Word Whimsy Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Components
• Setup
• Getting Ready for the First Turn
• Playing a Turn
• Ending the Game
• Additional Notes

Components

• 50 Red Prompt Cards
• 250 Word Cards: 170 Single Word Cards; 80 Double Word Cards
• 15 Blank Cards: 5 Red Prompt Cards; 10 Word Cards (make your own cards out of these!)
• 60 Point Chips: 12 each of numbers 1 through 5
• 7 Envelopes: used for submitting your cards to the Referee
• 5 Variant Rules Cards

Setup

1. Shuffle all of the Word Cards together. Put the Word Cards into a face-down stack in the middle of the play area so that each player can reach them. (You can split them into multiple stacks to make reaching them easier.)
2. Shuffle all of the Red Prompt Cards together. Put them into a face-down stack in the middle of the play area.
3. Sort the point chips into twelve separate "Point Stacks," each stack consisting of one of each different color chip. (In other words, each Point Stack contains a 1, a 2, a 3, a 4, and a 5.)
4. If you are playing with six or seven players, you're ready to go! If you are playing with five players, remove the "5 point" chip from each Point Stack. If you're playing with four players, remove the "5 point" and the "4 point" chips, and so forth.

Note: When getting ready to play for the first time, take a second and make sure each player is on the same page about how to put the cards in the envelope in the right order, as it can be a bit tricky your first game. See the illustrated example for more details.

Optional rule for five or seven players: In a five-player game, you may remove two Point Stacks so that everyone gets to Referee the same number of times. In a seven player game, remove five Point Stacks to accomplish this.

Getting Ready for the First Turn

1. The player with the biggest mouth is the first Referee.
2. Each player, including the first Referee, draws a hand of seven Word Cards.

Playing a Turn

1. The Referee flips over a Red Prompt Card and reads it aloud.

2. Each player (other than the Referee) chooses any number of Word Cards in his or her hand, orders them so they form a phrase, and puts them in an envelope. You can choose one card, you can choose all seven of your cards, or you can choose any number in between. These cards, when read in order, will form a phrase, such as "Zombie Walrus Chicken." If you have a "Double Word" card, you may turn the card upside down to choose the other word.

   How to submit your cards using the envelope: When you look at the front of the envelope and pull the submission out, the cards should be facing you. The card that is "on top" of the other cards is the card that should be read first. The card beneath that one should be read second, and so forth.

   Example: If the Referee flips over the Red Prompt Card "Most Likely to Win in a Fight," you might submit the phrase "Colossal Samurai Puppies" using your envelope as illustrated below. "Colossal" is on top, and "Puppies" is on the bottom.

   (Illustration: an envelope marked "First card to be read", with the cards Colossal, Samurai, Puppies sticking out in that order, Colossal on top.)

3. The Referee mixes up the submitted envelopes so that nobody knows who submitted which one, and rereads the Red Prompt Card aloud. Then, one at a time, the Referee takes the cards from the envelopes and reads the submissions aloud. He or she then takes one of the Point Stacks and distributes one chip to each submission, ranking each submission according to how well he or she feels it responds to the Red Prompt Card. The first place submission is awarded the highest numbered point chip, and so forth. Note that in a 7-player game, last place doesn't score any points!

4. The Referee collects all of the cards played that round and puts them in a discard pile.

5. Each player draws cards until he or she has seven cards in hand, the player to the left of the Referee becomes the new Referee, and you start a new round!

Ending the Game

Once enough rounds have passed that all of the point chips have been awarded, the game is over. Each player totals up his or her points, and the player with the most is the winner!

Additional Notes

• Remember that the Red Prompt Card is always being seen from the Referee's perspective, so if the card is "I hope they have this in heaven," it's what the Referee hopes is in heaven.
• If you decide to use your blank cards, keep in mind that adjectives and nouns generally make the best cards.
• If you run out of Word Cards in the middle of a game, simply shuffle all of the discarded words back together.