Bleeding Sherwood
Bleeding Sherwood Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Setup
Shuffle the Peasant deck and place it in the center of the table, with space for a line of target cards beside it. Shuffle the Goodes deck and deal a starting hand of five cards to each player.
Play starts on the dealer's left.
Each Round
On each round, there will be one or more Peasants (targets) in the center. Players will play Goodes from their hands, bidding to pick up their most desired targets.
Step 1: Reveal the Targets
From the Peasant Deck, deal cards faceup into the center of the table, until they reach a total minimum value as follows:
| Players | 2 | 3-4 | 5+ |
|---|---|---|---|
| Min Value | 5* | 25 | 30 |
*With two players, you always deal just one target from the Peasant Deck.
For example, with four players you reveal targets from the Peasant deck until you reach a total of 25 points or more. If either deck empties, the game ends immediately.
Bonus Cards: Some Peasants (most of the 5-point cards) come with an extra Goode card. Attach the next card from the green deck, face up, to these targets.
Special Cards: Some Peasants have special abilities. Each one explains what it does. Follow the special instructions after dealing out all the normal targets.
Step 2: Bid
Starting with the first player and proceeding to the left, players may play one Goode card from their hand, or pass. Your bid is equal to the total value of cards you play. You do not have to exceed the current bid. If you pass, you cannot play more bids. This may go around the table multiple times, until all players have passed.
Step 3: Collect
Starting with the highest bidder, each player takes a target from the table; either one of the targets in the center, or one of the spent bids. (Only spent bids become valid targets; you cannot collect your own bid, or one from a player who has not acted.) Each bidder acts in descending order, and afterwards anything left on the table is discarded.
Pickups: Goode cards that you pick up in this manner go into your hand. Peasants remain faceup on the table in front of you.
Ties: If multiple bids are tied, the earliest player is highest. That is, the person who bid earliest in this bidding round.
Zero Bid: If you play no cards, you have still made a bid of zero, and this may still capture a target. If more than one player bids zero, the earliest player is highest.
Next Round
The next round starts with the player who played the highest bid. Turn over new targets from the Peasant Deck as described above.
End of Game
The game ends when any player reaches a score of 100 points, or when either deck is empty. (If either deck empties after setting up a round, do not play that round.) Score the point values of all the Peasants you have collected. Bid cards remaining in your hand act as a tiebreaker only.
Congratulations, you have rebalanced the wealth of Sherwood Forest.
History
Bleeding Sherwood was one of the earliest Cheapass Games, shipping in the Fall of 1996. The original game was strikingly similar to this version, but with one major difference: There was only one target, and only the highest bid could capture anything.
This was a brutal game, but we liked it, because we had gotten good at it. Nobody else felt that way.
There were also some surprises in the Goodes deck, which screwed up the bidding in one way or another, but the main complaint with the game was that unless players were unreasonably conservative with their bidding, they ran out of bid cards.
Over the years we tried encouraging players to be smarter about how they bid, if they bid at all, but in the end we realized that one tiny change (that is, every bidder gets something) would make the game much better. James Ernest says this insight came from designing two hundred better games, but we'll let you be the judge.
In any case, we hope you will enjoy this new edition of Bleeding Sherwood, and play it in the spirit of good-natured self-serving capitalism!