Dr. Gomb
Dr. Gomb Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Components
GET THEM RIGHT, SEW THEM TIGHT! Dr. Button – Upgrade your mind!
For 2-5 players. Length of the game: about 45 minutes. Above 8 years of age.
Content:
- 120 cards (in 5 colors, each of them containing 5 copies of number 1 cards and 4 copies of number 2, 3, 4 and 5 cards, as well as 1 broken button, 1 joker button and 1 surprise button)
- 1 rule booklet
The Aim of the Game
Players will collect button sequences of the same color with different numbers (from 1 to 5), but there should always be one single button in every collection, which must have a different color and numbering than the rest of the buttons. This one card is called the odd one out. Each player can start only one sequence of each color, so they can compile 5 different sequences at most.
There are 24 copies of each red, green, blue, pink and yellow buttons, showing the value of each card with a number on the top and a picture in the middle. One numbering can only be once in a sequence, and it is mandatory to have ONE AND ONLY ONE odd one out of a different color. Each player should have an odd one out card of a different color and numbering in each of his sequences. (You can see in the example below that a perfect game contains odd one out cards in five different colors and numbering.)
[Illustration: five example sequences, one per color, each with its odd one out card.]
Your aim is to collect as many victory points as possible with your sequences. The winner is the most cunning player who has the most points when the drawing deck runs out.
Settings
With 2 players you should randomly discard 30 cards from the deck, while with 3 players you should discard 20 cards, putting them back in the box without looking at them. After preparing the deck in this way, shuffle the cards properly and set aside 10 randomly chosen cards turned face down. This will be the so called talon. Put the rest of the cards in the middle of the table turned face down where everyone can easily reach them. This will be the drawing deck. It can be practical to turn the talon 90 degrees compared to the drawing deck to easily distinguish between them.
Turn two cards from the top of the drawing deck face up and put them next to the drawing deck. These will be the discard piles, so you will have one drawing deck, two discard piles and one talon.
The player with the most buttons on their clothes will be the starting player.
The game can be played in two modes: you can choose the easier basic mode or the normal mode which offers you much bigger challenge. First we introduce the basic mode.
Gameplay of the Basic Mode – Button to Button!
From the starting player and proceeding clockwise every player should perform exactly one of the following actions:
- A – drawing a card from the drawing deck.
- B – drawing a card from one of the discard piles.
- C – choosing one complete sequence played in front of him and discarding every card of it to the discard piles, distributing them in any order he wishes.
Note: Whether you draw a card from the draw deck or a discard pile, you can always draw only the topmost card of the chosen deck. If a player draws the last card of a discard pile, it should be immediately replaced with another card from the top of the drawing deck, placing it face up.
You can do one of the following actions with the card you just drew:
- play it in front of you, starting or continuing one of your own sequences, or
- place the card on one of the discard piles.
Playing a Card
If you decide to play a card, it must be placed on the table face up in front of you, where every player can clearly see it. If you do not have a button in that color yet, you can start a new sequence. If you have one or more buttons of that kind, you can place the card on top of the same kind of your button cards, according to the illustration above. You have to keep your cards sorted by color, a little bit shifted on each other, showing only the numbers and illustrations on top of each card all the time.
Please note that if the card you wish to play already touched one card of a sequence, you must place it in that one!
You do not have to collect the cards in numerical order, and you can rearrange your cards within each sequence anytime, or you can even place your newly played cards at the appropriate spot of a sequence according to numerical order, indeed, you can relocate complete sequences of yours, to be able to see the order of your cards more clearly in each sequence.
However, since the aim of the game is to have one odd one out card in each sequence, you should not forget to play one card in each row which shows a button of a different color and numbering than the rest of the cards in that sequence. Of course, when rearranging the order of your cards, you can never put a card into another sequence than the one you originally played it into!
Putting a Card on a Discard Pile
You have to form the discard piles so that their topmost card completely covers the cards underneath. (The cards played in front of you on the table should be kept shifted on each other.) If a player already played his twenty-fifth card, he keeps drawing cards from the drawing deck in his own turns, but this time he will try to hinder his opponents.
Special Cards in Basic Mode
There are three special cards in basic mode, which work according to the following description:
-
Joker button (star): If somebody draws such a card, he can place it (but it is not mandatory) into one of his sequences according to the regular rules. He only has to determine the value of the card at the end of the game (from 1 to 5).
-
Broken button (exclamation mark): If somebody draws such a card, he must discard a button (card) of the same color from any of his own sequences. In this case both the discarded card and the broken button are out of the game (put them back in the box).
In case the ability of the broken button does not come into effect (because the player does not have any button in the given color to be discarded), the broken button must be placed on one of the discard piles!
-
Surprise button (question mark): If somebody draws such a card, he can go through the cards of the talon (although, it is not mandatory, the surprise button can also be placed on one of the discard piles). He can pick all cards of the talon which has the same color as the surprise button and can play them into his own sequences. However, if the player finds a broken button in the talon, he cannot pick any cards, but the ability of the broken button comes into effect immediately, thus he has to choose one card of his own sequences with the same color as the broken button and discard both of them out of the game (back into the box).
After this the player puts back the talon to its original place and does not tell the others, what cards it contains.
End of the Game
The game ends when the draw deck runs out. (The talon can still contain cards.) The active player can still place his last card in front of him or put it on one of the discard piles, and after that everybody should proceed to the final scoring (see the SCORING section).
Gameplay of the Normal Mode – The Secret of the Sewing Box
The normal game mode is really simple, but still provides serious brain training to the players. In this mode players use the rules of the basic game, with the following exceptions:
Players should always keep their cards shifted upwards on each other, showing only the number of the topmost card while the rest of the cards of the sequence cover each other, so that only the buttons at the bottom of the cards could be seen. In this mode you cannot rearrange your cards during game play and you are NOT ALLOWED to take a look at the cards underneath until the very end of the game.
Note: Try to keep the cards played in front of you in a vertical position. You cannot use unique signs to memorize your cards (e.g. you cannot turn the topmost card 45 degrees to remember lacking a certain card). During the normal game mode you can only rely on your own memory skills, instincts and sometimes on your luck.
In this game mode the active player can also choose a third action instead of drawing a card or discarding one, with the following modification:
- C – choosing exactly three cards played in front of him and discarding them on the discard piles in any order he wishes. It can be useful in a situation where a player realizes only after playing certain cards that he made a wrong move. Please note, that a broken button cannot be discarded!
How the Special Cards Work in Normal Mode
- Broken button (exclamation mark): If somebody draws such a card, he must cover the topmost card of one of his sequences which has a DIFFERENT color than the broken button (so he cannot cover a card of the same color). The broken button cannot be played as the first card of a sequence, and cannot be played on an already finished sequence. In case the player cannot play the broken button properly, it has to be placed on the top of a discard pile.
The rules of the joker button (star) and the surprise button (question mark) remain unchanged.
Scoring
Scoring works the same way in both game modes. At the end of the game all card sequences have to be spread and organized according to their numbers so that everybody can see all of them (in the normal game the broken button should be discarded while the covered cards remain in play), and after that you have to check how many buttons each player collected and if any of the numbers are missing from their sequences.
Do not forget that every odd one out card has to be different from each other in both color and numbering. Players can now determine the value of the joker cards in their sequences, but this value can only be one which is not included in the sequence yet.
- Cards which are not part of a continuous sequence should be discarded and will not be scored. (Printed callout beside this item: "We treat these cards as a unique sequence.")
- If the odd one out card of a sequence was removed or it never even had one, the whole sequence should be discarded.
- If there are at least two odd one out cards of the same color that is incorrect gameplay, the faulty sequence or sequences should be discarded, so you can keep only one of those sequences.
- If one sequence contains two or more odd one out cards of the same numbering that does not count as an incorrect game, it should not be discarded, but it will add up 0 extra points. (The player, of course, will get the normal points.)
Each of the sequences and the sequence consisting of the odd one out cards should be scored according to the two following tables:
| Numbering of the cards in a sequence | Scores | Extra points scored for the sequence of the odd one out cards |
|---|---|---|
| 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5 | 11 points | 44 points |
| 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 | 8 points | 33 points |
| 1 – 2 – 3 | 5 points | 22 points |
| 1 – 2 | 3 points | 11 points |
| 1 | 1 point | 1 point |
| If number 1 is missing from a sequence | 0 point | 0 point |
| If a number occurs more than once in a sequence | 0 point | 0 point |
| If the odd one out card is missing from a sequence | Incorrect gameplay! |
Note: item 3 above calls two or more odd one out cards of the same color incorrect gameplay, while the last table row calls two odd one out cards in two sequences of the same color correct gameplay (0 points). The printed wording differs; both are transcribed as printed.
Scoring consists of two separate steps. Firstly, you score the cards standing in continuous, regular sequences. Secondly, you check how many extra points you collected from the odd one out cards. Note that the odd one out cards should also form a continuous sequence.
Example for scoring: Anna tried to collect all kinds of buttons during a normal game. Her sequences are shown on the following illustration, after she revealed and organized her cards.
[Illustration: Anna's revealed sequences, as printed in the rulebook.]
Anna gets 11 points for her blue sequence, since it contains every card from 1 to 5 and exactly one odd one out card. She gets 5 points for her red sequence, since the green joker card (also the odd one out) replaces number 2, and she discards number 5, since it does not connect to the sequence continuously. Her green sequence is worth 8 points, since it contains every card from 1 to 4 and exactly one odd one out card (yellow 3).
Her pink sequence is worth 0 points, since number 3 is missing from it, so she has to discard red 4 and pink 5, since they did not stand in a continuous sequence, therefore no odd one out card will remain in the sequence, so the last two cards should be discarded too.
Her yellow sequence is worth 0 points, since the broken button covered a number 3, which was already in the sequence, so this full sequence should be discarded together with the odd one out card. As the second step of scoring Anna gets 22 extra points for her odd one out cards (because of the pink 1, green 2 and yellow 3 cards, standing in valid, continuous sequences), so by the end of the game she has 46 points.
Every player should summarize their points for each of their sequences. The player who collected the most points will be the winner – and the successor of Dr. Button!