Bang!

This is about the card game. For more uses of the word Bang, please see Bang.

Bang! is a wild west themed card game designed by Emiliano Sciarra and released by Mayfair Games. In 2004, Bang! won the Origins Awards for Best Traditional Card Game of 2003 and Best Graphic Design of a Card Game.

Overview

The game is played by four to seven player (two to eight, with variants and expansions). Each player takes one of the following roles:

• Sheriff
• Deputy Sheriff
• Outlaw
• Renegade

Each player is also given a unique character card with special abilities and a certain amount of "bullets" (i.e. life-points).

The object of the game is different for every role:

• The Outlaws must kill the Sheriff
• The Sheriff and his Deputies must kill the Outlaws and the Renegade(s)
• The Renegade, each taken singularly, must remain the last character in play

Set Up

Each player receives a character and a role.

The Sheriff reveals himself, while other roles remain secret. Character cards are revealed. The Sheriff receives one additional bullet. Each player is dealt a number of cards equal to his character's bullets.

Each player is considered to be at relative range "1" from the ones sitting next to him, at range "2" from the ones sitting one seat further, and so on (counting the shortest route).

Gameplay

Rules

To shoot at another character, a player must play a card bearing a "Bang!" icon. If the targeted player has a "Missed" card he can play it thus avoiding the shot, otherwise he loses one bullet. When the last bullet is lost, the caracter is killed.

A Beer card can be used to restore a bullet. A player cannot exceed his character's number of bullets.

A player can usually play only one "Bang!" card during his turn, but other cards can be played to steal cards from an opponent's hand, to force an opponent to discard a card, to jail a character, to change the relative range to other players or to change the range at which the player can shoot at.

At the end of his own turn, a player can have no more cards than his current number of bullets. He can discard cards to meet this requirement.

Play continues clockwise, with each player drawing two cards at the beginning of the turn, until the Sheriff is killed or until all the Outlaws and all the Renegades have been killed.

Strategy

The Sheriff should only shot at known enemies: if the Sheriff kills a deputy he immediately loses his entire hand of cards. And he loses an ally as well.

The Outlaws have no interests in hiding: they generally start shooting at the Sheriff as soon as they can, in order to avoid shooting one at another and in order to gang up against the law.

The Deputies should obviously start shooting at the Outlaws as soon as they reveal themselves.

The Renegade should act double-faced: he should defend the Sheriff at first, and then try to kill the Deputies and, finally, the Sheriff. Thus the Renegade should disguise himself as a Deputy as long as he can, in order to avoid being shooted at by the law.

Expansions

• High Noon: a set of 13 cards that are given to the Sheriff. The cards are not meant to be played by players; the Sheriff reveals one card at the start of each of his turns, and the effects of the cards are applied to all the players until the next High Noon card has been revealed. You can end up losing your character's special abilities or being forced to draw one less card at the beginning of the turn. Or "Bang!" cards may be disallowed, or maybe the "Beer" ones.
• Dodge City: a set of 15 new characters and 40 new play cards. A second Renegade is also introduced, thus allowing eight people to play.

External Links

• Board Game Geek reviews and pictures of the game.