Color Cards guide

Goal

Be the first to play every card from your hand.

How to play

• Play a card matching the top of the discard pile by colour or by number.
• If you cannot play, draw from the deck.
• Action cards change the flow - skipping the next player, reversing direction, or forcing a draw.
• Wild cards can be played at any time and let you name the colour that must follow.
• A wild draw four can be challenged: if the challenger is right that you held a matching colour, you draw the four instead.
• With stacking draw cards on, you can answer a pending draw two with a draw card of your own and pass the bigger total along. Nothing stacks on a draw four, because its challenge window has to be settled first.

Calling out

The moment a play leaves you on one card you must call "Color Cards!". That is when the window opens and when opponents can catch you - being caught costs you two cards. Calling any earlier is rejected.

Technique

Keep a wild card in reserve for a colour you cannot follow rather than spending it on a turn you could have played anyway. When you are down to a few cards, prefer to shed the colour you hold least of, so you are never locked out by a single colour change.

Winning

• The first player with an empty hand wins the round.
• The winner scores the cards left in every other hand: number cards at face value, skip, reverse and draw two at twenty, and either wild at fifty.
• The first player to the target score wins - 200, 500 or 1000, set in the lobby.
• Action cards aimed at the player about to go out are worth holding for exactly that moment.