FaeKin Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Contents
• Set Up
• Goal
• Play
• Ending the Game
• 2- and 3-Player Mode
• Jokers Variant

Contents

• 14 Summer Court cards
• 14 Winter Court cards
• 1 Crown card
• 1 Dagger card
• 2 Joker cards

Set Up

1. Place the Crown and Dagger cards in the center of the table.
2. Shuffle the Summer and Winter Court cards into a 28-card deck. Deal three cards to each player. Be sure each player gets at least one card from each of the two Courts.
3. Each player examines their hand of three cards. Their highest Rank card determines their identity, which Court they belong to, and their Rank within that Court. In the case of a tie for the highest card in a player's hand, the two cancel one another out and the third card represents their identity.
4. The player who told the most recent lie goes first.

Goal

Crown the player in your Court with the highest Rank and Dagger the player in the opposing Court with the highest Rank. These are known as the Heirs of each Court.

Play

Players take turns in clockwise order.

1. On your turn, place a card from your hand face down in front of another player, challenging them to a duel.
2. The challenged player selects any one of the cards in their hand and places it face down.
3. Each of you secretly looks at the other's card and returns it to the original owner.
4. Whoever played the lower card must reveal it to the group, placing it face up in front of themself. Point the revealed card toward the winner of the duel, indicating the season of the winning card. In the case of a tie, neither card is revealed.

The cards range in Rank from (lowest to highest) 1-10, J, Q, K, and A.

For example: Jamie duels Sam and plays a Summer 8 card face down in front of Sam. Sam plays a Winter Q face down in front of Jamie. Both secretly look at the other's card, before returning the cards to their original owners. Jamie, having lost the duel, flips over the Summer 8 card, placing it face up in front of themself.

Your identity does not change if your card is revealed during a duel. Revealed cards may not be used in future duels unless all three of your cards are revealed.

Ending the Game

At any time during the game, a player may trigger the end of the game by touching the Crown and Dagger cards. The first player to touch the cards makes a claim, attempting to identify the Heirs of both Courts. A Court's Heir is the player from that Court with the highest Rank.

When making a claim, they place the Crown card in front of the player they guess is their Court's Heir. Similarly, they place the Dagger card in front of the player they guess is their rival Court's Heir.

Players then discuss and may attempt to convince the player to move the Dagger and/or Crown. Players may deceive each other right up until the player who makes the claim chooses to "lock in" their claim, at which time all players reveal all cards. While players may lie throughout the game, they may not reveal their cards to anyone until the claim is locked in.

If both the Crown and Dagger cards are correctly placed in front of the Heirs, the player who made the claim and their Court win! If either guess is incorrect, the rival Court wins!

If all players belong to the same Court, they only win together if they leave the Dagger and correctly place the Crown with their Heir.

All cards are shuffled and returned to the deck, and a new game begins with a new starting player.

2- and 3-Player Mode

During setup for a two- or three-player game, deal six additional Court cards, face down: three for each of your new fae opponents, Sorcha and Maeve.

For each fae, reveal one card of a Court that the fae has at least two cards of. If the revealed card is an Ace ("A"), reshuffle and re-deal all cards.

These fae will not duel players, but players will want to duel them to uncover information about their hands. You may only duel Sorcha or Maeve if you have at least as many revealed cards as that opponent does.

Gameplay continues as normal. Sorcha and Maeve may be the Heirs of the Courts, so be sure to collect as much information as possible through duels before making a claim!

Jokers Variant

Shuffle in the two Joker cards and continue with setup. Gameplay proceeds as normal.

The Joker's rank is a 0. In a duel, Jokers will lose to any number card (1-10), but will defeat any face card (J, Q, K, or A).