Stealing Mona Lisa
Stealing Mona Lisa Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
Components
18 "art" cards (red backs) 42 "skill" cards (blue backs) 48 "choice" cards (8 colors)
Plays 3 to 7 players
Setup
- Shuffle all the skill cards (blue backs) face down in one pile.
- Shuffle all the art cards (red backs) face down in another pile.
- Every player chooses a color of choice cards and takes the 6 cards of that color.
- That will leave at least one color of choice cards left over. Use one of the colors as the museum's color. Put the museum's choice cards face up in the middle of the table. Put the other extras back in the box as they will not be used.
Overview
Each player is a thief boss planning different thefts of famous paintings. Start the hand by shuffling all the skill cards and dealing 5 skill cards to each player face down. The dealer is the player who most recently stole something (or decide any way you like).
Not on the first hand, but in later hands, if players have cards they kept from another turn it is important that they DO NOT add these to the new 5 cards just handed to them until instructed to do so.
Take art cards, one less than the number of players, from the top of the deck and lay them face up in the center of the table.
If there are face up art cards already in the center from a previous round, count these cards as just flipped cards. Again, the total number of art cards laid out should equal one less than the number of players.
So, in a 3 player game there should be 2 art cards, 4 players have 3 art cards, etc. Put these face up in the center of the table in a line. From the museum choice cards, put a letter below each piece of art. Most people put them in alphabetical order, but you don't have to. Make sure it is clear which letter is under each piece of art and that only one letter is under each piece of art.
If you do not have enough art cards to turn over, turn over as many as you can. After doing this, if there are two or more art cards face up, the game will continue. If you only have one piece of art face up then the game ends immediately.
Each of these artworks has different skills listed on them that would be required to steal them and a dollar value. Each round, thief bosses (players) each get a hand of 5 new skill cards. Each skill card has 1 "skill" on it such as sneak, get away, recon, guile, muscle, or hacking.
Simultaneously, each thief boss chooses one of these 5 cards to add to their team face down. Then, they simultaneously pass the remaining 4 cards to their right (and receive 4 cards from the player on their left). Next, from the 4 cards just handed to them, they will now take one more to add to their team face down in front of themselves. They will then pass the remaining 3 cards to their right again simultaneously. Repeat this process until each player has 5 cards face down in front of him/herself.
Now, and only now, thief bosses may add to their hand of five new cards any skill cards they carried over from a previous round.
Next, each thief boss chooses which famous artwork he wants to steal. To do this, he first looks at his hand of skill cards and compares it to the art that is available to steal this round.
Then, from his entire hand he must choose as many skill cards as he would like to play toward gaining ONE of the famous art pieces. He must choose at least one of his skill cards to play each round. He places these chosen skill cards face down in front of himself and puts the rest of his hand to the side.
Afterward, he secretly looks at his choice cards. The letters on these cards match the letters below each work of art. He chooses his letter matching the letter of the painting that he wants to try to steal and puts it face down on top of his stack of chosen skill cards. The rest of the unused choice cards he puts on top of the cards he already put to the side.
Heists
HEISTS: After every thief has a stack of skill cards with a choice on top of them, all thieves simultaneously flip over each of their choice cards.
In the case where only one thief boss tries to steal a famous painting (a boss' letter is unique and doesn't match any other boss') he discards his hand of skill cards from under that choice card and takes the painting he selected putting it face down in front of himself. (Note: He does not, in this case, have to reveal what cards he played. He may have not even had the right skills to pull off the job, but no one will ever know).
In the case of more than one thief boss is trying to steal the same piece of famous art, reveal all hands of cards that are trying to steal that particular work of art. Examine the hand of cards for each of these players, and compare them.
First, look to see if each thief boss has skills in their hand matching what is required to steal the specific piece of famous art. If they do not have at least one of each skill, they may keep their cards (adding them back to the cards earlier put to the side under the unused choice cards), but will not be stealing any famous art this round. If more than one thief does have the required skills to steal this famous art, each thief adds up all of his skills that match what is on the famous art and says the total aloud. Remember to NOT add up any skills that do not match what is on the famous art; only add what matches. More than one of a particular type of skill card may be used. For example, you may add a 5 and a 3 guile for a total of 8 guile.
Whichever thief has the highest total takes the piece of famous art, puts it face down in front of himself, and discards his hand. In case of a tie, look at the first skill furthest to the left on the card required for that piece of famous art. Whoever has a higher number in that skill wins the tie. Any thief who failed to steal any art this round may keep his hand of skill cards adding them to the cards he put to the side under his unused choice cards.
At the end of the round, thief bosses may have left over cards under their unused choice cards. Before they get to see what art is up to steal for the next round and before getting a new hand of cards, they may choose to keep some of these leftover cards from under their unused choice cards to carry over into the next round. The number of cards they may keep depends on the number of players.
• In a 7 player game each player may keep 1 card between rounds.
• In a 6 player game each player may keep up to 2 cards between rounds.
• In a 5,4, or 3 player game each player may keep up to 3 cards between rounds.
Finally, start a new hand by shuffling discarded skill cards with the deck of unused skill cards and dealing 5 new skill cards face down to each thief boss, then revealing new famous art to steal. There may be leftover art from previous rounds, keep those out and just add the number of new famous art to bring up the total to one less than the number of players. Again, if there is not enough art to do this, you may have to play the round with fewer art pieces, but as long as there are two to choose from, the game will continue.
Finger Variant
FINGER VARIANT: Some people prefer to play with the choice cards, but there is also another fun way to play Stealing Mona Lisa. Instead of using any choice cards to make selections, have each thief boss put their right elbo on the table and point at the sealing once they are ready to choose. Once every thief boss has done this the dealer should count down from 3. When the countdown gets to "1" every thief boss should move his finger that was pointing up so that it now touches one of the face up art cards up for stealing in that round. That is their choice for which painting they will attempt to steal this round.
If a player is accused of moving slowly in order to change his choice at the last moment in response to other player's choices all players may vote by majority to deny him any chance to steal any art this turn. You also shouldn't be playing with a dirty cheat like that.
Game End
GAME END: The game will end when there are less than two pieces of famous art to steal. At this time, every thief looks at all the famous art they have stolen throughout the game and adds up all the values printed on the famous art. Whoever has the highest total value in their stolen collection, is the best thief, and the winner!
If there is a tie ties are broken in this order:
- Of the tied players, if one has the Mona Lisa they win.
- Of the tied players, the one with the highest single value on one piece of art wins.
- If it is still a tie, play again as a tie breaker.
Have fun stealing!