Cooks & Crooks
Cooks & Crooks Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Game elements
a) PANTRY: A player's hand is their pantry, and they can't hold more than 7 cards at any given time.
b) PLAYER'S OVEN: Ovens also have 7 available spaces for ingredients and/or trash. Players must have a dish in their oven at every time, except if they complete their dish at the very last turn, in which case the oven gets closed. (The oven shows the current dish and the spaces for ingredients and trash.)
c) DISH CARD: There are 5 types of dish cards: Pizzas, Yakitoris, Hamburgers, Soups and Burritos. Each shows its base points and required ingredients. When a dish card is facedown, some ingredients are unknown.
d) INGREDIENT CARD: Used to make dishes.
Grandma's Mystic Seasoning is an special type of ingredient that works as a wildcard, replacing a single ingredient. Only one allowed per dish.
e) TRASH CARD: If a dish is completed while containing one of these cards, that dish will have the indicated points deducted (See SCORING for more details). These cards are used in step 4, Sabotage. (Each shows its negative points.)
f) RADIOACTIVE CARD: These cards greatly benefit one specific dish as indicated by its icon, they can be used by a player in step 3, Prepare dish, to obtain extra points when the dish is completed (See SCORING for more details). On the other hand, they're trash on every other dish so they can also be used to attack other players on step 4, Sabotage. Use them wisely! (Each shows the positive points and type of dish it benefits, and negative points for every dish other than the one marked.)
g) TURN COUNTER: The game lasts six rounds; at the end of each round, turn the turnwheel in a clockwise direction.
How to play
Objective
Complete dishes by adding the ingredients indicated by the card, whilst trying to have the least amount of trash in your oven. The game lasts 6 rounds, after which points are counted, and whoever obtained the most is declared the winner.
Setup
- Each player picks up an oven with the chef of their preference.
- Shuffle all the ingredient, trash and radioactive cards into a single pile, deal 3 of them to each player and place the rest of the cards in a face-down pile in the center of the playing area.
- Separate each dish card by type (hamburger, pizza, etc.), shuffle each deck individually and place them in five face-down piles around the ingredient pile.
- Assign an space next to the pile of ingredients for the discard pile (which starts out empty at the beginning of the game).
- Each player should look at the three cards in their hand and, if they want to, may discard one, two, or all three and pick up the same number from the central pile of ingredients. Take this chance to get rid of those cards you don't think will help you in the beginning!
- Each player will select a dish to start with and place it face-up in their oven.
- Finally, the central deck of ingredients is turned so that it is in a face-up pile. The cards should now look like the image on the right, and each player has three cards and a dish in the oven.
Starting player
Whoever has eaten most recently will be the initial player. Order of play will continue with the player to their left, and so on.
Player's turn
During their turn, players must follow the turn order as specified in their ovens. Players are free to skip steps they do not desire to do, but the steps they do can not be done out of order (for example, a player may not do step 3, Prepare dish and then afterwards step 1, Supply pantry).
1. Supply pantry
Discard, face-down, as many cards from your hand as you desire (including none). Afterwards you may take one, two or up to three cards from the central deck of ingredients, so long as you have no more than 7 cards in your hand. Cards must be taken one by one so that everyone can see what you're taking with you. It's not necessary to declare how many cards will be taken beforehand.
2. Action
Choose one, and only one, action out of three possible ones for your current turn:
PANTRY RAID: Take 2 random cards from an opponent, look at them and give one of the two back alongside one of your own (so long as you have at least one to give). Alternatively, you may chose to return both cards and give none of your own.
Example: Tomaleone takes two cards from Doña Moles and looks at them. They're the tomato and the cheese, both of which he needs although he can only keep one. He decides to keep the cheese, so he returns the tomato to Doña Moles while also giving her a card of his own: the rat!
OVEN THEFT: Take 1 card from the oven of another player to put it in your hand, and immediately replace the stolen card with one that that dish is missing. Radioactive cards acting as an ingredient (i.e. wasabi for the yakitori) may not be taken this way.
Example: Tomaleone steals the mushroom from Pierre's oven. Because the dish is now missing the mushroom and the onion, he could put either of these in its place, but he decides to instead place a Grandma's Mystic Seasoning card which will act as a wildcard for either of the two missing ingredients.
CLEAN OVEN: Pick a single card from your oven and put it in your hand. If your oven is completely full, you can choose to pick two cards instead of one. This action may not be performed if it will make you have more than 7 cards in your hand.
3. Prepare dish
You may put up to 3 ingredient cards face-up in your oven, so long as you have space for them. The cards you may add in this way are:
- Ingredients requested by the dish that the oven doesn't already contain.
- "Grandma's Mystic Seasoning", which acts as a wildcard substituting one ingredient. Only one allowed per dish.
- A radioactive card for its corresponding dish, i.e., anchovies for the pizza.
The dish is considered done the moment it has all the required ingredients, at with point it is scored (see SCORING). After scoring, remove and keep the dish card and discard all others in the oven. Select a new dish to put in your oven. You may not chose a dish type previously prepared by you in the current game.
4. Sabotage
Take 1 trash or radioactive card in your hand and place it face down in another player's oven to try and ruin their dish. You may only do this if they have space available in their oven.
Round's end
When every player has taken their turn, the round ends. Increase the turn counter by 1 by turning the turn wheel clockwise.
Last round and game's end
The sixth round is the last one of the game. If a player manages to finish a dish in this last round, the dish is scored as usual and they close their oven, making them immune to sabotage. In case a player is not able to finish their dish, special scoring rules are used (see SCORING). Each player will count their points, and whoever has the most is declared the winner. Congratulations!
Scoring
Finally, every ingredient for the dish is in the oven. Grab a pen and paper, it's time to see what the judges think!
You may have upside-down cards that other players placed in your oven. If that's the case, reveal them to see what trash is in there. This will affect your total score.
The number indicated in the dish card are the base points; subtract the number of negative points of each trash card currently in your oven, and add +5 extra points if you (or someone else!) added the radioactive card that corresponds to your dish (i.e. the pickles to the hamburguer).
Example 01: Doña Moles has just finished the WcBurguer with its four ingredients, so she turns over the face-down cards to find out they are a fly (-1) and a snail (-5). Her score is thus going to be 14-1-5 = 8 points total.
Example 02: Pierre Croissant has placed the three ingredients for the Mademoiselle soup in his oven. He also placed the snail in it. Because the snail benefits the soup (as indicated in the lower right corner of the snail card), his score is going to be 10+5 = 15 points total.
Unfinished dishes
If a dish is unfinished by the end of the game, the base points for the dish are ignored and scoring is done in a different way: every correct ingredient (including Grandma's Mystic Seasoning and the corresponding radioactive card) gives out +2 points, while every trash card subtracts -1 point, ignoring the actual number on the card.
Example 03: The game has finished and Doña Moles failed to finish the Kabuki Yakitori. Out of the three ingredients that the dish requires, he only has the meat. Also in his oven is Grandma's Mystic Seasoning and the wasabi, alongside three trash cards other players added which are revealed to be a cockroach, a greasy hair and the snail. His positive points are thus going to be +6 (two for the meat, two for Granda's Mystic Seasoning and two for the wasabi because it benefits the Yakitori) and -3 for all three trash cards (minus one per trash), giving him a total of 3 points.