Spoons

For other uses, see (disambiguation)}}}.

Spoons is a children's card-matching and bluffing game also enjoyed by adults. Spoons is a fast-action, knuckle-punishing game requiring the players to pay attention to two things at once.

For 3 to 8 Players, ages 7 & Up. Cards are dealt to each player every round. Gameplay is generally turn-based with players drawing and discarding on every turn, and the game consisting of several rounds with multiple turns per player per round. Additionally, players must observe and interact with the spoons througout gameplay.

Contents

Playing the game

Object

Get four of a kind and grab a spoon! Once a spoon is grabbed, everybody grabs for the rest. Don't be the one left without a spoon!

Setup

In each round, the game will require one fewer spoon than the number of players. For example, if there are six players, you will use five spoons. Arrange the designated number of spoons in the center of the table so they will be easy for all players to grab. Any additional spoons should be removed from play.

Assign one person to be the dealer and another to be the Trash at the start of each round. As the game will consist of multiple rounds, the role of dealer can be changed after every round. The trash will always be the person sitting to the dealer's left. The dealer sets up the round by shuffling the cards and dealing four to each player including himself and the trash. The remaining deck of cards can be placed in front of the dealer face-down. This is called the "draw pile" and room should be left in front of the trash for a "discard pile". Each player should pick up their cards and look at them.

Playing a round

The dealer starts the round by drawing a card from the draw pile and putting it in his hand. From his hand, the dealer should choose one card and discard it face down to the player at his right. That player will draw the single card discarded by the dealer and discard one to the player at her right. Gameplay will continue thusly until a card is discarded to the trash player. The trash draws the card discarded by the player at his left, but discards to a "discard pile" instead of to the dealer, who is the player at his right. After the trash discards to the discard pile, the dealer should commence a new round by drawing a card from the draw pile.

Players may not keep more than four cards in their hand when they are not taking their turn. Each player is trying to make their four cards into a set of four (four Kings, four twos, etc.) by drawing new cards and discarding unused ones. A player should keep the four cards that are most likely to produce a set of four cards. When the draw pile is depleted, the discard pile is shuffled and becomes the draw pile.

Grabbing spoons

Rounds of gameplay should proceed at a constant (or accelerating) speed as outlined above. As soon as any player has a set of four cards and has discarded to the player on her right, she is allowed to take a spoon from the pile in the middle of the table. As soon as any player grabs a spoon from the pile of spoons, any other player is allowed to take a spoon as well. This should cause a mad grab for spoons leaving one player empty handed. The player who ends the round without a spoon loses that round.

Scoring

The losing player has a letter in the word "s-p-o-o-n-s" counted against them. That is, the first loss is "s", the second is "p", etc. When a player has accumulated all six letters in "spoons", they drop out of the game. At that time, the number of spoons is reduced by one. The game continues until only the winner is left.

Rules/Strategy

Preemptive Grabbing

No player may grab a spoon until at least one player has a set of four and has had a chance to grab a spoon for herself. A preemptive spoon grabber tries to grab a spoon before they have four of a kind just to make sure they get one, which is illegal. House rules determine the consequence for a preemptive spoon grabber. The situation is usually resolved in one of two ways. Either all the spoons are returned to the middle and gameplay resumes where it was interrupted, or the preemptive spoon grabber loses the round and the cards are re-dealt.

NOTE: believing that another player has four of a kind does not give you the right to grab a spoon, nor does seeing another player reach for a spoon give you that privilege.

Running/ Grabbing the spoon and running from the table isn't allowed. However, you can move around the table if you are pulling the spoon from someone, as long as you are in arm's length of everyone at the table.
NOTE: Whoever ends up without a spoon loses the round, how the spoons get distributed is up to the players' efforts.

Bluffing

Bluffing is encouraged, as you can reach for a spoon at any time as long as the spoon is not actually touched. This can have a distracting effect on one's opponents, or even cause someone to improperly grab a spoon prematurely.

Eyes on the spoons

Players should be vigilant while playing their cards that all the spoons are accounted for. Sometimes a player can quietly get four of a kind in their hand and slip a spoon away from the pile without anyone noticing.

Because players are focused on their own hand, when you get four of a kind, surreptitiously nab a spoon. The card-passing may continue for several seconds while you watch the fun.

Eyes off the cards

One can conceivably play without ever looking at the cards at all. Just pass the discards from left to right, keeping both eyes on the spoons. Often times players, while doing this strategy, will look at the cards at the beginning to try to close out as many pairs as possible by keeping as many different cards as possible.

Variations

On Spoons

When playing somewhere where spoons are not obtainable, play is possible with other similar objects, such as pencils, pens, glasses, cups, coins, etc. that are available.

In some versions, you can still lose the spoon even when it's in your hand. Most of the time you have to touch it to your chest, nose, or some other body part.

No Spoons

Instead of grabbing a spoon, it's also possible to play this game by simply touching your nose and holding your finger there (or sticking out your tongue) when you get four of a kind. This method has the advantage of being more discreet than picking up a noisy spoon, so the losing player may not have noticed that the others have a finger on their noses. This concentrates more on attention than speed. This method also prevents any player from having an advantage by sitting closer to the spoons.

Card Hinting

In some instances of this game, the dealer will tell the rest of the players the bottom 1-4 cards in the deck, so they will know that if they try to collect that number, then the rest of their cards will be at the bottom of the deck. If players have cards that they wish to discard after hearing the bottom cards, they may send them straight to the "trash" pile.

Levels

Alternatively, levels can be used instead of letters, normally the levels 1 to 5.

No Talking

Further depth can be added to the game by introducing that players can talk to people with the same letters as them, but if they talk to someone with more letters, they automatically jump to that players level. For example, player A and B just have "s", and player C has "spoo". Players A and B can talk to each other, and player C can say anything to A and B, but if player A talks to player C they will become "spoo". This can add much enjoyment, especially in large groups, as players on different levels try to trick each other into talking to them, and the conversations start referencing other players in the third person.

Other Cutlery

While not a complete departure from the rules of spoons, many and varied objects can be used, from varied sizes of spoons (ie, teaspoon through to large soup ladles) or with other objects competely, such as pots and pans, hats, candy, or any other objects at hand.

Though, it should be noted that due to the nature of the game, it is considered a rather bad idea to play with sharp or pointed objects, such as forks and knives.

Popularity

The game of spoons is extremely popular in the Australian scouting movement, where in the younger sections games such as poker or blackjack are either frowned upon or outright banned. Oddly enough, spoons is still wildly more popular in the Rover Scouts section, because despite all but a very small majority of those in the Rover Scouts being over the legal drinking age in Australia, an affection and/or high level of skill has usualy been developed during the years in the younger sections of the scouting movement, and thus, most rovers prefer spoons to poker. Many rovers choose to combine the game of spoons with the consumption of alcohol.

Interestingly, The ScoutReach Lone Rovers Group has Built up an almost legendary status as Highly skilled Spoons Players.

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