Beardsmith
Beardsmith Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Setup
Players each choose a color and take their hexagonal tiles. A two player game will require every tile of both colors but tiles are removed from play for games with more than two players. Some tiles have small dots or pips on the face. These pips tell the players which tiles to play with. In a 6 player game each player would find and play with the tiles that have 6 pips. In a 5 player game each player would find and play with the tiles that have 5 or more pips (in this case 5 or 6 pips). And so on. Remove the other tiles from play. Each player turns their own tiles face-down and shuffles them to form their own draw pile.
(The rulebook shows two example tiles: one labelled "3 pips" and one labelled "5 pips".)
Play
Players draw one tile each to determine who goes first (scissors wins, then gum, then wild, then a tile with the most number of open ends on it). Players must also determine which starting board they want to use and place it in the middle of the table. Each player draws two more tiles which are placed face-up in front of him along with the first tile to form his hand. Player one starts the game by drawing a fourth tile and then playing one of their four tiles on the starting board. Tiles must always be played so that they satisfy the conditions of all surrounding tiles - sides with beard must match up with each other and empty sides (no beard section) can only be placed next to a tile with an empty side. Tiles may never overlap the starting board.
Diagram: Proper placement - all sides match up.
Diagram: Improper placement - blue and green do not match up.
Play continues to the left, with each player drawing one more tile and playing a tile out of their hand, always matching any sides of their tile that touch already played pieces. A player may play on any color tile, not just his own. Play continues this way until players run out of tiles at which point the game ends and scores are calculated. Rarely, a situation could arise where no moves can be made. If this happens the game immediately ends.
Special Tiles
There are three special tiles: wild, gum, and scissors. Wild tiles may be played on any empty space regardless of whatever borders it, but it must touch at least one open end. It effectively closes off any loose ends that touch it and anyone can play any beard, wild or gum tiles on any open side of it. Open sides on beard tiles can touch a wild as long as that beard tile is connected to the starting tile through other pieces and not "floating". Gum is played on or next to any tile, but any surrounding tile with loose ends touching the gum represent negative points for their respective players.
The three special tiles are shown as icons: the wild tile (a woven basket-weave pattern), the scissors tile, and the gum tile (a pale turquoise blob).
The scissors rules below are printed on the same sheet as the Setup section, with their own diagrams.
The scissors tile is placed directly on top of (stacked) any piece, essentially removing the piece underneath it from play. It creates a "hole" where another piece can be played as long as the new piece matches all of its neighbors (this new piece will be stacked as well). A scissors piece can never cut a piece of beard which would let other pieces "drop". In other words if other pieces would become disconnected from the board due to scissors, the move is illegal. If a game ends normally (everyone runs out of tiles) a scissors or a gum cannot be the last tile you play. If it is the last piece you have, you skip your last turn.
Diagram: Pre-existing tiles.
Diagram: Scissors played on top (2nd layer).
Diagram: New tile played on top of scissors (3rd layer).
Scoring
Each player adds up their score as follows: each face-up tile is worth 1 point, each beard end (in their color) which touches gum is worth -1 point, and each loose end (a section of beard on their color of tile that is not tied off) is worth -1 point. Highest score wins! In the case of a tie the player with the most face-up tiles wins. If it is still a tie the player with the least number of loose ends wins. If it is still a tie then the player with the greatest number of connected tiles (in their own color) wins. If it is still a tie then the player who can run a hundred yards the fastest wins.