Our game group and the high school club have been playing a lot of Clue
lately. We get pretty serious about the note taking and deduction,
but movement by rolling the die really makes it pretty random sometimes.
I started thinking of ways to use cards for movement, then the ideas turned
into the following set of cards with special actions. We had a lot
of fun taking the pictures and making the cards. They add some nice
twists to the game too, with plenty of options and some new ways to bluff.
The graphics below are fairly large (300 dpi for the color ones). Not only will they take some time to download, you may need to experiment with a graphics program to get them to print correctly. (I use Paint Shop Pro and they printed perfectly on an 8.5 x 11 sheet, but I've had e-mail from some gamers in the world who don't have as much luck printing graphics I've made.)
If you don’t want to print out six sets of the 12 color Clue cards, there’s also the file of the cheap version with just text. That set of cards is smaller, so all 12 fit on one page. They don’t look very nice, but they are quicker to make and it’s easy to print each set on a different color of card stock.
Here are the files:
Color card file 1(.jpg)
Color card file 2(.jpg)
Making a suggestion: Naming a suspect, weapon and room on your turn. A suggestion does not mean you think you know “who did it”. At this point you’re still looking for information and your opponents will attempt to prove your suggestion false by….
Disproving a suggestion: Players disprove your suggestion by showing you cards that you mentioned. Again, we play as it says in the rules and if you have questions about this process, check there.
Making an accusation: This is when you think you know which three cards are in the envelope. Making an accusation is the last thing you’ll do in the game, since you will either win if you’re right or be out of the game if you’re wrong.
In this set of rules “card” or “cards” refer to the special Clue cards, not to Evidence cards used in the game. To save space on some of the Clue cards, though, I’ve eliminated the word “Evidence” when referring to Evidence cards. Just remember that the text on these special Clue cards always refer to Evidence cards when they mention taking cards, passing cards, looking at cards, etc..
Start the game by giving each player a set of 12 cards. These
cards should be shuffled, placed on the table near the player who owns
them, then each player draws two. The rest of the game is started
just as it would be according to the rules.
Players may not use a card or cards in both ways described above.
In other words, you can’t use cards to move, then play a card to use its
special effect. Also, a player may choose to not use a card on his
turn.
If a player chooses to use a card or cards to aid movement, it must be done before he rolls the die. One card can be played at this time, signifying that the player is going to add the value on the card to the die roll. He then will roll the die as usual and move his pawn up to the number of spaces equal to the number on the card plus the number on the die.
Alternatively, a player may play two Clue cards and add their values together. When playing two cards, the die is not rolled, but the pawn is moved up to the number of spaces equal to the sum of the two cards. It’s costly to move this way using two cards, but there are times when it’s better than risking a turn to the roll of a die.
Regardless of whether the player played one or two cards at this time, the movement of the pawn and the remainder of the turn will be carried out exactly as described in the usual rules. Cards played for movement are discarded into the player’s own discard pile.
If the player did not use a card or cards to move his pawn, then he
may be able to play a card as a special action. Here are some general
rules for using cards as actions:
The text on the cards clearly indicate their use. It may be
a good idea before the first game for players to look through all the cards
and become familiar with their effects. Initially using the cards
will slow down the game, but once players know what the cards do, it may
actually speed it up.
Whenever a card is played for its special action, it is discarded to
the player’s discard pile.
If a player runs out of Cards, he can’t draw new ones until all players
run out of cards. This is very unlikely, but in the case that it
happens, all players shuffle their discarded cards and form a new draw
pile as soon as every player has taken at least one turn without being
able to draw a new card. The game continues as above from this point
on.
For a possibly wild game, players may choose to allow any number of cards to be played on a turn. In this case, players can only draw cards at the end of their turns if they didn’t play any cards.
Other variants to consider:
If you have other ideas for how to play, or some other ideas for
cool Clue cards, please send them to me!
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