Hool!
Hool! Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Overview
Designer: Elwood T. Baker (Gin Rummy) | Illustrator: Wanjin Gill
Ages 8+ | 2-4 players | 20 minutes
Use the cards in your hand to make three-card melds. Be the first to play all of the cards out of your hand to win, but if you think your cards are low enough, you can call for a quick end to the round and see if you win immediately!
Melds
There are three kinds of melds you can build with your cards:
- Group — three or more cards of the same number.
- Run — consecutive numbers that are all the same color.
- Seven — a single 7 card, which may be melded on its own.
1. Deal the Cards and Start the Game
Each player is dealt 7 cards. On your turn, you may either draw the top card of the deck, or take the card on top of the discard pile that another player discarded.
A card you bring into your hand this way can then be melded (laid down on the table) using one of the three methods described above (a Group, a Run, or a lone Seven).
2. If You Have Nothing to Lay Down, Try Attaching
If a meld is already on the table (whether it belongs to you or to another player), you may attach a card from your hand to it, as long as the meld's shape stays valid afterward:
- Attaching a green 9 to a green 10-11 run keeps it a valid Run (now 9-10-11).
- Attaching to a green 7 by itself turns it into a new Run.
- Attaching a red 8 and a blue 8 to a yellow 8 keeps it a valid Group.
You may attach several cards at once, but after attaching, the meld must still be a legal Run or Group.
3. Stop When You've Met a Winning Condition
If you complete melds on the table (for example, a Group of 5s and a red Run), you may declare Hool!. If you do this without having used Attaching at all during the round, it is a Perfect Hool!
Before drawing a card on your turn, if the cards remaining in your hand add up to 10 points or less, you may declare Stop to end the round immediately.
Alternatively, if you have not melded (registered) any cards on the table yet, laying down every card in your hand at once on your turn is also called a Hool!. When a Hool! is declared, the round ends immediately and the declaring player wins.
Scoring
When a round ends, the cards left in players' hands are converted into penalty points against them:
- Add up the printed values of the cards remaining in your hand (each card's number is its point value). The lower this total, the lower your penalty.
- Holding an unmelded 7 raises your penalty sharply the more of them you're stuck with: one 7 doubles your penalty (×2), two 7s quadruple it (×4), and three 7s multiply it by eight (×8).
- If the round ended because a player declared Hool!, every other player's penalty is doubled (×2).
- If the round ended with a Perfect Hool! (a Hool! reached without using Attaching), every other player's penalty is quadrupled (×4) instead.
- Declaring Stop and taking a "Thank You" pickup (drawing the top card of the discard pile instead of the deck) also carry their own penalty checks, generally punishing a player who benefited from a Thank You pickup but still fails to finish first.
The exact point value of the Joker cards and the number of rounds that make up a full game are not stated in any public Playte/Gameology material found; check the rulebook insert included with the physical product for these details.
4. Once You've Enjoyed Hool!, Try Gin Rummy Too
Gin Rummy uses the same cards as Hool! and is played almost identically, but there is no step of laying down (registering) melds on the table partway through the round. Instead, you keep your Groups and Runs hidden in hand, and any cards that don't yet fit a meld count as Deadwood.
Try to guess how close your opponents are to completing their hand, and enjoy the tension of not knowing what they're holding!
Components
54 cards (values 1 through 13 in 4 colors, plus 2 Joker cards).
Publisher Note
Gin Rummy was devised by Elwood T. Baker. Wanjin Gill illustrated the cards. Published by Gameology Inc. (Playte) — www.playte.com.
For the full detailed rules text, refer to the rulebook included with the physical product.