St Patrick
St Patrick Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Components
36 cards, 9 for each of the 4 suits (Shamrock, Harp, Celtic Cross, and Snakes), 15 Relics, and this rulebook. Grab a pen and paper to keep score.
Each suit has 4 colors numbered from 1 to 9: Clover (Green), Cross (White), Harp (Orange), and Snake (Black).
Snake cards from 1 to 9 are all worth 1 snake bite. The 7 of Cross and the 7 of Harp are both worth 3 snake bites. The 7 of Clover is the St Patrick card, and its holder starts the round.
Overview
St. Patrick is a trick-taking game played over several rounds in which you compete to retain the most life points by using Relics to avoid Snake bites. Each round has three phases: Deal cards, recovering Relics, and hunting Snakes.
But be careful! If you are greedy and ALL the Relics are recovered BEFORE the Snake hunt, the Relics turn to curses and each player will lose as many life points as the number of Relics they have collected.
1. Deal Cards
Place the 15 Relics in the middle of the table. Deal all the cards face down to the players. In a 3 player game, each player will have 12 cards. In a 4 player game, each player will have 9 cards.
During the first round, each player must simultaneously pass one card of their choice to the player on their left. They can pass any card they choose. In subsequent rounds, the player with the least points chooses the number of cards that everyone passes to their left: either 0, 1, or 2 (maximum). If there is a tie for the lowest score, the default is each player passes one card.
2. Recover Relics
Relics protect you from Snake bites.
The player who has the St Patrick card (7 Green) in hand starts recovering Relics. After analyzing their hand, they can choose to recover one or more Relics, by taking them from the middle of the table, or they may choose to pass and not take any Relics. Important: passing will not prevent a player from recovering Relics later, except if all players after them also pass.
Once this player has recovered Relics, the other players in clockwise order take turns also recovering Relics or passing. On their turn, players may take as many Relics as they choose, but they may never return any to the middle of the table. Keep taking turns recovering Relics or passing until all but one player passes or until all Relics are recovered. This phase ends at the end of a turn when either:
A. A player has recovered Relics and all following players decide to pass: The Relic recovery phase stops. Players keep their Relics in front of them and move on to phase 3: "Hunting the Snakes."
B. All the Relics have been taken: Your collective greed has caused the Relics to become cursed! Each player loses as many life points as the number of Relics they collected. A new Relics recovery phase is then started as follows:
- Retrieve all the Relics and place them back in the middle of the table.
- Each player simultaneously gives their full hand of cards to the player on their left.
- The player who now has the St Patrick card (7 Green) starts this new phase of Relics recovery.
Important: Do not re-deal the cards and do not repeat the first phase passing individual cards.
If all the Relics are taken again, repeat this phase: the players lose life points, give their hands to the player on their left, put the Relics back in the middle of the table, and restart recovering Relics again. Keep repeating this, until enough players pass during the Relics recovery phase and phase 3 "Hunting the Snakes" starts, or the hands are passed around the table and each player has had a chance to see and play each hand.
Special snake hunt if the hands have been fully passed around
After reducing their scores for the Relics they have taken, players keep their last hand and the Relics they collected and play that hand for the fun of seeing how it works out. Scoring in this special hunt is limited. Players cannot lose more Life points but can each regain 1 Life point if they succeed in taking equal or fewer snake bites than the number of Relics they retrieved.
3. Hunt Snakes
The player with the St. Patrick card (7 Green) in their hand leads the first card. They can play any card they choose from any suit. (They do not have to play the St Patrick card and they can lead a Snake card if they want.)
Like classic trick-taking games, play continues in clockwise order and the other players must each play a card of the same suit as the card that was led if they have one. They are not required to play a higher value card and can play any card provided it is in the suit that was led.
If a player does not have a card in the suit that was led, they can play any card of their choice from their hand. Regardless of the value of that card, if it is not in the same suit that was led they cannot win the trick.
The player who played the highest card in the suit that was led wins the trick, takes all the cards from that trick, and starts the next trick by leading a new card of their choice.
When a player wins a trick, all the cards in the trick with a Snake icon (meaning all the Snake cards (black), the 7 Harp (orange), and the 7 Celtic Crosses (white)) are placed face-up in front of them so that everyone can see them during the current round. The other cards are discarded face down.
Once all cards have been played, each player counts up their Snake bites as follows: Each Snake card (black) gives them 1 bite, the 7 Celtic Cross (white) and the 7 Harp (orange) gives them 3 bites each. Refer to the number of teeth marks on the cards to help keep count. All the other cards are harmless.
Once players have counted the bites they took, they remove from that score the number of Relics that they retrieved in order to determine their loss of life points. Mark down their life points on the score sheet accordingly. Unless the game end has been triggered, start a new round.
Tip: All Shamrock cards (green) are safe to pick up, regardless of their value, as are any orange or white cards other than the 7 Harp and the 7 Celtic Cross. Stay away from Snake cards!
The big sacrifice
If a player gets all the bites possible (15), they are rewarded for their remarkable sense of sacrifice. They are protected from harm and lose no life points, but all the other players each lose 3 life points in shame.
In this case, the number of Relics owned by the other players does not matter and will not protect them.
4. Game End
Play as many rounds as necessary until after a Snake hunt one of the players has lost at least 20 Life points bringing their life score to zero or below. This triggers the end of the game.
Finish that round and the Snake hunt, and then the winner is the player with the highest remaining Life score. (That could be below zero if everyone has lost all their Life points.)
If there is a tie, restart the whole game and play again until a single victor arises.
Credits
Conception: Haig Tahta, Sacha Tahta Alexander Illustrations: Bastien Jez Art director & graphic design: Yan Moussu Rédaction: Cédric Basso Proof reading: Matt Molandes
© 2022 Matagot