The Game of Bluffs. Rules
How to Play
Note on the game: This isn’t about winning or losing—it’s about being the last one to get drunk (an endurance challenge) and about sharing gossip, whether true or false (confessions).
Note on confessions: Confessions must always be about yourself. Sharing gossip about third parties is strictly forbidden.
Rules
A. Only women may participate; maximum number of players: 8, minimum: 4.
B. The deck contains 8 suits (anagrams of beer, brandy, gin, whiskey, rum, tequila, sweet wine, and vodka) and 8 cards per suit, making a 64-card deck, plus a wild card.
If you don’t have this kind of deck, you can use any other, even combining two decks as long as they’re identical (for example, a Spanish deck and a poker deck). Under no circumstances can there be more than 8 cards per suit or more than 8 suits, plus the wild card.
Types of cards:
1 (Shot): 11 points
10 (Mug): 10 points
3 (Pint): 9 points
6 (Half): 6 points
9 (Glass): 3 points
5 (Chupito/Small shot): 2 points
7 (Little glass): 1 point
2, 4, and 8: No points
Wild card: Advantage
Scoring by card values
Note: The wild card cannot be played on the first hand and may only be played by the person who won the previous hand. It offers an advantage to the player: she may skip drinking during the next rounds, eliminate as many negatives as she wants (before or after playing the wild card), or decide what drink everyone (herself included) must have for the rest of the game, regardless of which card begins the round.
SUIT HIERARCHIES: The suit is chosen each hand.
The “life suit” lasts the whole game, but in each new round (except the first), the current hostess throws a new card that will have higher value than the rest, except for the “life suit.”
beer, brandy, gin, whiskey, rum, tequila, sweet wine, and vodka. But the order depends on the life suit. Example:
If “rum” is the life suit, the order is: rum, tequila, sweet wine, vodka, beer, brandy, gin, whiskey.
If “brandy” is chosen as the hostess’s suit, the order is: rum, brandy, gin, whiskey, rum, tequila, sweet wine, vodka, and beer.
If someone plays a rum card and another plays a beer card, the rum wins, since it’s the "life suit."
C. How to deal cards per player:
8 players: each gets 8 cards, discard 1 from the deck.
7 players: 9 cards each, discard 2.
6 players: 10 cards each, discard 5.
5 players: 13 cards each.
4 players: 16 cards each, discard 1.
NOTE: Discarded cards (if any) are the first to come from the deck before dealing.
If the wild card is discarded, it may only be replaced by the 2 of the life suit—but only if the player has already won a round. If the 2 is also discarded, the wild card cannot be recovered.
No other card can substitute for the wild card.
SCORING:
Points: scored according to the cards played each round.
Positives: Each new hostess (except the first) gets a positive at the end of the previous round.
Negatives: Each “bluffer” or “failed snitch” gets a negative.
D. Choosing the hostess.
First round: the player who drinks a half-liter mug of beer the fastest becomes hostess. The card she plays is the life suit for the game.
Subsequent rounds: hostess is chosen by the previous round’s winner. The card played by the new hostess is only valid for that round, never outranking the life suit.
The player to the hostess’s left serves drinks; the one to her right deals cards.
After dealing, the hostess throws the opening card, representing the life suit (the drink for everyone). Only do this after everyone has finished their drink.
E. In the first round (and only the first), all players must play a card matching the hostess’s suit. Anyone who doesn’t (for any reason, regardless of accusations) must take a card from the hostess and drink an extra drink in the next round.
In subsequent rounds, players may play any card, unless the hostess plays a life suit card.
Each round, every player plays only one card. The highest scoring card (respecting the life suit priority) wins and becomes the next hostess.
If there’s a tie for points, the player closest to the current hostess wins. This also applies for passing on the hostess title.
The new hostess will play a card, which won’t be the life suit unless she gives up her hostess title to the next highest scorer in exchange for not drinking in the next round.
F. The Snitch:
If a player plays a card not matching the suit, any other player can shout “BLUFFER!” at her.
If the accused had a card of that suit but didn’t play it, she gets a negative and must drink a glass or take a card from the snitch (who also gets a positive).
The positive winner can choose:
Skip a drink in the next round and lose the positive.
Drink in the next round and make everyone else drink double at the start of the next round, and lose the positive.
Take a card from the previous hostess and lose the positive.
Do nothing and keep the positive until the end.
If there was no bluff, the snitch gets a negative and must take a card from each player or drink two glasses.
How to clear a negative:
Drink three glasses at the start of the next round,
Tell a truth,
Or drink two glasses and keep the negative until the end (this last choice can only be changed if the player later gets a positive).
G. How to lose the game:
Whoever runs out of cards first loses.
Whoever has the fewest positives loses. In case of a tie, the lowest point total loses.
Any negative means a positive for every other player.
H. The final hostess must ask the loser a question.
The loser must answer, truth or lie, beginning with:
“I’ll answer with the truth (or a lie): …”
She must be convincing. If the others think the answer is:
Coherent/true > each drinks a glass and the hostess tells a joke.
Incoherent/false > the loser drinks a glass and tells a joke.
I. End of the game:
Game ends when fewer than 3 players remain standing, whatever the original number.
J. Other game options
Some drinks, by unanimous vote, may be substituted, including non-alcoholic drinks and water.
The game can switch gender: only men. In that case, only lies and jokes are allowed. The loser cannot say “I’ll tell the truth.” It’s understood that only tall tales are told, whether true or false.