Pandeng: The High Roller Card Game

Pandeng is a climbing card game for 2 to 4 players using a deck of 57 cards. 4 players can also play as teams of 2 sitting opposite each other.

A similar game is said to have been played by Imperial officials during the Han Dynasty in China ... for money!

HOW TO PLAY:

In Pandeng you want to collect as few cards as possible. Each player starts with a hand of six cards from a deck that contains 57 cards numbered 2-11. One player starts by playing a single card or multiple cards with the same value, calling out the sum of those cards as they are played. Then draw back up to 6 cards from the draw pile.

So if the player plays a 4 (or two 2s) he deals it to the center of the table and calls out “4”. The next player has to play a card (or cards of equal value added together) to surpass that sum or else collect all of the cards played to the center of the table. The player then starts with one or more cards again.

The number 8 (long regarded as the luckiest number in Chinese culture) is the strongest card in the deck, it beats them all! So what beats an 8? Two 8s! And two 8s succumb to three 8s and so on. There are eight 8's in the deck, and when to use these 8s is a key strategy in Pandeng!

But be WARNED! Those 8's can count against you at the end of a round! More on this in a moment.

As soon as the draw pile of cards is gone, and one player is out of cards, the game ends immediately, and everyone else adds the cards still in their hands to the cards they've collected, counting each card as a point for a score. If you are stuck with any 8s, each 8 counts as an additional 8 points, so you don't want to be too precious with the 8s during play.

After playing as many rounds as the number of players at the table, whoever has the lowest score is the winner!

The 57 card deck consists of:

Three 2s Three 3s Four 4s Five 5s Six 6s Seven 7s Eight 8s Nine 9s Nine 10s Three 11s

—description from the designer