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Number of Players: 2-8 Cards: 1 Deck of normal playing cards Counters: Assorted counters to represent gold found in the Mayan ruins.

Artifact: A court card. Worth five points. Cave Network: All the face up cards played so far in a game. Cave Collapse: If three cards of the same rank (i.e. 3 fives, or 3 jacks) are ever seen face up on the table. This includes cards just played by continuing players and cards that are currently part of the Cave Network. Continuing Player: A player that continues into the cave network, expanding it by playing a face up card. Fleeing Player: A player retreating out of the cave network for the rest of the game by playing a face down card.

Much like the Incan Gold game, it's a game of pushing your luck and knowing when to betray the other players to get away with as much gold as possible. Every turn a player decides whether to play a card to continue journeying into the caves, or to retreat with their current gains. The chances of dying and not making any money increases as players move further into the caves. The difference between this game and the original is that it uses normal playing cards, and there are more choices for the players involved.

1. Remove the jokers from the pack.
2. Randomly remove cards face down from the pack based on the number of players in the game:-

~~2 Players: 32 cards ~~3 Players: 22 cards ~~4 Players: 12 cards ~~5 Players: 12 cards ~~6 Players: 10 cards ~~7 Players: 10 cards ~~8 Players: 12 cards

1. Deal the rest of the deck evenly to all players face down.
2. Players now pick up their cards, look at them and arrange them how they like.
3. Give one discarded card to each player. The players may look at these cards but not use them in their hands- their purpose is to hide what card is being played in a round. The card remains on the table in front of the player, face down.
4. Place one Joker card face up in the middle of the table. When the cave network is created by placing cards face up on the table, they should be placed to build outwards from the joker - that way it can be seen which cards are the outermost cards.

Each round the players decide whether to proceed forward or to retreat.

1. Each player takes a card from their hand and places it either face up or face down underneath the covering card on the table.
2. After all players have put a card underneath the covering card, all players slide the covering card off simultaneously.
   • Face Up Card - The player is continuing into the caves.
   • Face Down Card - The player is fleeing the caves.

1. The face down card is discarded. The card remains face down and may not be looked at by anyone for the remainder of this game.
2. All counters on the Joker are evenly split amongst all the fleeing players.
3. Counters that cannot be split evenly are placed on the Joker and will be available for the next fleeing player(s).
4. Remove all court cards from the cave network. Court cards are Artifacts and are worth 5 points each. Distribute the court cards evenly amongst the fleeing player(s).
5. Court cards that cannot be split evenly are placed back into the cave network and will be available for the next fleeing player(s).
6. Fleeing players remain out of the rest of the game .

1. The face up cards are placed next to any existing face up cards currently on the table.
2. If there are three of the same rank cards face up on the table (either number or court cards), the cave has collapsed and all players are killed - the game is over and no continuing player is able to keep any counters they have thus far retrieved in this game.
3. For all the numbered, non-court, cards played - take that amount of counters and evenly distribute them amongst the players who continued.
   • Do not include any face up cards that are part of the cave network that were played in a previous round.
   • Do not include any counters on the Joker.
4. Any counters that cannot be split evenly are placed on the Joker and will be available for the next fleeing player(s).

The game ends when the cave collapses, or when the continuing players run out of cards.

• If the continuing player(s) successfully make it all the way through the cave system without it collapsing (they play all their cards and there are never three of a kind in the entire cave network) - then they may take any artifact cards (court cards) and counters on the Joker and evenly split them amongst the survivors. Remaining cards and counters are discarded.

Five games should be played. For every new game, all the cards apart from the Jokers should be reshuffled - so discarded cards will be different for each game.

CategoryGames