Sbam!
Sbam! Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Components
- 6 Ropes (for the first game, carefully assemble the ropes as illustrated on the cover)
- 61 Cards
- 25 Damage tokens
Setup
Put a rope between each couple of players so that each player has one rope on their left and one rope on their right. In a 2-player game, players should sit in front of each other with two ropes between them, one on each side.
Put all the remaining ropes back in the box.
Place all Damage tokens in a supply on the table.
Overview
Sbam! is a competitive game in real time. The game is played over several rounds until only one player remains and all others are eliminated. Players are eliminated when they take 5 Damage tokens.
Each round, players will draw and play cards in real time as fast as they can to fight only the players sitting next to them. When the round ends, you will check the result of each fight separately.
Cards are divided into 3 colors with strength from 1 to 3; there are also special cards with different effects.
How to Play a Round
Shuffle all the cards and deal 3 cards to each player. Then, divide the remaining cards into a couple of face-down decks and put them in the center of the table (it's more comfortable to have more decks if you're fighting with many players).
Say out loud a countdown: 3, 2, 1, FIGHT! and start playing. All players play at the same time as fast as they can. Hold your cards with one hand and use the other hand to play and draw cards.
You must play a card face up either to your left or to your right against the corresponding opponent. The ropes are used to divide the cards played by two opponents, so you must play cards on your side of the rope. Immediately after playing a card, you must draw a new card from a deck.
When Does the Round End?
The round ends only when a player plays one or more Sbam! cards (see below). Players can choose freely when to play a Sbam! card, so each round's duration can vary from few seconds to few minutes.
If there are no more cards to draw, the round ends immediately.
ATTENTION! Sbam! cards effect can be canceled by the Oops card. If a player plays one or more Sbam! cards and another player immediately plays the Oops card, the round continues until new Sbam! cards are played (see Special cards for further details).
At the end of the round, each rope will represent a fight between the two players who have played cards there.
Special Cards
There are 6 type of special cards:
- Sbam! card – There are 5 Sbam! cards in the game and you can play more Sbam! cards together (it's the only case where you can play more than 1 card).
- When you play 1 Sbam! card, you must say Sbam! and the round ends. However, you will lose any tie fight this round!
- When you play 2 Sbam! cards, you must say Sbabam! and the round ends. If you lose fights this round, you don't take Damage tokens!
- When you play 3 Sbam! cards, you must say Sbababam! and the round ends. All other players take 1 Damage token. Don't check the fights this round and immediately play the next round.
- Oops card – There's only 1 Oops card in the game. You can play the Oops card only immediately after Sbam! cards are played: You must say Oops, the Sbam! effect is canceled and the round continues.
- Stacked-bars icon card – There are 3 of these cards, 1 for each color. If you have played a card of a color, you and your opponent don't discard identical cards of that color when checking the fight at the end of the round (see below).
- Plus icon card – There are 3 of these cards, one for each color in the game. If you have played a plus icon card of a color, that color will be calculated in this fight. If it's not the color with most cards, sum up the cards of this color to the color that is calculated (see below).
- X icon card – There are 3 of these cards, one for each color in the game. If you have played an X icon card of a color, discard all the cards of that color in this fight (yours and your opponent's).
NOTE: All special cards are not considered to be of a color, even if they have special effects related to that color.
How to Check the Fights?
For each fight (i.e. each two sets of cards played next to each ropes), follow these rules to see who's the fight winner:
- Before the calculation, discard any couple of identical cards (same color and same strength), played by a single player (if the stacked-bars icon card of that color has been played in that fight, don't discard them). If a third identical card has been played by that player, the third card remains, but with a fourth card they must be all discarded, and so on.
- Check how many cards for each color remain (sum up the cards played by both opponents). Only the color for which the most cards have been played will be calculated (discard all the cards of the other colors).
- For each opponent, sum up the strength of all the remaining cards of the same color. The player with the lower strength loses the fight and must take 1 Damage token. In case of a tie, players don't take Damage tokens (unless one of them has played a single Sbam! card). In case of multiple colors calculated together, deal only 1 Damage token to the loser.
- If there are tied colors with the same higher number of cards played, those colors will be calculated together (sum up the cards of the tied colors).
- Remember to always apply the effects of the special cards during the calculation.
After checking all fights, take the cards back together and shuffle them to prepare the next round.
Example 1: The two "2-blue" cards are discarded. Blue is the most played color (4 cards remain) and David has the blue highest strength (6 versus 1). John takes a Damage token.
Example 2: By effect of the X icon card played by Francesca, all yellow cards are discarded. The double 1-red cards played by John are not discarded because he played the stacked-bars icon card. Red is the most played color but Blue must be added to the calculation by effect of the plus icon card played by Francesca. Francesca has the highest total strength (11 versus 9). John loses and takes another Damage token.
Who Is the Winner?
If a player takes the 5th Damage token, that player is eliminated and should leave the table. Now, the players who were sitting to that player's left and right are now sitting next to each other (remove the unneccessary rope between them).
When only two players remain, they will sit in front of each other and continue playing (with one rope on each side).
If only one player remains with less than 5 Damage tokens at the end of a round, that player is the winner!
If the last players are eliminated together in the same round, they share the victory and leave the ring head-on!