player. Often, the play of just one card radically alters the entire
scope of the board layout, thereby substantially altering the cards you
can, or desire to play from your hand. Things just change far to
quickly to make long-term plans.

A bit about the game. Ed's pants have been stolen and it is the job of
the players to cast suspicion upon their opponents as the culprit.
Three main facts are important to the overall play of cards: The Who,
When and Where facts, each of which give a pertinent fact. Players take
turns playing cards, attempting to place evidence upon their opponents
which match these facts, thereby implicating those players. For
instance, the Who fact card may state, "Investigators suspect the thief
wore an unusual hat". If you play an evidence card on an opponent which
states, "You love your Viking helmet", then that player clearly comes
under suspicion. To indicate this, he places a glass stone onto the
evidence card. Ultimately, the player with the most stones in front of
him after two rounds is the culprit, while the player who possesses the
fewest stones receives credit for fingering the thief and is victorious.

That sounds easy enough ... but there's more. There are six groups of
witnesses, ranging from the Law Enforcement officials to the Circus
performers. These are set out in a row on the table, effectively
ranking them in reliability from 1 - 6. The deck of Witness cards
contains six cards for each witness category, ranked 1 - 6. The higher
the number the better, so if the Folks on the Street category is ranked
as the most trustworthy, then the #6 Folks on the Street card (the
Mailman) is the most reliable witness of all.

Each player is dealt three Witness cards and places them in front of
their personal play mat, one each for the Who, When and Where
categories. These three cards are known as supporters play a major role
in determining which cards you can play during the course of the game.
For instance, in order to play an evidence card (let's say a 'Where'
evidence card) on an opponent in an attempt to implicate them in the
dastardly crime, your supporter in that category (Where, in our example)
must be a more reliable witness than your opponent's supporter in that
category. To determine this, you must first consult the ranking of the
six Witness categories and, if both supporters are members of the same
category, then consult their individual rank.

So how do you change the ranking of the Witness categories? This
actually is one of the easiest tasks, as all you must do is play a
witness card to the table and move the matching category up or down in
ranking 1 - 3 spaces, depending upon the strength of the card you
played. A 5 or 6 card allows the player to move the matching Witness
card up or down 3 spaces. A 3 or 4 cards allows movement up or down 2
spaces, while a 1 or 2 card allows the player to move a Witness card up
or down only 1 space.

Further, you can change the actual supporter cards in front of your
personal play mat. To do this, however, the witness card you play must
have a credibility number equal to or less than the current supporter
you desire to replace. You can also change one of your opponent's
supporters, but the value of the witness card you play must be equal to
or greater than the supporter you wish to replace.

As I mentioned, there are three basic facts which begin the game in play
and dictate who is incriminated once matching evidence is played.
However, in this ever-changing world, the facts can also change. In
order to change one of the three fact cards in play, your supporter in
the matching category must be a member of one of the top 4 ranked
Witness groups. If this condition exists, you may play a new fact card
in the appropriate category and discard the old fact card.

All of these rules taken by themselves are easy enough, but when tossed
together, it becomes a bit tricky and cumbersome to remember the
particular circumstances which must exist in order for you to take a
particular action. These are summarized on the player mats, but one
does grow weary of constantly consulting these mats and determining
whether you can play a card or not.

On a turn, a player plays one and only one card, taking one of the
actions listed above. Or, he can simply discard a card and pass. A new
card is taken to replenish their hand at the end of a player's turn.
This one action limit is extremely confining as it often would require
the play of two or more cards to alter the board situation in order to
take an effective action. For example, if I want to play a an evidence
card on opponent in order to implicate them in the crime, there are
numerous factors I must consider. If just one of these fails to be the
appropriate circumstance or card, then the play of the card is either
invalid or useless.

For example, suppose I want to play a 'Where' evidence on Elizabeth in
order to implicate her in the crime. First, I must make sure that my
supporter in the 'Where' category outranks her supporter in that
category. If not, I either have to change my supporter, or change
hers. To do so, of course, I first must meet the appropriate
requirements -- playing a supporter of equal, greater or lesser value,
depending upon whose supporter I am attempting to replace. If I do
this, however, I've used my action and must wait till the round returns
to me to then place the evidence card. By that time, however, it is
quite possible and even likely that the board situation has been altered
so that my initial planned action is no longer relevant.

As opposed to changing one of the supporters, however, I could have
opted to change the fact card which is currently in play. However, to
do this, I must make sure my supporter in the appropriate category is
ranked in one of the top 4 Witness groups. If not, I then must take an
action to change my supporter or alter the Witness rankings. Again,
this uses my one action, and by the time play returns to me everything
may have been altered again. Often, I got the distinct feeling I was
running on a treadmill and not really getting anywhere. What's the old
adage ... One step forward, two steps backwards.

I eventually concluded that it was best to simply play as many evidence
cards on my opponents as possible, then change the fact cards at a
future date in an attempt to match some of the evidence I had planted.
I figured the wider the variety of evidence cards on my opponents, the
better chance a fact change would match one or more of these evidence
cards. This turned out to be true, but unfortunately had the effect of
actually un-incriminating them at the same time. For instance, if they
had been previously implicated under the 'Who' category by the 'funny
hat' evidence, changing the 'Who' fact might well incriminate them under
a different scenario, but at the same time remove the incrimination
stone on the 'funny hat' card. Again, more spinning of my wheels
without accomplishing much.

A round ultimately ends when all of the cards in one of the three draw
piles (Witness, Evidence or Fact) depletes. At that point, players
receive incrimination points based on the number of stones they
possess. The more stones, the more points (up to a maximum of 10 points
for 4 or more stones). A second round is then played, with scores being
cumulative over the course of the two rounds. The problem we had is
that it is very difficult to stick a player with more than a couple of
stones. As soon as someone changes one of the facts, it is usually
common for one or more players to become un-incriminated, thereby
surrendering stones. Again, things change so quickly that it was
difficult to keep stones on players for any length of time.

I will say that I found the mechanisms clever, but the game was a bit
too chaotic. Perhaps allowing a player to play 2 cards on a turn would
increase the effectiveness of each player's turn as he would then be
able to set-up the right combination of cards in order to have desired
effects occur. As is, it is simply too difficult to formulate a plan
and to make a card play really have an impact. I am hoping that future
plays will give me added insight and enjoyment, because for now, I'm a
bit disappointed. I also have to try the game with four players as it
is a partnership game with that number of players. Perhaps this is a
better way to play the game.

We managed to stick Elizabeth with 2 stones in the first round, giving
her 3 incrimination points. Darren possessed one stone, while I managed
to avoid becoming incriminated. In round 2, both Elizabeth and I
avoided incrimination, while Darren collected another stone. The game
ended with Elizabeth being implicated in the crime, with the accolades
going to me for correctly identifying the thief.

Finals: Greg 0, Darren 2, Elizabeth 3

Ratings: Elizabeth 9, Greg 4, Darren 3