ARSCHMALLOWS XXL
ARSCHMALLOWS XXL Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Setup
- Shuffle all the cards.
- Deal 6 face-down cards to each player. Spread them out in front of you, still face down. Careful: you may not look at them! (For a quick game, deal only 4 cards per player.)
- Place the remaining cards in a single pile in the centre of the play area. This pile is the draw pile.
- Draw the top card of the draw pile and place it face up next to the pile. This card is the first card of the discard pile.
- Once only, at the start of the game, everyone may look at two of their own cards. They are then returned to their places, face down.
Example setup for 3 players (you may arrange the cards differently).
Warning: no second look!
How to Play
The person who most recently ate a sweet goes first. Play then proceeds clockwise.
On your turn: Draw the top card of the draw pile and look at it without showing it to the other players, OR take the top card of the discard pile.
Then choose ONE of the following 3 options:
A. After looking at it, swap this card with one of your face-down cards, your choice. You may not look at your face-down cards before making your choice. The card you just took is placed face down in front of you (even if it came from the discard pile). Place your replaced card face up on the discard pile.
B. After looking at it, refuse the card and place it face up on the discard pile. Then turn over one of your face-down cards of your choice so that it is face up. You may not look at your face-down cards before making your choice. The cards revealed in this way are called “BLOCKED” (BLOQUÉES). They remain visible until the end of the game and can no longer leave your play area.
C. If you took a card FROM THE DRAW PILE and it is an Action card, you MAY choose to carry out the action it describes immediately. Then place this Action card face up on the discard pile. If you do not want to carry out the action, play the card according to one of the two options above. It is possible to chain actions thanks to “Rejouer x2” (Play twice): what luck, enjoy it!
Reminder: an action cannot be triggered if the Action card comes from the discard pile!
Getting Rid of Cards
To reduce the total value of your cards, you may get rid of some of them. Here is how:
- You must have 3 cards of the same cooking level (or more) in front of you, face down. After taking a card at the start of your turn, you may then discard these 3 cards (or more). Turn them over one by one to show that they are indeed identical, then place them on the discard pile. In place of one of these cards, place the card you drew, face down. This card cannot be used in the series you are discarding, even if its value is identical!
Warning: If, while turning over the cards to discard them one by one, you find that you have made a mistake and they are not all identical, you must keep all your cards and add the card you drew at the start of the turn to them (all turned face down again). You may try your luck again on a later turn.
- You may proceed in the same way to get rid of Action cards. The only difference: 2 identical cards (or more) are enough.
Reminder: your face-up cards are blocked. You therefore cannot get rid of them!
End of a Round
A round ends immediately as soon as one of these conditions is met:
A. All of a player's cards are face up.
B. A player believes that the total value of their cards (face-down cards + face-up cards) is the lowest around the table. That player announces “Arschmallows!” at any moment during their turn.
Then carry out the following steps:
- Each player turns all of the cards in front of them face up and adds up their values. The value shown on Action cards also counts. Note each player's total.
- If a player triggered the end of the round by announcing “Arschmallows!”, that player wins the round if they actually obtained the strictly lowest score. Otherwise, that player's score for the round is doubled as a penalty.
- The player who totalled the most points in the round will go first in the next round.
End of the Game
The game lasts 3 rounds.
Add up all the scores obtained by each player over these 3 rounds. The person with the lowest total wins the game!
In case of a tie, the tie is broken in favour of the player who won the most rounds (who obtained the lowest score). If the tie persists, the victory is shared. Like a good bag of sweets!
Components
62 cards and this rulebook.
42 Cooking-level cards, with values from -4 to 8:
- 1 × -4 (BIEN SÉANT)
- 1 × -2
- 8 × 8 (CARBONISÉ)
- 4 × each of the other values
- The cooking-level names printed on the cards include DORÉ (4), BIEN SÉANT (-4) and CARBONISÉ (8).
20 Action cards, with values from 9 to 11:
- 8 × 9 (ESPIONNER)
- 8 × 10 (ÉCHANGER)
- 4 × 11 (REJOUER X2)
The Action cards:
- 9 – ESPIONNER (Spy): Look at a face-down card (it can be one of your own).
- 10 – ÉCHANGER (Exchange): Without looking, swap one of your face-down cards with an opponent's face-down card of your choice.
- 11 – REJOUER X2 (Play twice): Take two extra turns.
Goal of the Game
Get rid of your high-value cards. At the end of each round, you add up the value of your cards. The person with the lowest total wins the round.
To win the game, have the lowest cumulative total after 3 rounds.
XXL Edition Notes
This section records differences found between the base-game rulebook above and the publisher's own XXL product text. The XXL rulebook itself was not available, so these points are unverified. They are not part of the transcribed rules.
- Number of rounds. The base-game rulebook says the game ends after 3 rounds. The German Denkriesen shop description for the XXL edition says the winner is the player with the lowest total after 6 rounds ("nach 6 Spielrunden"). The base-game German shop page also says 6 rounds, so the discrepancy is between the publisher's marketing copy and the rulebook. The printed rulebook text (3 rounds) is what is transcribed above. Confirm against the XXL rulebook before relying on this.
- Babo figure (XXL only, per the shop text). The XXL shop description says a player can secure a “Babo” figure by playing a shield card (Schildkarte). While a player holds the figure, they are protected from the effects of Action cards, until another player plays a further shield card and takes it. Neither the base-game rulebook nor the base-game shop text mention a shield card or a Babo figure, so these components and this rule are not transcribed above.
- Unrelated text. The XXL shop description also contains a passage about a tower-building game (a card game with a 10-point win condition), which is not Arschmallows content. It is ignored.