Time to rate and critique the trick-taking games in my collection, at least those I have played frequently enough to feel confident where they fall in terms of ratings. Some of these games I have reviewed before and if you like to know more, you can click on the link to get more details on my thoughts for the game.

Trick taking games are a dime a dozen out there. They are one of the most common genres out there and the evolution of the game has been amazing. Lots of designers have published incredible innovations to the core single-card trick taking mechanism and the variety out there will keep fans busy for a long time. I have not always been a fan of this genre, but have come to appreciate it more over the years. Overall, I still prefer climbing / shedding games over trick takers, but I will happily try any trick-taking game out there.

I have also separated the trick-takers from the climbing / shedding genre. If you would like to check out the sister list, kindly click on this link.

As always, I dislike having to rank things in absolutes. Instead, I will do my usual tiered ranking- grouping them by I like it (keeper), Take it or leave it (average), Not for me and to be determined.

I like it

I have to say that the games that fall into this category overlapped greatly with the broader consensus in the board gaming community for gems and classics in this genre. There is a potential for self-selection and bias as I initially chose to try climbing /shedding and trick-takers that are a known commodity. Hence, my overall selection is already skewed towards excellence. Perhaps the games that fall into this group aren’t surprising.

Potato Man – This is the quintessential trick taker that is often misunderstood as a kid’s game. It can be if you take this game lightly and don’t look beneath the layers. It is also possible to play this game seriously and play some mind games with your opponents. The way cards come out matters and timing when the potatoman comes out is imperative to grab the higher value scoring cards. Also, it is important to keep track of the suits in play and the scoring ranges. This is a sleeper hit for another reason: the game is simple enough for a 9 year old to play and grok. This is no easy feat as many trick-takers require some level of meta analysis to be competitive or win. Potatoman is simple enough for young ones to participate and also to win without dumbing it down too much for adults. A keeper.

Sluff Off (Wizard Extreme) – This game is very popular in Germany and is designed by Stefan Dorra, one of my favorite designers. This is a trick prediction game where players must guess how many tricks and in which color they can win at the start of the game. It is not as hard as it sounds and the trick prediction in scoring is not that rare as far as scoring twists go. But Sluff Off is an early pioneer for this type of scoring and early bird gets the worm, eh? It is a classic and should remain in my collection for the long term.

David and Goliath -This game is currently out of print and not clear why. It really should remain in print. The consensus out there is that it is an excellent game and I can attest to that. The game can hold up to 6 players and I think it is an excellent iteration of the genre where the scoring criteria is its strength. Tricks are played as usual, with the weakest card capturing the strongest. But during scoring, any suits with two cards or fewer will score face value points, while the rest score a single point. Makes for very tricky play as players want to simultaneous win but also avoid collecting suits.

Schadenfreude – Fantastic race-to-the-end trick-taker with a Knizian twist. Essentially, the first player to cross the finish line with a fixed number of points ends the game but cannot win. It is the next highest scoring player just below the finish line that wins the game. Much like High Society. Clever! You want to push hard, but not the hardest, while edging others to beat you across the line. This idea of coming in second is also embedded through the trick-taking phase where coming in second wins each trick. Finally, the title of the game is excellent! It is indeed a case of Schadenfreude when you play to win by pushing your competitor across the finish line.

American Bookshop – This is a clever one by Taiki Shinzawa. I was recently introduced to this master trick-taking designer. Oddly enough American Bookstore does not feel like a trick-taker because each hand can end prematurely if a cutoff score is met. So, it is possible that players may not even play any card for that trick, making it feel less of a traditional trick taker. The set collection for points in the end is lifted from Knizia’s Poison where positive points are only counted for that one person who gains a majority for the suit. All others score negative points. Clever.

Charms – Again, another out-of-the-box design by Shinzawa! This is a keeper too. The traditional genre is turned upside down when numbers and suits are segregated from each other and each card has one or the other feature. Crazy, I know. It feels fresh and different from other twists and plays differently too. The predictive tricks work well here as players are competing to match their own bets and not against each other. Competition is more indirect, but plenty of chances for screwage too. Love it!

Take it or leave it

Games in this category are not bad, in fact many are decent. It’s just for me, they fall in the average category. I will play them when asked and may even suggest them on occasion, but they will not be my first choice. The fate for games in this tier is uncertain in some ways. Some will stay in my collection while others will go away.

Texas Showdown – Texas Showdown or called Seas of Strife is probably in the higher end in this tier of ranking. Most who play it, like it. The neat part about the game is that suits in the game are all differently distributed, with the lower numbered cards higher in quantity. The twist in the game is that players can follow suit with any previously played card and not just the lead suit. The winner of the trick is then determined by the highest card in the majority suit. Fresh! Because of how the game is set up, more players make the game better. This is rare. It plays well with 5-6 players but it can get quite unpredictable. We play with the originally intended rules by the designer and that is the only way to play it in my opinion.

Diamonds – This is also borderline I like it game. It is a really simple trick taker with set collection embedded within scoring to score points. Players try to win by accumulating jewels that are worth more behind the vault than in the showroom. Jewels are moved around between locations and players by means of winning tricks, with each suit linked to a specific action that shuffles the diamonds around (e.g. stealing, moving from showroom to vault, etc.). Winning a hand and majority tricks also wins extra actions at the end of each round. The fact that my kid loves it bumps it up a botch. Good simple fun. While I am not as enthused about this game, this is likely a keeper.

Crew: The Quest for the Nine Planets– This is a famous co-op of course. While others have raved about the game, it remains just average for me. I have played the space version of the game and currently trying out Deep Sea Mission. So far, I enjoy this version better. I admire the concept and understand why this game shot up the charts. It is unlike any other that has come before. It also started a trend for co-op trick-takers. The only other one I know is listed further down this article. In the end, I suppose I still prefer competitive vs. cooperative games and I think this extended to The Crew.

Milkuro – Oof, this one is a tough one to rate, but likely may fall further. The game is also called Trick-Taking in Black and White. Milkuro is a recent rebrand. All cards have black and white numbers in an ascending but anti-parallel fashion. So both 44W/1B and 44B/1W exists on the same card but on extreme end. Players call out numbers and color and high card wins. The catch here is that black and white suits won must be balanced at the end to win points. Otherwise, uneven suit counts will be negative points. Technically, there are no suits in this game and hence, no ability to short suit. For some reason, that stunted the game for me, no ability to short suit.

Voodoo Prince – This is a rare Knizia trick-taker with just a very simple twist. Essentially, players will score the number of points based on tricks collected by all other players at the point of exit, and the point of exit is determined based on player count. So you want to time the exit and be the second to last player to exit the hand. Clever, cute. Only three special cards in the entire deck and I kinda like that. Very basic and very Knizian. Enough twists to keep you intrigued.

Not for me

It’s not like games in this tier are bad. They are not. They just don’t feel right for me or my group. In many instances, I think they are good games for some group settings that are unlikely to happen in ours, hence, I think they will be leaving more collection at some point, or have already left.

Krass Kariet or Dealt – This has also departed my collection. I have vague memories of playing this but Scout has quickly surplanted Dealt even though both games share a passing similarity. The deal with dealt is that the initial plays felt very counterintuitive as well and the idea that there is no one winner but there is one loser did not sit well with the group. Sure, several variants have emerged to crown a winner but since the reception wasn’t great, we decided to let it go.

Played once or twice, but to be Determined

These are games that have not played enough or have not played it to determine its fate. In some cases, games such as Turn the Tide have been played a long time ago and I recently reacquired. As with any gamer, my tastes have evolved with time and some games deemed terrible in the past may have a new lease of life. It certainly warrants a few more fresh plays.

Cat in the Box – Thus far, played twice, each with 5 players. I have enough experience to say that the game is a brain burner, but my verdict on the game is still unclear. I think I like it quite a bit, but maybe not top tier. One reason is that the game is not intuitive and also not an easy teach. Which means it won’t hit the table as much. Cat in the Box is also not a great representative of the trick-taking genre. I have many more I could pull out that can entice a newbie. That being said, I find the game intriguing and challenging in a way that makes me want to play more. So, an overall good sign.

Stick Em – After several plays, I think this game should be in the top echelon, but for some reason, it is not. Part of the reason is that it is not an intuitive game to wrap your head around. Especially for newbies, understanding which cards to play and how that hurts opponents is not as straightforward. Players choose a suit that will award negative points and avoid collecting that suit. The problem is that off suit cards are dominant, which can be confusing after having played so many trick takers with a standard set up. This is a crowd-dependent selection and will come out with folks more familiar with the genre. I would like to put this up top in the Tier 1 section, but not sure I can do that yet.

Turn the Tide – This is an old game that I used to own, got rid of it and then reacquired. I hastily disposed of the game a long time ago. Having replayed the game, I can see some intriguing elements to the game play but unsure of its longevity. Part of the novelty of the game comes in uneven scoring between rounds and for better or for worse, the game is only complete if you play as many rounds as there are players. Cutting short the number of rounds will making scoring meaningless. This can drag out the game with 5 players because each round can be pretty long.