Border Attack: 2 Players

What You Should Know Before You Play

The object of the game is to use your knowledge of which U.S. states border which other states, and your card playing skills to win. While you don’t need to know more state border states than your opponent, if you do you’ll have an advantage.

The state rankings (from 1^st to 50^th) in size, statehood, and population of the cards you play also will help determine your success. The Alaska card has the best (i.e., 1^st) size ranking, Delaware has the best statehood ranking, and California has the best population ranking. Use the GeoPlunge cards, and only shuffle the deck before the game begins.

How You Win

To win, you must play or discard all 25 cards dealt to you during the game before your opponent plays or discards all 25 cards he or she got.

If both players run out of cards at the end of the game on the same “trick”, the player who wins that trick wins the game.

How to Play

*        To start the game, deal each player 5 cards.

*        Until the game ends, deal each player 5 more cards from the deck whenever 1 player has no cards left in his or her hand. If you still have some cards left when 5 new cards are dealt to you, add those new cards to the cards in your hand.

*        Play one “trick” at a time until someone wins the game. On each trick, each player plays one of his or her cards.

*        On each trick, one player plays a card first (this is called “leading” on the trick). Then the other player plays a card face-up. At that point, the trick is over.

*        However, each player has to say something before he or she plays a card on a trick. If you are leading on a trick, you must, before playing a card,

o       Choose (by saying out loud) whether the cards to be played on that trick will be ranked based on Size, Statehood or Population (you then lead a card).

*        If you are not leading on a trick, after the player leading on a trick plays a card, you must, before playing your card,

o       Say out loud how many border states the card you plan to play has, and then

o       Say out loud either (1) the name of the state, or (2) the name of all of the border states, of the card you plan to play.

*        Before you play your card, the player who already led a card on the trick then gets 1 guess at what state you are playing or what all of its border states are (whichever one you didn’t say). If your opponent guesses right, he or she discards a card from his or her hand.

*        After the guess is made by the player leading on the trick, the non-leading player plays a card. Whoever plays the better ranked card on the trick wins the trick.

*        Whoever wins the trick gets to discard an extra card from his or her hand, and gets to lead a card to begin the next trick. (The dealer leads on the first trick of the game).