Starter Deck

Purchase a couple decks of index cards. Make each of the following basic cards:

• Make a Card (x2)
• Make 2 Cards
• Convention: Everyone makes a card
• Rip up a card
• Destroy a card
• Make one minor textual change to a card.
• Cross out one word on a card and replace it with another.
• Just Kidding: the card just played has no effect
• Cancel a Card
• Tu quoque: Make another player also obey a played card.
• No, do the opposite of what that card says. (x2)
• Skip to any players turn. Play at any time.
• Draw 3 Cards
• Steal a Card
• Take a Discard
• Discard all your cards
• Peek at another player's hand and take one card.
• WIN (x3)
• WIN as soon as you have no cards left in your hand.
• After one more round, the player with the most cards WINS.
• LOSE (x3)
• Settle a Dispute (x5)
• Judge: From now on, settle all disputes for which no one plays any ``settle a dispute'' cards.
• Court of Appeals: Overrule the settlement of any one dispute.
• If anyone has cards with the words `win' or `lose', discard them now.
• Make one WIN card, one LOSE card, and one `Settle a Dispute' card. Randomly keep one and discard the rest.
• From now on, `win' means lose and `lose' means win.

In addition, add a few thematic cards that suit your fancy. Some of my favorites:

• Leprosy: You cannot touch the draw pile, the discard pile, or another player. Whenever you play a card, shout ``unclean, unclean!''. Discard into a separate discard pile. When you run out of cards you die. Anyone who touches a card you touched also contract leprosy.
• Marriage: Choose two players of the opposite gender. They combine their hands and are treated as a single player. All decisions must be made jointly.
• Socialism: All players combine their hands into a common hand face-up in the center. Anyone can play from this hand.
• Bum: Discard down to one card. You may never draw from the draw pile or have more than one card. Any time you have no cards, you may immediately take any card from the discard pile, as long as it wasn't discarded by a bum.
• Black Death: All players lose.
• Mind Control: make another player obey any one order on their turn, if they can.
• Ignorance is Bliss: One player ignores any one card for the rest of the game.
• Mail Bomb! Read this card and place it face down in front of another player. If they touch it, they lose.
• Clearly Did Not Do The Reading: Allows a player to adopt an absurd interpretation of a card which is contradictory to (not just inconsistent with) the plain literal meaning of the text.