Kampf der Magier
Kampf der Magier Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Components
The game contains 55 cards: 51 wizard cards, 2 crystal ball cards and 2 joker cards.
The cards show 13 wizards, each marked with a number that symbolizes its magical power. The 1 is the weakest wizard and the 13 is the most powerful wizard.
The crystal ball card lets the wizards freeze the wizard cards played in front of them, so that the next player must defeat them.
The joker card can be played in place of any card from 1 to 7. Higher-powered cards cannot be replaced by the joker.
Setup
The players choose one player to be the dealer. The dealer shuffles the cards and deals each player 6 cards face down. The remaining cards form a face-down draw pile.
Playing the Game
The player to the left of the dealer starts the game. On a turn, the active player plays one or more cards from their hand and announces the combined wizard power of the played cards.
-
If a player plays more than one card, the played cards must all have the same power. A joker can be played in place of any card from 1 to 7, even when the player plays several cards at once. In that case the joker takes on the same power as the card(s) played with it.
-
After their turn, each player draws cards from the draw pile until they again have 6 cards in hand.
-
The next player in turn plays one or more cards whose combined wizard power is higher than that of the previously announced wizard. The combined wizard power of the cards played by the player whose turn it is must always be higher than the wizard last announced. The only exception is the crystal ball: it does not change the wizard power, but it can be played at any time, passing on the defeat of the wizard in play to the next player.
-
The duel continues in this way for as long as the next player in turn can defeat the combined wizard power last announced, using the cards in their hand. When a player cannot defeat the last announced wizard, or does not want to, they must take all the cards played so far in the duel. These are the cards lying face up on the table. The player takes them, places them face down in a pile in front of them, and then starts a new duel by playing one card of their choice from their hand, or several cards, as described above.
-
When the draw pile runs out, the players can no longer top up their hands to 6 cards. The game continues until one player plays their last card from their hand.
Example
- Player A plays 1 card: a 1. Wizard power: 1.
- Player B plays 2 cards: two 3s. Combined wizard power: 6.
- Player C plays 1 card: a 12. Wizard power: 12.
- Player A plays 2 cards: two 5s and one joker. Combined wizard power: 15.
- Player B cannot defeat the 15 wizard, so Player B takes all the cards played so far.
End of a Round
A round ends when one player plays their last card from their hand. The other players then place the cards remaining in their hands onto the cards they have collected so far. Afterwards, each player counts the number of cards in their collected pile. Cards lying face up in the middle of the table are not counted when counting the collected cards.
End of the Game
The players play as many rounds as there are players in the game. After the last round, the players add up the number of cards they collected in each round. The player with the fewest cards in total wins the game.
Game Variant
The players place the cards they have taken face up, arranged in a single pile in front of them. During the game, the players may use the top card of this pile, which reduces the number of cards they have taken so far accordingly.