cross-posted from: https://beehaw.org/post/7415121
The game in question is Guandan, where you and your teammate try to make poker hands to discard your cards before the opposing pair does, which lets you level up. Teams can only win the entire match by reaching level A while avoiding having the player who discards all cards last.
The game looks interesting, has anyone played?
Removed by mod
Sounds a lot like Tichu, a team-based 4 player trick taking game where you play quadi-Poker hands and try not to be the last out with cards in hand. Our group has a lot of fun with that, although Tichu seems simplified in a few areas. You have 14 cards each instead of 27, there is only a single wild card, you count points instead of levels, and bombs are more rare.
This might be an interesting upgrade.
Tichu is the bomb, literally.
Never played, but thought it was interesting that it’s not played for money. More importantly playing it for money is viewed as being in very poor taste.
My understanding wasn’t that they weren’t gambling, just that they claimed they weren’t (gambling is illegal in China). The Chinese have a reputation for loving gambling, despite its illegality.
Chinese officials have been censured in the past for receiving bribes through the playing of card games
How would this happen if they weren’t gambling?
Yes, we do. Small stakes gambling is part of our culture, even kids do it on festivals
Yeah that’s what was surprising. I read that this game specifically discourages gambling, but like you said, maybe they were just making sure they don’t get their hands slapped
I’ve played a lot of Applewood lately. I love shedding games but I prefer ones were bombing is very limited or non-existent (Dalmuti is awesome without bombs, and Haggis (Applewood’s predecessor) strikes a fun balance where there are bombs but they’re fairly distributed).
When bombs are too plentiful, sequencing your hand gets foggy.
