Game: Grass

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sbilbey — 2007-10-31T23:17:18+00:00

Box Front (scanned)

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moxtaveto — 2007-07-25T15:37:08+00:00

READABLE (and coloured) diagramm for the score-example

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Debate — 2007-07-24T08:28:03+00:00

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Debate — 2007-07-24T08:26:03+00:00

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quentin1 — 2007-04-17T03:32:45+00:00

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quentin1 — 2007-04-17T03:32:19+00:00

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quentin1 — 2007-04-17T02:43:51+00:00

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quentin1 — 2007-04-17T02:43:14+00:00

The Cops

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quentin1 — 2007-04-17T02:42:30+00:00

Money

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quentin1 — 2007-04-17T02:41:30+00:00

The Replacements

Thread: Re: Up-strategizing Grass.

GaryB — 2007-01-23T14:11:42+00:00

I am also suprised with the original post. In our group, Protected cards are like gold dust. They are always the 'holy grail' of the trading furore, other than when one needs a specic Heat Off of course. Let me put it this way, if player X has Heat Off Felony up for trade, and 2 people desperately want it, it will go to a player offering a Protected 25k before it will go to the player offering a straight 25k peddle, no question. Having 25k in front of you with Proection on is better than having two 25ks with no Protection.

[N.B. You also mentioned that you don't bother calculating the Banker's 20% skim, which is another reason why you may undervalue the Protected cards.

In summary, if I have a card for trade that several players want, I would rank the cards they could offer as follows...

1) Euphoria (would never happen of course)
2) Stonehigh (ditto)
3) Market Open (if I still need one)
4) Heat Off (if I need it), including Pay Fine if I can use it
5) Paranoia (if I am currently holding a WORSE Paranoia)
6) Dr Feelgood
7) Protected 50k
8) 50k peddle
9) Protected 25k
10) 25k peddle
11) 5k peddle

Thread: Re: User Review

GaryB — 2007-01-23T13:56:35+00:00

I repeat my earlier comment... regardless of what your rules say, forbidding someone from placing Heat On when they have Heat on themselves is definately detracting from the game. I say this from experience. If your rules say this, I suggest you contravene it with a house rule, as you will get a better game.

Forbidding Market Close when Heat is on should be a no brainer, and no one has mentioned it above.

Allowing/forbidding Protection while Heat is on is fine either way, really. I can see the attraction of placing Heat on someone who just dropped a vulnerable $50k peddle as a strategy to delay their ability to protect it next turn (the usual move that follows dropping 50k). So shrug on that. Other than to say that since some unfortunate players (especially those with clear leads) can sit with Heat on for most of the current round, you might want to cut them some slack and allow Protection to be played, otherwise they may have nothing to do (but beg) for the entire round.

So in summary, when you have Heat on, I recommend the following cards can be played:

- Heat Off (obviously)
- Nirvana (again, obviously because the rules state these cards remove Heat)
- Heat On (revenge is mine!!)
- Protection (cut me some slack, I'm in jail)
- Paranoia (playing Utterly Wiped Out is a known strat to rid yourself of a particularly large pile of Heat, since you lose EVERYTHING)

Thread: Re: Up-strategizing Grass.

dead jawa — 2006-10-07T07:24:20+00:00

To follow up my own article: After continuing to play the game for sometime now the standard I use is that you can only unprotect money on your turn and only to use a pay a fine card.

Also if 3 round hands (market open, peddle, market close) become a problem I'm just using the variant that the market can't be closed until everyone's managed to get a market open in front of them at least once (even if later destroyed).

Thread: Re: User Review

JoshBot — 2006-08-13T22:17:26+00:00

The introductory rules (a separately folded piece of paper) state in the FAQs:

Question - Can you play a "Protection" card or a "Heat On" card when the Heat is on You?

Answer - No!

See the scans of the Introductory rules.

Grass is a really great game that takes about 10 minutes to explain to new players, but has a great deal of depth and wonderful atmosphere.

Thread: Re: Session report

SkipM624 — 2006-07-24T15:07:25+00:00

Was this session conducted with or without the aid/hindrance of actual cannabis sativa? If so (or not) it would tell us a lot about the report, I suspect. .

Thread: Re: User Review

mjwills — 2006-05-10T01:24:41+00:00

GaryB wrote:
My rules state that ... You are still free to place Heat on others and play Protection (and remove your own heat too obviously). You are also free to make deals and play the Paranoia cards when you have Heat on.

Obviously we must be dealing with different versions of the rules. As I pointed out in my earlier response to Zardoz, the restrictions on Protection and Heat On are dealt with in my rules under the section 'Most Commonly Asked Questions'.

As I mention in my review, the rules that come with the game (or at least my edition) are atrocious. They are organised very poorly, and it took me quite some time to convert them into the format I used in the review. This is particularly annoying because the game isn't complicated - there is absolutely no need for the rules to be as bad as they are.

Thread: Re: User Review

yossarians — 2006-03-28T14:05:56+00:00

The logic here is that you are somehow in the confines of the police, and cannot actually "do" anything, other than trying to get yourself off the hook. Additionally, this game is clearly a derivative of Mille Bornes, in which a player hindered by a Flat Tire, etc. is also unable to hinder another player, or do anythind else for that matter.

Actually, I'd say that if the police are watching you, they'd be just fine with getting info on other dealers (putting the heat on them). Just my 2 cents.

Thread: Re: User Review

schlappy — 2006-03-28T07:38:28+00:00

GaryB wrote:
Just to add more 'heat' (ha ha!) to the debate. My version from the 80s includes TWO rule books. One is a comprehensive set of rules and the other is summary of play and a list of each card type and what it does. My rules state that when you have Heat on, you cannot peddle nor close the market (the review omits this important rule), nor Skim, but that is all. You are still free to place Heat on others and play Protection (and remove your own heat too obviously). You are also free to make deals and play the Paranoia cards when you have Heat on.

Rules aside, I have played this game a million times with many varied groups of people. Having the Heat cards remove your ability to place Heat on others would not be condusive to good gameplay. You can sit for a LONG time with Heat on in this game, often in full knowledge of which player holds the card you need to get rid of it, but having nothing they need in return to trade. Placing Heat on that player when you hold the Heat Off card THEY now need is a typical strategy.

I'm confident I have the same 80's version as you -- with both the ACTUAL rules, and the summary. I was surprised to find that you are correct in what you found (or didn't find) about restricted play of Heat On, etc. while having a Heat On your own market.

However, I have been playing the game for 20+ years operating under the impression that, while having Heat On your own market, you could ONLY:

-- get rid of the heat
-- play a Paranoid card
-- discard

The logic here is that you are somehow in the confines of the police, and cannot actually "do" anything, other than trying to get yourself off the hook. Additionally, this game is clearly a derivative of Mille Bornes, in which a player hindered by a Flat Tire, etc. is also unable to hinder another player, or do anythind else for that matter.

Fortunately, Grass has the open negotiation mechanic -- which, aside from making it a FAR better game than Mille Bornes, also greatly reduces the downtime from nasty cards played by other players. Also, there are no equivalent cards in MB to Grass' Stonehigh & Euphoria -- one of which cycles through the deck fairly regularly.

Perhaps I'll suggest that we try it the other way sometime, but my feeling is that the group will prefer the way we've always played it. I'll report back...

Thread: Re: User Review

GaryB — 2006-02-09T15:47:51+00:00

Just to add more 'heat' (ha ha!) to the debate. My version from the 80s includes TWO rule books. One is a comprehensive set of rules and the other is summary of play and a list of each card type and what it does. My rules state that when you have Heat on, you cannot peddle nor close the market (the review omits this important rule), nor Skim, but that is all. You are still free to place Heat on others and play Protection (and remove your own heat too obviously). You are also free to make deals and play the Paranoia cards when you have Heat on.

Rules aside, I have played this game a million times with many varied groups of people. Having the Heat cards remove your ability to place Heat on others would not be condusive to good gameplay. You can sit for a LONG time with Heat on in this game, often in full knowledge of which player holds the card you need to get rid of it, but having nothing they need in return to trade. Placing Heat on that player when you hold the Heat Off card THEY now need is a typical strategy.

Thread: Re: Up-strategizing Grass.

bop517 — 2005-10-28T13:24:42+00:00

Wow. Whenever I have played, EVERYONE protected cards because everyone stole cards (as well as playing Stonehigh(?) and Euphoria to take em.

Unfortunately, my feeling for the game has dropped. I will play with three, maybe four. Five players just dragged forever, it seemed.

Thread: Up-strategizing Grass.

dead jawa — 2005-10-27T21:18:10+00:00

Or, a really awkward way of stating increasing the level of strategy in Grass.

This is part variant and part rules discussion so I'm posting it here. Two of the initial problems with the game that we noticed were that nobody much cared for the protected cards. You could protect $25,000 for example, or just play an additional $25,000, so why bother protecting? That and no one liked having to figure out 20% for the Banker card at the end of the game.

What was figured was that the game needed more card stealing going on, and the way to do that was to change the Banker card into a super Steal Your Neighbors Pot card. So the rule used was that the Banker card could be used to either steal a peddle card or steal everyones lowest unprotected card (like the side effect of a Stonehigh card).

In addition the game comes with four mostly blank cards (for replacement purposes only? Bwa-ha-ha-ha!). Take two of these and turn them into additional Banker cards (for more stealin!), and take the other two and turn them into $75,000 protected cards. With all the extra stealing going on and perhaps fewer choices to steal from what with more cash being protected those protected cards start being worth a bit more.

Now we come to an unclear point in the rules, can you choose to un-protect money? One way of playing this is Yes, you can unprotect money whenever you want. So if you have to pay a fine you can use protected money and if someone skims everyones lowest card and all you have unprotected is Dr. Feelgood then you can unprotect that $5,000 and pass that off instead. The second way to play it is No, protected money is permanantly hands off. This makes things a bit more strategic, but also makes protected cards more likely to just be dumped again. After all, why protect money if that might prevent you from paying a fine later or allow someone to skim your $50,000 card because you used a $25,000 protected earlier. There's also a compromise option, to allow you to unprotect money only on your turn and only to pay a fine, so that you can still protect $5,000 cards and still have them availible for pay fine cards.

I'm not sure which of those options I like the most myself yet, and their use and usefullness can also impact or be impacted by game length. So for example, you may want to play with the second option but then shuffle all the Market Closed cards into the bottom half of the deck, insuring a longer hand where every player will have time to both get spare cash out AND protect excess wealth.

One final word, playing a very short hand (Market Open, any peddle card, Market Closed) is a very usefull strategy, but if it becomes the only strategy and you're looking at a six hour game you can either use the rule where the Market Closed cards are shuffled into the latter part of the deck or even make a negative amount at which point a player is dropped out of the game (like at -$200,000 that player is kicked out of the game), at least those are my suggestions.

Thread: Re:User Review

Zardoz — 2005-02-23T19:12:28+00:00

mjwills (#88155),

My rules are the same as www.bggfiles.com/viewfile.php3?fileid=3107 and there is no mention of not being able to play Heat ON when you have Heat On. I have been playing this way recently and it works quite well. Will revert back to the old way as per the Italian rules you showed and see how it changes the game.

Thanks for the help!

Zardoz

P.S.

Yes the game is simple, but I find there are subtleties in the game that make it interesting. Quite a lot of factors have to be considered for such a simple game.

Also play Pirateer board game which won the Mensa Select award. Nice game but I actually find Grass has more to it, although like all these games luck play a too large a part. But hey it make it less compeditive that way.

Thread: Re:User Review

mjwills — 2005-02-22T11:37:43+00:00

Phlegm wrote:
mjwills (#88155),

The game is very simple. Think Mille Bornes.

1. I never said the game wasn't simple. But understanding the rules can be quite tricky given the appalling layout (so new players may want to keep my review nearby when playing since it covers 95% of the rules).

2. I (and everyone I have ever played with) has not played Mille Bornes - so that doesn't help much.

Thread: Re:User Review

Phlegm — 2005-02-22T10:53:30+00:00

mjwills (#88155),

The game is very simple. Think Mille Bornes .

Thread: Re:User Review

mjwills — 2005-02-22T07:40:36+00:00

Zardoz,

I have compared my rules at home to those at http://www.bggfiles.com/viewfile.php3?fileid=3107 .

My set of rules is twice as long (total of 14 'columns' vs 7). The information you were asking for (about Protection and Heat On) is in the section 'Most Commonly Asked Questions' (under the 'Where and how you play your Grass cards') which is not part of the rules at http://www.bggfiles.com/viewfile.php3?fileid=3107 .

Thread: Re:User Review

mjwills — 2005-02-22T01:47:31+00:00

Zardoz,

The rules as posted at BGG are definitely different to those included with my version.

I have scoured the net to find my version in a digital format, but can't...

The closest I can find is rules in Italian!

If you read the end of http://nuke.goblins.net/downloads/6/0/grass_ITArules.pdf you will find the statement:

Posso giocare una carta “Protection” o una carta “Heat On” se siete bloccati da una carta “Heat
On”?
No!

This is the equivalent section that is missing from the BGG rules - it says that if you are 'Heated' you can't play Protection or Heat On.

As I mentioned earlier, the organisation of the rules is very bad...

Thread: Re:User Review

mjwills — 2005-02-22T01:36:22+00:00

Zardoz,

The way I have presented the rules is substantially different to that included in the actual 'offical rules'. That is one of the major flaws with the games - the rule book is badly organised. It would have really benefitted by a table showing different situations (no Market Open played etc) and what cards can be played in that situation.

Looking at your specific issues:

Now if you check the instructions, nowhere does it state that you can't play a Heat On, Protection or Skim cards until you remove the heat using a Heat Off or Nirvana card (or Utterly Wiped Out). It does state you can't play a Peddle card, but that is all.

The restriction on Peddle cards (which you have noted) is at Section 3 at the top of column 2 of Page 1 of the rules as at http://www.bggfiles.com/viewfile.php3?fileid=3107 .

The restriction on Skim cards is half way down Section 8 (column 3 in Page 1).

I will have to check my copy of the rules at home (which are probably the same as those at http://www.bggfiles.com/viewfile.php3?fileid=3107 but I'm not sure) with regard to Heat On or Protection. Part of the problem is that the rules are so badly organised that it often takes me 10 minutes to find mention of a rule that I know is there. But I'll post back here with my findings.

Thread: Re:User Review

Zardoz — 2005-02-21T14:12:56+00:00

mjwills (#76738),

Hello

I've had the game Grass for years and use to play it the way you described. I then left the game for many years and just recently started playing again. I was reviewing the instructions and realized I had probably been playing it incorrectly and maybe you are too. Under your "Game Details" you state:

Heat On
* There are four types (Bust, Detained, Felony, Search and Seizure). If you play these on another player, they cannot play any Peddle, Heat On, Protection or Skim cards until they remove the heat using a Heat Off or Nirvana card (or Utterly Wiped Out).

Now if you check the instructions, nowhere does it state that you can't play a Heat On, Protection or Skim cards until you remove the heat using a Heat Off or Nirvana card (or Utterly Wiped Out). It does state you can't play a Peddle card, but that is all.

As the instructions also say you can play a Heat-On card even if your market is not open, one could also assume that you can play one when the Heat is on you too.

I was just wondering where you came up with that rule. Did I miss something or did you just find that it makes for a better game that way.

Thanks

Zardoz

Thread: User Review

mjwills — 2005-01-12T14:42:04+00:00

SUMMARY

Grass is a card game for 2 to 6 players.

Each player is a drug dealer, aiming to maximise their drug dealing profit while minimising everyone else's.

Grass is a simple, light game. The packaging is unique (comes in a little hessian sack) and card stock is average (with white borders). Its fairly easy to teach (though the rules are not the best written I have seen), and appropriate for playing with non gamers. Its theme is around drug dealing - so keep that in mind if dealing (no pun intended) with people who may find that offensive. The theme and card art work quite well together - the first time a new player sees 'Lust conquers all' (a Protection card) you will often get a smile.

The mechanics of the game are very easy - draw a card, play a card. Scoring is simple, easy to follow and predominantly public - so everyone can see how they are going compared to everyone else. Trading / negotiation is nice and works well with non-gamers (read the rules carefully re: negotiation, since it is an area I have played incorrectly in the past).

The Paranoia cards add a bit of fun to the game - the fact that they result in negative affects and allow card passing means there can be a 'chicken' mentality where everyone is waiting for someone else to play the Paranoia cards (so they can offload theirs). And the Euphoria and Steal Your Neighbor's Pot cards means everyone is reluctant to play out their high value cards in case they get stolen.

Strategy is fairly minimal and self evident (for example, always play a low value Peddle card first - in case someone plays a Stonehigh card or you need to play a Pay Fine Heat off).

Not recommended for gamers, but for non gamers its a good little game. It plays best with 4+, and is best played in small doses of 1-3 rounds. When playing with people who know the rules, expect a round to take 10 - 20 minutes. Assuming two rounds before someone hits $250,000 you should knock it over in 20 - 40 minutes.

I would rate the game 6 if playing with gamers (possibly as filler?), 7 if playing with non-gamers. At less than $10, you'll get your money's worth - but probably not much more.

GAME DETAILS

Each player starts with a hand of 6 cards. Going clockwise, each player draws a card from the deck, and then plays a card (at the start and end of a player's turn they will always have 6 cards).

After drawing and before playing a card, the active player may negotiate. They can trade cards in their hand with another player - as long as both players provide the same number of cards (no 2 for 1 trades). They can also trade tabled Peddle money (in this case, both players do not need to provide the same number of cards). Or they can do both, as long as the 'hand' component of the trade is balanced (so both players finish the turn with 6 cards).

Scoring is done at the end of each round - a round ends when someone closes the market (using Market Close) or the deck runs out. The game ends when one player reaches a 'score' of at least $250,000.

The cards can be grouped into the following categories:

Market Open / Close
* Market Open allows you to start your drug dealing endeavours. Without it, you can't play any Peddle cards.
* Market Close allows you to end the round (if you want, its optional).

Peddle
* Range in variety from $5,000 (Home Grown or Mexico) to $100,000 (Dr Feelgood). These can be placed in your (public) 'Stash' once you have played a Market Open.

Heat On
* There are four types (Bust, Detained, Felony, Search and Seizure). If you play these on another player, they cannot play any Peddle, Heat On, Protection or Skim cards until they remove the heat using a Heat Off or Nirvana card (or Utterly Wiped Out).

Heat Off
* There are four types (Bust, Detained, Felony, Search and Seizure). The matching Heat Off can be played against the last Heat On that has been played against you (so if Player A played Heat On Bust no you, and Player B played Heat On Detained on you, you need to play Heat Off Detained). Once this is done, you can start playing Peddle, Heat On and Protection cards.
* There is an extra type - Pay Fine Heat Off. This card counters any Heat On card (regardless of type) at the cost of the smallest tabled Peddle card in your Stash.

Nirvana
* Stonehigh gives you an extra turn, eliminates any Heat Off situations and requires all player to move their lowest value tabled Peddle card from their Stash to yours.
* Euphoria gives you an extra turn, eliminates any Heat Off situations and requires all player to move their highest value tabled Peddle card from their Stash to yours.

Protection
* These come in $50,000 and $25,000 varieties. They have no value in themselves, but 'protect' tabled Stash money up to their $25,000 or $50,000 value. Any protected money is safe from Nirvana, Paranoia or Skim cards. The money you are protecting must be in your Stash before the Protection card is played. Cards with value over the value of the Protection card (eg $100,000 Peddle card) cannot be protected.

Paranoia
* There are three types of Paranoia cards - Sold Out, Double Crossed and Utterly Wiped out. When any of these three are played, all players pass one card from their hand to the player on the left (a good opportunity to offload Paranoia cards in your own hand!). On top of this, the below outcomes occur:
* When a Sold Out is played / discarded, the player loses a turn and discards their lowest value tabled Peddle card.
* Double Crossed is the same as Sold Out, but the player discards their highest value tabled Peddle card.
* Utterly Wiped Out results in the loss of two turns, plus every card in front of the player - except Protection cards and the Peddle cards they are protecting. Thus the player loses any Heat On, unprotected Peddle and Market Open cards in front of them. This is obviously the worst card in the pack.

Skim
* Steal Your Neighbor's Pot allows you to do just that - steal one unprotected tabled Peddle card (of your choice) from one other player.
* The Banker is never played, but is instead kept in your hand until Market Close. The player who holds the Banker card at the end of the hand can skim 20% of each opponent's unprotected tabled Peddle cards.

Scoring occurs at Market Close (or when the deck runs out) as follows:

* Sum all your tabled Peddle cards.
* Subtract 20% of unprotected tabled Peddle cards if another player has the Banker.
* Add 20% of everyone else's tabled Peddle cards if you have the Banker (there is only one Banker card in the pack).
* Subtract Paranoia fines ($25,000 for each Sold Out in your hand (ie untabled), $50,000 for each Double Crossed, $100,000 for each Utterly Wiped Out).
* Subtract value of highest single Peddle card remaining in your hand (ie untabled).

Once totalled, the player with the highest score gets an additional $25,000. The game repeats until one player's total score is at least $250,000 (though you could stop after one round if you wish).

Some common rules mistakes

* Don't forget that when negotating, you can trade tabled Peddle money (it is spelt out in the rules under 'Negotiation Regulations') as well as cards in your hand.
* If the card supply runs out, the round is over (as if Market Close was played).
* If there are multiple Heat Ons on you, you only need to 'Heat Off' the uppermost (last played) one.
* If there is Heat On you, you cannot play Peddle, Heat On, Protection or Skim cards.

Thread: Re:Session Report

Perry — 2004-08-28T01:42:16+00:00

telbert (#4907),

You seem to imply that Steve had several Heat On cards on his Open Market at the same time.

If I have understood the rules correctly, if a Heat On card is played on an Open Market, then the first Heat On card is discarded. However, you may not play any Heat On card on your own Open Market AFAIK.

Hope it helps clearing things out. Now it will be easier to get the market available for playing money cards on. Also: Remember to TRADE CARDS! Oftenly people are prepared to help you open your market - if you have something to offer them! Some Colombian goodies, an other Heat Off card that could make THEIR Market Open available for Peddle cards.

Anyway - hope you figure it out. I have appreciated the game!

Thread: Re:Session Report

shumyum — 2002-12-18T22:00:57+00:00

My guess is that you need to play with fewer people (four is ideal). Honor of the Samurai has the same problem: if there are too many people between your turns, and you even have a whiff of being the leader, you'll be in worse shape than you started when it finally comes back around to you again. Ironically, both games SEEM like they should be more fun with more people, but it just isn't the case. More experience will probably help a bit too. We like Grass (the game...), but we haven't played it for a while, unfortunately. Love the art, hate the bookkeeping.

Thread: Session Report

telbert — 2002-12-18T13:46:34+00:00

We do have a serious problem with this game. The end game condition is when someone hits a large positive amount. Over the games we've played of this everyone averages a negative total. We could play until the proverbial cows came home after a detour via Alpha Centauri and still wouldn't be any closer to finishing then we had been at the start of the game. Hence we play the game for either a set number rounds or to a time limit.

Now after having that rant I must confess that 2 of the group did manage to end the game positive, though both did manage 2 positive and 2 negative rounds. The first round played out as usual, one person (Steve) managed to open an early market, only to find that everytime it got back to him the heat was on. He managed to get rid of the first few but then got stuck with one that he couldn't get rid of, so depite being the only player with an open market for most of the game, he didn't get to make any money. Eventually a couple of other markets opened, by whiuch time Steve had managed to attract most peoples heat on cards, allowing Paul to slap 50k down and then close the market, ending the first round as the only player positive. The next couple of rounds followed suit with one player managing to close the market after getting a cash card to the table. Only the final round played any differently. Andy seemed to be drawing all the market closed cards but didn't see any market opens, so most of the others managed to get their markets open and laid a couple of money cards between heat on cards. By the time someone eventually got a market close, 4 of the 6 players had managed to accumulate positive scores, in most cases not enough to wipeout their previous negatives. Oggie claimed his 2nd victory of the night just pipping Paul who can claim a moral victory having never seen his total score dip below zero. Andy was the best of the negative scorers beating Tel for 3rd. Boog and Steve both scored in the groups usual scoring range, with Steve almost getting a third of the way to the million (negative)

I can only assume that we are either playing the game with the wrong rules or playing it not as the designer expected. It still does provide plenty of entertainment, and fitted perfectly into the mood of the night, but I don't think we'll ever see that mystical large positive score.

Final Scores
Oggie 75, Paul 46, Andy -15, Tel -27, Boog -192, Steve -310

Ratings / 10
Oggie 8, Paul 7, Andy 7, Tel 7, Boog 8, Steve 7

Thread: User Review

BoardGameGeek — 2000-07-09T18:09:35+00:00

Released back in the mid-'80s, Grass disappeared from the store shelves for a while but has recently resurfaced in all its hazy splendor. Grass mixes excellent game play with a sly sense of humor. Packaged in an easy to carry faux-hemp sack with a drawstring, Grass is fun from the moment you pull it out of the drawer to play. Many people equate this game to Mille Bournes because of some similar game mechanisms, however a few rounds of play will reveal additional game play options and strategies that, in my mind, put Grass far ahead of Mille Bournes in replayability and fun.

The game can be played with 2 to 6 players, although I've played with seven or eight and the system hasn't broken down. The overall goal is to "open" your drug trafficking market and sell $250,000 worth of Mary Jane before your opponents do. It may take a few rounds for someone to reach the goal, however, because negative scores can be as common as positive scores, especially with more than four players.

The play starts by dealing each player a six-card hand. On each turn you must play or discard one of the cards in your hand, and then pick up to bring your card total up to six. First of all, you'll want to open your market with an Open Market card, because you can't start raking in the cash until you have a market to deal from. But you have many options on your turn. You can add to your market with a $5000, $10000, $25000, or $50000 stash to sell (there's one $100,000 "Dr. Feelgood" card, but play it at your own risk, because there's no way to protect the cream of the marijuana crop from being stolen by your opponents), or you can put "The Heat" on one of your opponents to stop them from selling on their turn. There are four types of "Heat" (Search and Seizure, Bust, Detained, etc.), which will stifle your ability to sell your pot until you play the corresponding "Heat Off" card.

More complexities arise with some of the other cards in the game. Steal Your Neighbor's Pot allows you to take one of your opponents cards from their market, Stonehigh and Euphoria allow you to get the fuzz off your back AND steal other players money cards. Protection cards allow you to keep some of your stash off-limits from your opponent's greedy hands, and the dreaded Sold Out, Double Crossed and Utterly Wiped Out cards will ruin your day.

Having any of these three cards at the end of the round will incur a large penalty against you in the scoring totals, but you can't discard them either. Tossing one of these cards on the discard pile has its own effects. Throw out a Sold Out and you lose your lowest money card in your market and your next turn. Double Crossed will cost you your highest money card and two turns. Utterly Wiped Out is just that: Say goodbye to your entire market and your next two turns if you have to discard it. So why would you want to discard these ugly cards? Because whenever one of these cards is played, everyone passes a card from his hand to the left. You'll often find yourself forced to play a Sold Out just so you can unload that Utterly Wiped Out on your neighbor.

The passing rules in the game add an excellent dimension to the game as you always have the option to rid yourself of some unwanted cards, and screw your neighbor at the same time. The best aspect of the game, however, is the trading element. Players can wheel and deal their cards to each other, even when it's not their turn. The trading dynamic of the game means there's no downtime on others' turns and a gives a heightened level of interaction between players. If you've just got to get the Heat off your back, you might have to offer up a 25,000 shipment from Columbia to one of your opponents, and if there's only one Heat Off floating around out there, the price might be higher.

When the deck is exhausted, or a player closes the market with a Market Close card, the round ends and players add up their totals in their Markets. Whoever has the highly prized Banker card skims 20% of everyone else's unprotected cash. Players subtract their highest money card still in their hands from their totals as well as 25,000 for each Sold Out in their hands, 50,000 for each Double Crossed and a whopping $100,000 if they're holding onto Utterly Wiped Out. Whoever got the highest round total gets a bonus of $25,000. If anyone has crossed 250,000 total cash, they win the game. If more than one player has crossed $250,000, whoever has the highest score wins.

Once you get past the initial stage of learning all of the cards' functions and scoring implications, Grass is a riot of the game. In fact, I'd rather spend a night playing Grass with a gathering a friends than use the real stuff. The card trading and passing elements of the game add immensely to the fun quotient, keeping all players involved and making it easy for players to stop someone who is close to winning from getting that last card to win. In fact rarely is a player completely out of the game, even if they trail by $200,000 things can turn around very quickly.

The game is fun with two players, but the best games are played with four or more. However, the more players in the game, the longer the game will take. Two players can probably kick out a game in 20-30 minutes, whereas a six-player game could range anywhere from 20 minutes to over an hour. In addition, the artwork in the game is suitably psychedelic. The cards are enjoyable to look at (most notably the "Love Conquers All $50,000 protection card, which makes up for what my group has deemed the ugliest card of the deck--the "Pay Fine, Heat Off" card). All in all Grass is an excellent game that you'll easily get high off of, but never grow tired of or zone out on while you're playing.