Skull & Roses is a game of bluff and strategy. Children can play it from the age of 10 in a game of 3 to 6 players. Each player represents a biker gang. The objective of the game is to determine the leader of the bikers. To win the game, the player must complete 2 challenges.
Material
- 6 double-sided game mats,
- 6 packs of 4 cards: werewolves, panthers, snakes, bulls, eagles and himself.
- 1 rule booklet.
- Please note! Each pack of cards consists of 3 “Roses” and 1 “Skull” card.
Set up
- Everyone receives :
- 1 game mat to place on the “skull” side in front of them.
- 1 pack of 4 cards from the same family to keep secret.
- Designate a first player.
How do you play?
- Study your hand.
- Choose 1 card and place it face down on your board.
- The turn passes to the next player in a clockwise direction.
- On the second turn, each player will have the choice of :
- Place, face down, a second card.
Or
- Make a challenge.
- Be careful! To place a card on top of another card, shift it a little so that the card below is visible. This will make it easy to count the number of cards on top of each other.
Laying another card
- If you choose to play another card, your turn ends.
- The hand passes to the next player and so on.
Make a challenge
- If you do not wish to put down another card or are unable to do so, you can choose to make a challenge.
- To issue a challenge, announce the number of cards you are committed to turning over without running into a ‘skull’.
- Once a challenge has been issued, the rest of the players, in a clockwise direction, have the choice of :
- Raise: bid again
- Pass: place their board in the centre of the table.
- Go around the players until only one overbidder remains; he becomes the challenger.
- The second to speak in the bidding is called ‘under the gun’.
- The last to speak before the highest bidder is called ‘the cop’.
The challenge
- The challenger starts by revealing his own cards.
- The cards are revealed starting with the top card.
- The challenger is free to choose the order in which he reveals the opponent’s cards.
- He is not obliged to reveal all the cards of the same opponent.
- The cards are revealed one by one.
- When a player bets to reveal all the cards, he/she attempts a “burn out”.
Lost challenge
- The challenge is lost when the challenger reveals a ‘skull’.
- The reveal stops.
- The challenger shuffles all his cards, face down.
- The owner of the revealed ‘skull’ chooses a card from the challenger’s deck.
- The chosen card is discarded in the centre of the table without being revealed.
- The other players take their cards back.
- If the challenger is the owner of the skull, he chooses the card to be discarded.
Challenge won
- The challenge is won when the challenger turns over the number of cards announced without coming across a “skull”.
- He turns his mat over to the “Roses” side.
New round
- The previous challenger opens the new round.
Stoned
- Stoned is the name given to a player who has only one card left.
- If the stoned player loses his last card, he is eliminated from the game.
End of the game
- The game ends when a winner is determined.
- A player wins the game in one of the following 2 cases:
- He completes 2 challenges.
- He is the last player in the game.
