Kuhhandel: Festival Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Goal
• Contents
• Setup (3-5 players)
• Gameplay
• Auction
• Special cases in the auction
• Cow trade (Kuhhandel)
• Triples
• Copycat cards
• End of game and scoring
• The 2-player game
  • Setup
  • Gameplay

Goal

The festival season begins. Each player tries to use their Kuhpons cleverly and to collect as many valuable cow triples as possible through auctions and cow trades.

The winner is the player who has the most points at the end, by multiplying the values of their triples by their number of triples.

Note on language: For readability only, the German manual uses the generic masculine; all forms are meant gender-neutrally.

Contents

• 40 cow cards (9 cow quartets with the values 10, 30, 60, 100, 150, 220, 300, 400 and 500, plus 4 "Copycat" cards)
• 40 Kuhpon cards (= money): 10 each of 0 and 100; 5 each of 10, 20, 50 and 200

The three card types are called Kuh-Karten (cow cards), Copycat-Karten (Copycat cards) and Kuhpon-Karten (Kuhpon cards, money).

Setup (3-5 players)

• Shuffle the cow cards face down. In a 4- or 5-player game, deal all 40 cards out evenly to the players (10 or 8 cards each). In a 3-player game, first remove one Copycat card and then deal the 39 cow cards evenly (13 cards each). Each player places their cow cards in a face-down stack in front of them.
• Deal the Kuhpon cards as follows: each player receives 2 cards of value 0 (for bluffing), 2 cards of value 100, and 1 each of 10, 20, 50 and 200 (= 8 Kuhpons per player). Keep your Kuhpons face down in your hand. If you are playing with fewer than 5 players, return the remaining Kuhpon cards to the game box.

The special rules for the 2-player game are at the end.

Gameplay

Whoever of you owns the biggest pet starts. After that, play passes clockwise. On your turn, you choose one of the following two actions:

• Either: Versteigerung (auction)
• Or: Kuhhandel (cow trade)

Then the next player takes a turn and again chooses one of the two actions, and so on.

Note: At the start of the game only auctions are possible, because there can be no cow trade yet (see "Kuhhandel").

Auction

The auctioneer picks up their cow stack and chooses 2 cows from it (including Copycat cards), and places them face up in the middle of the table. Return the remaining cow cards to your stack, face down, in front of you.

All other players may now bid any amount for these 2 cards, as often as they like. (The auctioneer may not bid.) Each stated amount must exceed the previous highest bid by at least 10. When no higher bid is made, the auctioneer awards the cards, for example by calling: "130 to the first, 130 to the second ... and 130 to the third - sold!"

Once the cards are awarded, the following applies:

• Either the highest bidder takes the 2 cards and lays them face up, clearly visible and sorted by cow type (colour) in front of them. Cards of the same type are placed slightly offset on top of each other, so that their number is always visible. In return, the highest bidder gives the bid Kuhpons to the auctioneer.
• Or the auctioneer uses their Vorkaufsrecht (right of first refusal) instead and takes the cow cards themselves. To do this, immediately after the award, the auctioneer pays the highest bidder as many Kuhpons as the highest bidder bid.

Note: Cards from your cow stack can never be placed directly in your display. They must always be auctioned first.

Point values: The game has 9 different cows with point values from 10 to 500. Of each cow type there are four cards, of which you need to collect only 3 (= 1 triple). What happens to the 4th card of that type is explained below.

Each triple scores, at the end of the game, the points belonging to its cow type. For example, three Punk cows (yellow) together score 150 points, and three Country cows (green) together score 220 points.

Special cases in the auction

• Nobody bids? If, after a reasonable time, nobody bids, the auctioneer takes the 2 cards for free as the auctioneer.
• No matching Kuhpons? Kuhpons are never exchanged or given as change. A player who cannot pay the exact amount must pay a higher amount. This also applies to the auctioneer if they use their right of first refusal.
• Unable to pay? A player who cannot raise the bid they have made (and the auctioneer does not use their right of first refusal) must show all their Kuhpons. The auction is then repeated. In this repeated auction, that player may of course not bid more than they have.

Cow trade (Kuhhandel)

Instead of an auction, you may make a cow trade with another player. To do so, you tell them which up to 2 cows the trade concerns. Both of you must own these cows (the cows are ones already lying face up in front of you). If the trade concerns 2 cows, they must be different: you may not offer a cow trade with 2 identical cows, even if they are on display.

Then you make a face-down bid by placing an amount in Kuhpon cards face down on the table. The number of Kuhpon cards is up to you, but must be visible. It is explicitly allowed to add 0-value cards to your bid, or to play only 0-value cards (that is, to bluff).

The challenged player then has two options:

• Either: Acceptance. The challenged player accepts your face-down bid. In exchange, they give you the cow or cows that were traded for.
• Or: Counter-bid. They place a face-down counter-bid on the table. In this case the bid Kuhpon cards are exchanged and counted secretly. Whoever bid more receives the other player's cow or cows.

Important: Each player keeps the Kuhpons they received from the other player.

Notes:

• If the challenged player bid exactly as much as you, you both take your bids back. You must then open this cow trade again, with (possibly different) face-down Kuhpon cards. If you bid the same a second time, you receive the cow card or cards. The money stays exchanged.
• "Copycat" cards can never be part of a cow trade.

Triples

As soon as you have 3 cards of the same cow type (colour) in front of you, through an auction or a cow trade, they form a triple and are pushed together. Triples are safe and cannot be changed until the end of the game. The 4th card of this cow type must now be changed:

• If at this moment it lies in front of someone on the table, that player turns it 180 degrees. It thus becomes the "black sheep" of its cow family, and at the end of the game it counts its coloured amount as negative points.
• If it is still in someone's cow stack, that player searches it out and places it on their money stack, also turned 180 degrees. Its coloured amount now counts for the rest of the game as an additional Kuhpon!

Note: Both cases also apply if the 4th card is in the possession of the player who formed the triple.

The printed sidebar summary of this rule reads: the 1 or 2 further cards of this type are now turned 180 degrees, and so become either negative points (on the table) or money (in hand).

Copycat cards

The "Copycat" cards, which can represent any cow type, are auctioned like other cows. As soon as you receive such a card, you place it face up in front of you. You must decide immediately where to place the Copycat: either together with any cow type of your choice, or separately next to the cows you already have, in anticipation of a new cow type.

Note: It is possible that you must turn over a cow card to which you have assigned a Copycat, because of an opponent's triple (= negative points). In that case you may assign the Copycat to a different cow type, or place it separately. A Copycat is never turned over (which is recognisable from the missing number on the edge of the card).

Triples can be formed by adding at most one Copycat card to them (never more!). In this case 2 cards of that cow type remain, and these are treated exactly as described above. It is not possible to form another triple from the other two cards by adding a Copycat card, because by that point they have already been turned over as negative points on the table or as Kuhpon in hand.

End of game and scoring

If you have only 1 cow card left in your stack, you offer it for auction on its own. If you have no cards left, you must offer a cow trade, provided you still have cow cards in front of you that do not yet belong to triples. If you have none of these either, you drop out of the current game and wait until every other player does the same.

When all 9 triples are complete, the game ends. You now determine your points as follows:

1. Add the triples. Add up the values of your triples.

   Reminder: The number on each cow type gives the point value of the whole triple (for example, 3 Metal cows are worth 400 points together, not 1200).

2. Multiply. After adding up the points, multiply this sum by the number of your triples.

   Important: Count your Kuhpons first! The player with the most Kuhpons receives an additional multiplier of 1. If several players have the most Kuhpons at the end, all of them receive the additional multiplier.

3. Add the Copycats. Each Copycat adds another +50 points (regardless of whether it is part of a triple or lies on its own).

4. Subtract. Then subtract from the total score all "black sheep" that lie in front of you.

Example of scoring:

• Anne has 4 triples with a total of 540; 4 x 540 = 2160 points. From this she subtracts her 2 "black sheep" with values of -200 and -100, giving 1860 points in total.
• Benno has 3 triples with a total of 510, the most Kuhpons, 2 Copycats and one "black sheep" (-200), giving 4 x 510 + 50 + 50 - 200 = 1940 points in total.
• Claudi has 2 triples (with a total of 720), likewise the most Kuhpons, 1 Copycat and 2 "black sheep" (-10 and -100), giving 3 x 720 + 50 - 110 = 2100 points in total. Winner!

The player with the most points is the winner. In case of a tie, the player with the least valuable triple wins.

The 2-player game

Setup

Set up the game according to the basic rules, with the following difference: each player receives ten cow cards from the well-shuffled deck. Then place the remaining twenty cards as a neutral face-down draw pile in the middle of the table.

Take the usual number of Kuhpons. Then shuffle all remaining Kuhpons and draw 10 random cards from them, which you place as a neutral face-down stack next to the other draw pile.

Gameplay

The cow trade remains the same as in the basic game. Auctions, however, work somewhat differently: you either auction 2 cards from your own personal cow stack as before, or you auction the top 2 cards of the neutral cow stack plus one card from the neutral Kuhpon stack, placing the cow cards face up and the Kuhpon card face down. Your opponent states their bid for the 2 cards (from your personal auction stack) or for the 3 cards (from the neutral draw piles). If you agree to the sale, your opponent pays you the bid and places the cow cards in front of them as usual. The Kuhpon is taken into your own Kuhpons without showing it to the other player.

Here too, in both cases you may use your right of first refusal, by paying your opponent their bid amount, in order to take the 3 cards from them (case A) or to hand them over to them (case B).

If, among the 2 cards offered from the neutral draw pile, there are 1 or 2 cows for which a triple is already lying face up, these cows immediately become "black sheep", that is, they are turned 180 degrees and thus become negative points. However, they are still auctioned!

Your opponent must then decide:

• A) Either they bid as usual: "I bid X money to take them, that is, I receive them."
• B) Or they bid the other way round: "I bid X money not to take them, that is, you receive them!"

Here too you may use your right of first refusal, paying the opponent's bid to them, in order either to take the 3 cards from them (case A) or to hand them over to them (case B). All other rules remain the same.

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Remaining printed credits (designer, author, illustration, art direction, design, editing, publisher address and copyright line) are omitted from this transcription.