Dog Poker Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• What is Dog Poker?
• Contents
• Game Setup
• How to Play
• Scoring Examples
  • Example 1
  • Example 2
• FAQs
• Card Reference

What is Dog Poker?

In Dog Poker, players collect cards to improve their score by fulfilling the gradually revealed scoring conditions.

Each round, after a scoring condition is revealed, players keep the cards they want and pass the rest to the player to their left.

After four rounds, players record their scores on the score sheet before moving on to the next game.

Once a player reaches 100 points, or four games have been played, the game ends and the player with the most points wins!

Contents

• Manual (Japanese/English) 2 copies. Note: the other manual is in Japanese.
• 32 cards: A: 10 cards, B: 7 cards, C: 5 cards, D: 4 cards, E: 3 cards, F: 2 cards, G: 1 card
• 1 Play Mat (Japanese/English). Note: the front is in Japanese and the back is in English.
• 30 Score sheets

Game Setup

(Read the red part only for two or three players. In this file, those passages are marked "[2-3 players]".)

1. Place the play mat in the middle of the table.
2. Turn the cards face down, shuffle them thoroughly, and make four piles of eight cards each.
3. Each player takes one pile of cards and looks at them privately. These are their "hands".
   • [2-3 players] Place one of the extra piles between a player of your choice and the player to their right. If there is another extra pile, place it on the other side of that player. (The piles are placed on both sides.)
4. Players then choose a card from their hands to serve as a scoring condition in this game, and submit them face down.
   • [2-3 players] Take a card face down from the top of the extra piles (if there are two extra piles, take one from each).
5. Shuffle the submitted cards and place them face down in the "1ST" "2ND" "3RD" "4TH" slots on the play mat.
6. Let the game begin!

How to Play

(Read the red part only for two or three players.)

1. Reveal the card in the "1ST" slot.

2. From their seven-card hands, players keep three cards and pass the other four cards, face down, to the person to their left.

   • [2-3 players] The player with an extra pile on their left shuffles the cards they pass into the extra pile. (They do not pass the cards to another player.)
   • [2-3 players] The player with an extra pile on their right, after passing their cards, draws from the pile until they have 7 cards in hand.
   • [2-3 players] For two players, both players will shuffle their cards into the extra piles on their left, and then draw cards from the extra piles on their right.

3. Repeat the above for the cards in "2ND", "3RD" and "4TH" slots as well.

   However, players keep "4 cards" for the "2ND" slot, "5 cards" for the "3RD" slot, and "6 cards" for the "4TH" slot.

   In other words, players keep one card more and pass one card less each round.

   • [2-3 players] Increase and decrease the number of cards passed to or drawn from the extra piles in the same manner.

4. After the "4TH" round, score points according to the scoring conditions shown on the four revealed cards.

   Scoring is divided into two main categories: base points for each card, and set bonus points for each combination of cards in hand.

   • Base points are awarded for each card in your hand that matches the revealed cards. The more cards you have, the more points you get.
   • Set bonus is awarded for each combination of cards in your hand that fulfills the conditions. If there is more than one combination, you receive points for all of them.

   (Example card A: "A = 1" base point; set bonus "ABCD EFG = 50".)

Scoring Examples

Example 1

Revealed cards: A, B, B, D (in slots 1ST to 4TH).

• The base points are 1 for A, 4 for B, and 4 for D. No base points for CEFG.
• The set bonus is 50 points for ABCDEFG, 15 points for AG, BF, and CE, totaling 65 points.
• The total of the base points and the set bonus is 74 points.

Transcriber's note: the hand in each example is shown only as card pictures in the manual; the calculation above is as printed.

Example 2

Revealed cards: A, B, B, D.

• The base points are 2 for 2 As and 8 for 2 Bs, totaling 10 points. No base points for C.
• The set bonus is 30 points for AACC.
• The total of the base points and the set bonus is 40 points.

FAQs

How do I score multiple cards with the same scoring conditions on the mat? You score points for each card on the mat, so double, triple, or quadruple the points.

When scoring condition D is on the mat, if I have two Bs and two Fs in my hand, do they score 10 points? Yes, score them as if there are two scoring condition D (BF = 5), which totals 10 points.

When scoring conditions B and C are on the mat, how do I score if I have AABBCC in my hand? For the base points, 2 points per card for B and 3 points per card for C, 2 + 2 + 3 + 3 = 10 points.

For the set bonus, "AACC = 15" for scoring condition B and "AABB = 10" for scoring condition C, 15 + 10 = 25 points.

The total of the base points and the set bonus is 35 points.

Card Reference

Each card shows its base point value and its set bonus combination(s). The small number is the count of that card in the deck.

Card	Dog	Base points	Set bonus	Copies
A	Golden Retriever	A = 1	A B C D E F G = 50	x10
B	Miniature Dachshund	B = 2	A A C C = 15	x7
C	Poodle	C = 3	A A B B = 10	x5
D	Chihuahua	D = 4	A G = 5; C E = 5; B F = 5	x4
E	Black Shiba	E = 5	B B D D = 20	x3