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an avoid-winning-the-last-trick trick-taking game.

Ah, finally back at The Mad Badger, after a long and profitable day of questing and looting. Now it’s time to unwind with a few dozen tankards of ale, while bragging of the day’s heroic bravery. But only a fool spends all his loot paying for drinks. No, a crafty adventurer, such as yourself, always makes sure someone else gets stuck with the tab at the end of the night.

Tightwad is a trick-taking game for the basic Decktet, in which you do not want to win the last trick. Each trick represents a round of drinks, and whoever orders the last round also picks up the tab.

Setup

Randomly chose a dealer, who then deals each player a seven card hand. Set the rest of the cards aside.

If there are more than 5 players in the game, an additional basic Decktet is needed. Just shuffle the two basic Decktets together.

Game play

• The player to the left of the dealer starts the first trick by playing a card to the center of the table. This card controls the trick for now.
• Going clockwise around the table, the other players each play a card, until everyone has played one card to the trick.
• Cards played must be either equal or higher in rank than the card currently controlling the trick, or be the lowest ranked card the player has in hand. Aces rank 1, crowns 10.
• A played card takes control of the trick if it is higher in rank and shares at least one suit with the card currently controlling the trick. Put this new controlling card on top of the old controlling card in the center of the table.
• An ace always takes control of a trick if the card currently controlling the trick has its suit. Note that any card with the ace’s suit will take control of the trick afterwards.
• The card that controls the trick when everyone has played one card wins the trick. Whoever played this card leads the next trick.

Example

It's a four player game. Steve leads a trick by playing The Soldier (5), this card controls the trick for now. Dylan then plays The Calamity () thereby taking control of the trick. Valerie must now either play another , a matching ace (ace of ), or her lowest card. She plays The Origin (2). Lastly Brandon plays the ace of , winning the trick.

Scoring

• The player who wins the last trick loses the round, and keeps the winning card on the table in front of him as a penalty. A card is worth its rank in penalty points. Penalty cards are not removed until the end of the game.
• The player on the old dealers left is the new dealer, and another round is played. It may happen that there are not enough cards left in the deck to deal each player seven cards. If this is the case, just deal as many cards as possible to each player, making sure everyone gets the same number of cards.
• The first player to reach 10 or more penalty points loses the game.

Variants

Credits

This game is based on the traditional card game "Cucumber".

Links

• Original BGG thread: http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/1187665/tightwad
• The rules for "Cucumber" can be found here: http://www.pagat.com/last/cucumber.html

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