3 Chapters

• Designer: Joe Hout
• Publisher: Amigo
• Players:2-6
• Age: 10+
• Time: 30 minutes
• Played with german copy provided by Amigo

Once upon a time, there was a magical book of fairy tales that had three chapters. You will now live through that book in 3 Chapters, a trick-taking game with three game phases:

• Chapter 1: Start with eight cards in hand, choose one, then pass the remaining cards clockwise. Continue doing this until all cards are drafted.

• Chapter 2: Play one card each. The highest card wins the trick and receives two points. Additionally, compare the skills on your cards with one another as this can earn you additional points.

• Chapter 3: Finally, evaluate the skills within your selected hand cards. They can bring additional points in this chapter.

If you choose the fairy tale creatures wisely at the beginning, you can win plenty of tricks and collect lots of points. Clever card combinations can also bring points without tricks because everyone knows, say, that Hansel and Gretel are particularly strong as a team…

This novel game is played in three distinct chapters: Drafting / Trick Taking / Scoring.  The deck is comprised of 50 cards, but you will not use the whole deck each game – instead, the deck is shuffled and each player is dealt a hand of 8 cards.  The rest of the deck goes unused this game.

(Note that my rules digest below are from a possibly not-final set of rules, so apologies for any discrepancies from the published version)

In the first chapter, the players draft cards.  Each player looks at their starting hand of 8 cards and then selects one for themselves, placing it facedown in a stack on the table in front of them.  The remainder of their hand is passed to the left, and the process is repeated with each player choosing one card from the hand given to him until all are chosen and each player gets a hand of 2 cards.  One is chosen for themselves and the other is discarded; so that every player has a stack of 7 cards in front of them on the table.

Each of the cards has a number in the upper left corner (going from 1 to 50) and a title.  Down the left hand side, you can find some character types – there are 8 different types in the game.  Finally, at the bottom right of the card, there may be a white box with some special scoring rules.  Unless specified with a seal stating a particular phase of the game, the ability is active when the card is played to a trick AND when it is counted in scoring.

As you are drafting, you will want to try to collect cards that work well together.  This may be difficult as other people may be wanting to compete for the same card.  Further, especially at lower player counts, it is quite likely that the card may not even be in play!

In the second phase, the players play a trick taking game.  The start player leads a card and then play goes clockwise.  The card with this highest value takes the trick.  All players keep the cards in front of them.  The winner of the trick gets 1 star.  Some cards will allow players to gain tokens (Hearts or Gems) when played based on other cards in the trick – this should be calculated after all cards are played.   In general, all players take their card back and leave it face up in front of them (will be used in Chapter 3).  The player who won the trick leads the next trick.  Continue this until all 7 tricks have been played.

In the third and final phase, players score their seven cards which are face up in front of them – again using the scoring criteria on the cards.  Tilt each card after you review it to make sure you don’t score it twice.  Once everyone has scored their cards, check to see who has the most Gems at the moment – this player gains 4 more gems.

Now, calculate your victory points:

• Stars – 2 points each
• Hearts – 1 point each
• Gems – 1 point per pair of Gems

The player with the most points wins.  Ties broken in favor of the player with the highest numbered card in their hand

My thoughts on the game

This is such an intriguing game.  One of my favorite games of the past few years has been Fantasy Realms (where you draft cards and then score them) – and this adds an extra layer of Trick taking into the mix!  As soon as I heard the elevator pitch at Gen Con from my Amigo friends, I knew that I’d be interested in trying it.  So much so, that I was thrilled to take home a German set of cards, translate the rules and write translations down on the cards. (stickers and sleeves are for suckers – so much faster just to write right on the cards!)

For me, I like to focus on making a hand that I know will score well in the third phase – after all, I’m in charge of choosing all the cards for that chapter.  Of course, if things are close, I’m not against taking a higher valued card, because the 2VP for the star reward for winning a trick is nothing to sneeze at!

As with most trick taking games, it’s advantageous to go last because you have the ability to choose your play knowing all the ramifications.  Even if you can’t win, you might be able to choose a card that benefits you with other scoring.  Don’t forget that the card effects work both when the trick is scored in Chapter 2 as well as when you score your hand in Chapter 3.

The combinations will probably be better known after you have played a few games – as you’ll have seen all the different cards by that time.  Also pay attention to the different proportion of cards available in different player counts, as the player count rises, more cards out of the 50 card deck will actually be in play.  Though I haven’t figure it out fully yet, it is certainly less likely that cards that rely on a single other card will be less likely to score than cards that simply want a particular attribute.

The scoring system is fairly simple (Stars = 2, Hearts = 1, gems = 0.5*), but it has confused a few people.  I try to leave the back cover of the rules visible on the table so people can reference this.  It might have been easier to make the values be 4, 2, and 1. And then the appropriate number of dots could have been placed on the respective scoring chits – but in the end, it’s really not a big deal.

The art is cute and all of the characters on the cards are from fairy tales or other tropes from kid’s stories.   The cards are laid out nice – and there was more than enough space for my ultra-fine sharpie to write down small translations on each card that needed it!

For a little 20-30 minute game, there is a lot going on here, and it has been intriguing to explore the possibilities.  As most of my games have been 3 or 4 players, this means that many of the cards are out of play, and this gives a high risk-reward to trying to set up pairs of cards.  It also rewards players who are able to remember cards they have seen during the draft – either pairing them up in their own hand, or simply knowing that the pair is out there somewhere and waiting for the right time to play their own half of the pair to maximize scoring.

In the end, this is a short game that definitely gives you a lot to think about. I cannot wait for my EN copy to come (I think early 2025), but for now, we’ll probably play the heck out of this Sharpied DE version.

Ratings from the Opinionated Gamers

• I love it! Dale Y
• I like it. John P
• Neutral.
• Not for me…