This article is about the Bang! card game. For more uses of the word 'Bang, please see Bang .

Bang! is a wild west-themed card game similar to a spaghetti western designed by Emiliano Sciarra and released by Mayfair Games. In 2004, Bang! won the Origins Award for Best Traditional Card Game of 2003 and Best Graphic Design of a Card Game.

Overview

The game is played by four to seven players (two to eight players with variants and expansions). Each player takes one of the following roles:

• Sheriff (x1)
• Deputy Sheriff (x2)
• Outlaw (x3)
• Renegade (x1)

Each player also receives a unique character card with special abilities and a certain amount of 'bullets' (i.e. life-points).

The object of the game is different for every role:

• the Outlaws must kill the Sheriff;
• the Sheriff and his Deputies must kill the Outlaws and the Renegade(s);
• each Renegade's objective is to be the last character in play. The Renegade(s) must kill all the characters with the sheriff being the last one dead.

Set Up

Each player is dealt a Character card and a Role card.

The Sheriff announces his role and the other players' roles remain secret. All players reveal their character cards.

The character cards determine the number of 'bullets' each player has; each player reveals their assigned number of bullets on the back of an unused character card. The player given the Sheriff role starts with one additional bullet.

Each player is dealt a number of cards equal to the number of bullets they have.

Each player is considered to be at distance 1 from the players sitting next to him on either side, distance 2 from those sitting one seat further away, and so on (counting the shortest route).

Gameplay

Rules

To shoot at another character, a player must play a card bearing a "Bang!" icon to a player within shooting range.

This means that if the shooter hasn't got any weapons, he can only shoot players at distance 1; if he has a weapon that can fire to distance 3, he can target any player at distance 3 or less.

If the targeted player has a "Missed" card, he can play it to avoid getting shot; otherwise he loses one bullet.

When a character loses his last bullet, he is "dead."

A Beer card can be used to restore a bullet. A player cannot use Beer cards to exceed his character's number of bullets. A player can only restore his own bullets via a Beer card, and he can only play it during his turn. A Whiskey card performs the same function as Beer cards, except that it restores two bullets (may not exceed the character's number of bullets).

Exception: if a player loses his last bullet, he can immediately play one or more Beer cards until he remains at 1 bullet.

A player may usually play only one "Bang!" card during his turn, but other cards can be played without restriction during the turn.

For example, some cards allow to steal cards from an opponent's hand, force an opponent to discard a card, jail a character, change the relative range to other players, or change the range at which the player can shoot. Most of the cards are self-explaining, bearing little symbols that describe the card's effect when combined; the rest carry a symbol that suggests that the player consult the game manual.

At the end of his own turn, a player can have no more cards than his current number of bullets. He must discard cards to meet this requirement.

Play continues clockwise, with each player drawing two cards at the beginning of the turn, until the Sheriff is killed or until all the Outlaws and all the Renegades have been killed.

Strategy

The game is an interesting application of Game theory. As the only the Sheriff is known it is hard to know who has what role. Generally, a person's role is implied if he tries to shoot, or otherwise harm, the sheriff. Others' role can be implied if they try to harm those who harmed the Sheriff. The advantage of keeping one's role hidden from one enemies must be weighted against the need to accomplish one's goal.

Since the Renegade loses if the Sheriff dies when there are still other in the game he must defend the Sheriff to some extent. On the other hand his ultimate goal is kill the sheriff. This leads to a "two faced" nature of the renegade, trying to weaken each side (outlaws and deputies) while keeping the Sheriff alive until the end. This also makes it harder to ascertain who is an outlaw, who is a deputy, and who is a renegade, as their actions may be similar.

Determining the winner

Once the Sheriff is killed, the game is over. If the only player left is a Renegade and is alive at this point, the Renegade wins. However, if two or more players are still alive or the only remaining player is an Outlaw, all the Outlaws win, dead or alive.

On the other hand, if all Outlaws and Renegades are dead before the Sheriff dies, the Sheriff and all the Deputies win, dead or alive.

Official tournament score

An official scoring system can be found on daVinci web site, the official web site of the Italian editors of Bang!. The scoring rules are as follows:

*if the Law wins:

:The Sheriff wins $1500 for every Outlaw;

:The Deputies win $1000 for every Outlaw if they survived, and $700 if they died;

:The Renegade wins $400 for every player if he is the last to be killed .

*if the Outlaws win:

:the Renegade, if he is still alive at the end of the game, wins $300 for each player in the game;

:the Outlaws, if they are alive, win $1000 for each Outlaw in the game, dead or alive; otherwise they win $800 for each Outlaw in the game.

*if the Renegade wins:

:the Sheriff wins $100 for each player in the game

:the Renegade wins $1500 for each player in the game

*Extra Penalty: if a deputy kills a Sheriff, he loses $5000

Character Descriptions

Some of the characters of Bang! are named after famous people. Some examples include:

• Willy the Kid = Billy the Kid - He can play any number of "Bang!" cards.
• Jesse Jones = Jesse James - During phase 1 of his turn, he may choose to draw the first card from the deck, or randomly from the hand of any other player. Then he draws the second card from the deck.
• Belle Star = Belle Starr - During her turn, no card in front on any other player has any effect. This applies both to the blue-as well as to the green-bordered cards.
• Bart Cassidy = Butch Cassidy - Each time he loses a life point, he immediately draws a card from the deck.
• Calamity Janet = Calamity Jane - She can use "Bang!" cards as "Missed!" cards and vice versa. If she plays a Missed! card as a "Bang!", she cannot play another "Bang!" card that turn (unless she has a Volcanic in play).
• Apache Kid = Sundance Kid or The Cisco Kid - Cards of Diamonds played by other players do not affect him.
• Doc Holyday = Doc Holliday - Once during his turn, he can discard any two cards from his hand for the effect of a BANG! card against a player within range of his weapon. Using this ability does not count towards the limit of one BANG! card per turn. To hit Apache Kid in this way, at least one of the two discarded cards must not be a Diamond.
• Kit Carlson = Kit Carson - During the phase 1 of his turn, he looks at the top three cards of the deck: he chooses 2 to draw, and puts the other one back on the top of the deck, face down.
• Lucky Duke = Lucky Luke (Fictional person) - Each time he is required to "Draw!", he flips the top two cards from the deck, and chooses the result he prefers. Discard both cards afterward.

Expansions

• High Noon (2003): a set of thirteen scenario cards that are given to the Sheriff, and revealed at the start of each of his turns - the card's scenario is effective until the next scenario card has been revealed. Scenario cards can cause a player to lose his character's special abilities, disallow the use of certain cards, or even return a dead player to play.
• Dodge City (2004): a set of fifteen new characters and 40 new play cards. There are also 8 more "role" cards added which allows up to 15 people to play.
• A Fistful Of Cards (2005): a set of fifteen new scenario cards, which can be mixed with the High Noon expansion.
• Face Off (2005): more a spin-off than an expansion, Face Off is a board game for two players designed to be played with a deck of Bang! cards.
• Eldorado (2006): first unofficial expansion, available here.

In 2007, a deluxe version, called Bang! The Bullet!, was released including all the previous expansions, along with a Sheriff's Badge.[1]

See also

• Game theory

References

External links

• Mayfair Games' Bang! page

Dedicated deck card gamesOrigins Award winners

Bang! Bang!Wanted! Bang!Bang!Bang!

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