Calaboose
Calaboose Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Contents
74 Playing Cards, 1 Sherriff's Badge
Set Up
Shuffle the cards and deal five cards to each player. Hand the Sherriff's Badge to the person to the dealer's left. That person will play first. Place the stack of remaining cards face down in the center of the table. This is the draw pile. During play, discard cards face up next to the draw pile.
Winning
The winner is the player with the highest bounty in his or her jail when the game ends.
Jail
Your jail is a collection of cards that will be placed face up and side by side on the table in front of you. It only has 5 cells, and can never have more than 5 cards. This is important because you only get points for the cards in your jail. In the beginning of the game, your jail is empty.
Play
Play progresses clockwise around the table. On your turn, you can do one of three things:
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Put a card face up in an empty cell in your jail. A jail can never have more than 5 cards, and you cannot replace one with another, so you can only do this if your jail doesn't already have 5 cards in it.
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Turn one of your jail cards face down. This is called locking down the card. You can only lock down a card when your jail has 5 cards in it. Once locked down, a card may not be turned back over, targeted, used, or taken out of the game. When you lock down a card, announce it to the group. After that, you do not have to remind players what card it is. Locked down cards are included when scoring.
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Send a card to someone else's jail. Select a card from your hand (not from your jail) and place it in front of the other player's jail – either in an empty cell or overlapping a lower valued card (the card's value is on its top corners). For example, you could send a Bandit over to take the place of a Huckster, but not a Bandit over to take the place of another Bandit. If the jail is not defended (see below), your card stays in the other player's jail and the card it was overlapping is discarded. You cannot add a 6th card to a jail. It has to go into one of the 5 cells.
When you play a card, immediately draw another. You should always have 5 cards in your hand.
Defending Your Jail
When someone places a card in your jail, you can defend with a higher value card either from your hand or from your jail (we'll call this the defending card). When defending, discard the other player's card and send your defending card to someone else's jail – either to an empty cell or overlapping a lower-valued card. That person can now defend against your card. A defending card may never be placed back in the jail it came from, but must go to another player's jail. See the Example of Play.
Ending the Turn
Once players start sending cards to other people's jails, it's easy to get mixed up as to whose turn it is. The turn isn't over until everyone has finished defending their jails. When the turn is over, pass the Sherriff's Badge to the next player.
Ending the Game
There are three ways to end the game:
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Play ends when one player has locked down all five cards in his or her jail.
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Play ends when a card is played which cannot go anywhere. For example, if you try to send a Bandit to someone's jail, but everyone else's jail cells are full (and they aren't any Hucksters in them), the Bandit can't go anywhere, so the game is over. The game would also end if you defended with a card that can't go anywhere.
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Play ends when a player runs out of cards. You never reshuffle the draw pile. Once it's gone, it's gone. After this happens, players use up the cards in their hands. Once a player puts his or her last card down, the game is over.
Score
At the bottom of each card there is a "Bounty" table. This lists how much a Gang of that kind of cards is worth. For example, 2 Bandits are worth 20 (total, not each), but one Bandit is only worth 1. Gangs of lower valued cards (except for the Huckster) tend to be worth more.
For example, a hand of 2 Bandits, 2 Card Sharks, and one Gunslinger would be worth 34 points (20 for the Bandits, 15 for the Card Sharks, and 4 for the Gunslinger).
Bounty table (Gang / Value): 1 = 1, 2 = 20, 3 = 30, 4 = 45, 5 = 60.
Anatomy of a Card
- The value of the card. If the value is "X", it is a card that cannot be placed in a jail.
- Either a description or any special abilities the card may have (see the Gunslinger and the Bad Lawman).
- The card's value in the Jail. A "Gang" is a group of cards of the same type. For example, 2 Bandits are worth 20 total points.
The Cards
There are 74 cards in the game: 20 Hucksters, 19 Bandits, 15 Card Sharks, 10 Cattle Rustlers, 5 Gunslingers, 2 Bad Lawmen, 2 Bad Whiskey, and 1 Jail Break cards. Some of these cards have slightly different abilities than the rest.
Gunslinger: Gunslingers can be used to defend against other Gunslingers. When doing this, don't discard either Gunslinger. Instead, send both cards to another jail. Both must go to the same jail, and both must be dealt with individually
Bad Lawman: Bad Lawmen beat every other card in the deck except a Huckster. A Huckster can be placed on top of a Bad Lawman in another person's jail, and a Bad Lawman can be defended by a Huckster. You may not send a Bad Lawman to take the place of a Huckster. In effect, treat the value of a Bad Lawman as if it were less than that of a Huckster.
Bad Whiskey: Discard Bad Whiskey to trade hands (not jails) with any other player. This card is not played in a jail, but may be played at the start of your turn, before you do anything else. Bad Whiskey can also be played to stop someone from using Bad Whiskey: both players discard their Whiskey cards and keep their hands.
Jail Break: Discard Jail Break to discard all cards of any one type from your jail. For example, you could use this card to discard all the Hucksters from your jail, or all the Bandits, or all the Card Sharks, but you couldn't use it to discard cards of different types. This card is not played in a jail, but may be played at the start of your turn, before you do anything else. Locked down cards are not affected by Jail Break.
Series Play
Playing multiple games can be a lot of fun, because even when you find yourself not winning an individual game, you're still playing for points. Grab a pad of paper, and tally up each player's score at the end of each game. We recommend playing three hands of Calaboose. That gives the luck of the draw a chance to even out between all the players.
Optional Rules
It is never fun to start with a hand full of Hucksters. Whenever a person is dealt a hand with 4 or more Hucksters in it, that person may discard the Hucksters, and draw new cards. Only do this once at the beginning of the game. If you're dealt four Hucksters, and then draw four Hucksters… well, that's just really bad luck.
Terminology
Cell: A cell is a place in your jail where you keep a single prisoner. Every jail has five cells.
Defender: When you use a card to defend your jail, that card is called the Defender.
Gang: A Gang is a group of the same type of cards in your jail. i.e., 3 Bandits is a "Bandit Gang"
Hand: The group of cards you are holding in your hand is called your hand.
Jail: A group of (up to) 5 cards face up in front of you. Every jail starts empty.
Lock Down: When you turn a card face down in your jail, that cell is Locked Down.
Example of Play
Players: You, Me, and Lefty.
On your turn, you play a Huckster from your hand into an empty space in my jail. I defend against the Huckster with a Card Shark from my hand. The Huckster is discarded, and I decide to send the Card Shark to take the place of a Bandit in Lefty's jail. Lefty defends with a Gunslinger from his jail, so the Card Shark is discarded and his Bandit stays in his jail. The Gunslinger, however, was used to defend, and so has to leave his jail. Lefty decides to send it over to take the place of a Cattle Rustler in my jail. Since I cannot defend against the Gunslinger (because I have no cards high enough in value), my Cattle Rustler is discarded, and Lefty's Gunslinger stays in my jail. The turn is over, and you pass the Sheriff's Badge to Lefty.
On Lefty's Turn, Lefty plays a Bandit into the empty cell in his jail and then passes the Badge to me.