Outlawed: Review

Outlawed Review:

Information:

Mechanics: Simultaneous Selection, Player Elimination, Hand Management

Player Age: 10+

Player Count: 2 - 5 Players 

Time to Play: 15 - 30 Minutes 
Designers: Ryan Cowler
Artists: Shaz Yong

Publisher: Green Couch Gaames
Year Published: 2017

BGG Complexity: 1.25/5
Disclaimer: A review copy for the game was provided by the publisher.Objective:

Objective:

Welcome to this anamorphic wild west world. Where the deputy has left their post. It's up to the players to apprehend the most criminals and prove they are worthy to be the new deputy.

Set up:

- Separate the cards into five piles, based on the same matching back of cards. This is each players deck. You will only need to use one of these decks for each player.

- If you are only playing with two players remove any card from each players deck that doesn't have the bullet icon.
- Each player will shuffle their deck and randomly discard one card (this will be removed from the game). From now on each deck will be each players hand of cards.
- Choose a starting player that player will have the deputy card placed in front of them.

How to Play:

Claim Phase:

This phase is really easy, starting with the first player then moving clockwise. Each player will play one of the cards in their hand (referred to as the played outlaw) and will announce out load what card they played (this is referred to as the claim) this can and often needs to be a lie. Once this is done the player will move to the apprehend phase.

Apprehend Phase:

In this phase, you will be checking to see if you met your cards apprehend condition. This could be as simple as someone else claim was a lie this turn.

To do this simultaneously everyone will reveal their cards and check if the apprehend condition was met. If you succeed the card will be placed face down in a jail pile (scoring pile) if you fail to meet the condition or blocked by another players card then the criminal has escaped for another day and will be returned to your hand.

Pass Phase:

Once the apprehended phase has finished pass the deputy card to the next player clockwise they will start the next round.

End of Game:

Once a player has successfully apprehended seven outlaws the game will now end and whichever player has the most points tallied by the apprehended outlaws (each outlaw has victory points on the bottom right of their card) in their scoring pile will become the new town deputy.

Final Thoughts:

Pros:
- Rules for a beginner game as well as a two-player game included.
- Great player range if two to five players.
- Fun bluffing elements of how to confuse your opponents or trick them into apprehending the outlaws you want.
- Scoring the most outlaws will give you fewer cards to play and not necessarily the most points so you have to be smart about which outlaw you apprehend.

Cons:
- This is the kind of bluffing game that needs to be played with the same group repeatedly to gain an understanding of what kind of bluffs other players could be doing, which is great if you play the game a lot with the same group but this needs to be known.

'Outlawed' does exactly as advertised it is a great compact bluffing game that reminds me of games I consider as essential bluffing games like coup. This is one of the games that each player needs to understand the group they are playing with and what cards are available to them so I would recommend the beginner game to first begin, but once you play the game with a smaller hand you will have a better grasp of what players are trying to trick the other players into.  For example, your card needs someone else to lie about who they are playing, and you are the last player to have your turn so you will be carefully watching what cards players say they are playing and the mannerism they have when they claim their card. This is a great game to play with a group of friends you know very well as the intricacies of bluffing will come out more.

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Green Couch Games
Outlawed on BGG
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