You are a Bartender! You are living your dream. You are the keeper of secrets and mysteries dedicated to ensuring the good times of others, but your Boss is tired of the business and wants to retire. Before he does he wants to know that he’s leaving the bar in good hands. Fortunately those good hands are yours; unfortunately your friends won’t just accept that. Your Boss will pit you against your friends in a contest to determine who has what it takes to run a bar. If that were it you’d be fine, but your friends are a bunch of backstabbing drama junkies. Watch your back! Let the games begin.
Bartender is a card game for 3 to 6 players.
Goals of the Game
There are two primary ways to win the game and one way to lose:
1. At the end of the week the player with the most GOOD NIGHT tokens wins the game.
2. At the end of any shift if the player in charge for the night has collected 20 points or more in PATRONs that player wins.
3. Any player who has collected 2 BAD NIGHT tokens loses the game and is knocked out of the contest.
Some cards may change the rules and conditions of victory, text printed on cards overrules any text found in this rulebook.
Setting up the Game
Take
the stack of 99 cards and shuffle and cut them. Place the GOOD NIGHT
and BAD NIGHT tokens in the center of the playing area. Deal each
player 5 cards. That’s it for set up.
Drafting
A
note about drafting: This drafting method is not designed to leave YOU
with the best cards in your hand. Its purpose is to give you a sense
of what cards are available to be played and to give you an idea of how
high you should bid during the auction or if you should bid at all.Each player looks at their 5 cards and chooses one then passes the other 4 cards to the right. Look at your next 4 cards and choose 1 then pass right. Do this until you are passed 1 card. You should have 5 cards. Take these 5 cards and pass them to the player on your left. The 5 cards you RECEIVE make up your starting hand.
Auction
Take
a good look at your hand and try to remember some of the cards you’ve
passed during the draft. Now try to figure out the lowest bid you can
make to win the auction.The auction starts with the first player to make a bid. Then bidding passes to the right. Each player has the opportunity to make a higher offer or pass. Once all players pass or the highest offer is 20 the SHIFT begins.
Shift
A
note about terms: This game consists of 5 SHIFTs and each SHIFT has 8
HOURs. SHIFTs are rounds of play that always begin with an auction.
HOURs are a player's turn.The player who won the auction is the Bartender In Charge (BIC) for the SHIFT. They are responsible for the SHIFT. If the bar does well by meeting or exceeding their winning bid they get a GOOD NIGHT token. If it fares poorly and fails to meet that goal they receive a BAD NIGHT token. Refer to the Goals of the Game for the consequences of receiving either of these tokens.
The player who won the auction is the Bartender in charge for the SHIFT. They begin the SHIFT by drawing 2 cards from the top of the BAR deck. Then they take their first HOUR.
Note this: the only player who draws cards is the BIC. In order to draw any cards without winning an auction and being the BIC is by playing SCHEME cards or PATRON cards.
Hour
A
player’s turn consists of playing a SCHEME card and/or a PATRON card.
A player may choose to play one or both or none. However if a player
fails to play a PATRON card by the end of their HOUR the BIC of the
SHIFT may reveal the top 5 cards on top of the BAR deck and chose a
single PATRON to enter the BAR. PATRONs that enter the BAR this way do
not trigger the special effects printed on them. They just enter the
BAR and are counted at the end of the shift for the points.One thing to remember: if a card asks a player to play a PATRON card and that player chooses not to play one then the BIC may reveal the top 5 cards of the BAR deck and choose any one PATRON card to enter the BAR. Its special abilities and effects do not trigger if a PATRON card enters the BAR in this way.
Scheme cards
SCHEME
cards are the various things you can do to help or hinder yourself or
your friends. They draw you cards or make your friends discard cards.
They have special abilities and effects that alter the rules of the
game. When a player plays a SCHEME card during their HOUR it enters the
BAR, you do its effect, and it remains in the BAR until the end of the
SHIFT. If there are any questions regarding order of effects--that is
if 2 effects are trying to happen at the same time--the BIC will decide
how these effects resolve. At the end of the SHIFT all the SCHEME cards
go to BREAKAGE.to reiterate: if any dispute arises and players cannot find a consensus as to how to apply the rules to a game situation the BIC will decide how play proceeds. Winning the auction is an intentional game mechanic.
Patron cards
PATRON
cards represent the people who come into the bar. The number printed
in the upper right hand corner is the value they are worth at the end of
the SHIFT. Some PATRON cards also have effects when they enter the
BAR. As with SCHEME cards PATRONs enter the bar, its effect if any
happens and then it remains in the BAR until the end of the SHIFT. And
if there are questions regarding order of effects the BIC will decide
how these effects resolve. At the end of the SHIFT all the PATRON cards
go to BREAKAGE.note on terms: BREAKAGE refers to the discard pile.
After the BIC takes their HOUR play proceeds to the right following the description as outlined above. And that’s it, each player takes an HOUR until 8 HOURs have been played. Try to have each player take equal number of turns but if it doesn’t happen don’t fret. It’s just the way it is.
take note: If at anytime a player has to draw a card but there are no cards left in the BAR deck the BIC shuffles the BREAKAGE offers a cut and that is the new BAR deck.
End of the Shift
At
the end of the SHIFT the BIC counts out the total value of PATRONs that
remain in the BAR. Don’t forget that some PATRONs value change
depending on other PATRONs who may or may not be in the BAR. Compare
this total with the BIC’s winning bid. If it’s equal to or greater than
that number the BIC gets a GOOD NIGHT token. Otherwise the BIC gets a
BAD NIGHT token. If this is the BIC’s second BAD NIGHT token that
player takes a bow and exits the game.If the BAR is packed and there are 20 or more points worth of PATRONs in the bar then the current BIC wins the game.
And that’s a SHIFT. Do this four more times.
The Game Ends
At
the end of 5 shifts the game ends and the player with the most GOOD
NIGHT tokens wins the game. If there is a tie between 2 players then
the player with fewer BAD NIGHT tokens is the winner. If there is a tie
at this point then the first player who can explain exactly what a
player could have done to win by making a different decision or making a
different play is the winner. If no one can make this explanation then
NO ONE WINS. Alternatively you may send an email to bartendergameatgmaildotcom explaining the situation and I will decide the outcome of the game.note to remember: this alternative path to victory is available to anyone including but not limited to players knocked out of the game, players who do not have a GOOD NIGHT token, or even non-player bystanders observing the game.
Things to consider:
Simplifying the game:
Don’t have an auction just set any number to be the goal. I might say 10 would be cool.Don’t have the draft just deal out 5 cards. If any player dislikes their hand they may discard any number of cards from their hand and draw that number of cards. They may do this only once per game.
Complexifying the game:
Try secret auctions.
Try drawing cards every HOUR.
Customizing the game:
Feel free to make up cards or rules as you please.Feel free to put your own art on the cards, by hand even.
Feel free to make up tokens that show/track what shift it is or hour it is.
Feel free to make up tokens that have numbers for the auction.
Feel free to drink while playing this game. I imagine I will come up with a variant that turns it into a full blown drinking game someday, but if you do it first drop me a line at the above email address and fill me in on the rules.
One Last Thing
So
that’s it. These are the rules to Bartender. If there are issues and
disputes take those issues to the BIC. If there is no BIC then start an
auction as quickly as possible. And you’ll have one.
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