Overview
At a glance
Is this game right for my group?
ABG editorial scores on a 1–5 scale.
Harder to teach
High replayability
Low interaction
Scales well
Deep strategy
How it plays
How does it play?
WIN OR DIE TRYING Your only goal is to make sure that your Beans don’t die. Fair warning, these bumbling Beans will ALWAYS find dumb ways to die.
Core mechanisms
Key systems that shape the decisions players make.
Push Your Luck
Choose whether to secure current gains or risk them for a larger reward.
Hand Management
Time and sequence a limited hand of cards to preserve future options.
Player Elimination
Players can be removed from contention before the game ends.
Take That
Direct negative effects at selected opponents.
Read the full game description
WIN OR DIE TRYING Your only goal is to make sure that your Beans don’t die. Fair warning, these bumbling Beans will ALWAYS find dumb ways to die. Their survival depends on a deck of cards that MIGHT help (but mostly won’t). In Dumb Ways to Die, each player starts the game with 3 Beans and a handful of cards. On your turn you roll a die to determine how many actions you must take. Actions consist of Drawing a card from the deck or playing a card from your hand and following the actions. Playing cards may result in forcing other players to draw cards, peeking at other player's cards, swapping hands with a player, attacking an individual player or forcing every player to take extra actions. When drawing you may draw a card that will instantly kill one of your Beans. If a player is attacked or if you draw a Kill card, you may defend against that attack or death by playing an accident card with a corresponding icon. If you're able to play the matching card type, you have cheated death and live another round. If you can't play the required card, one of your Beans is killed. Once all three of your Beans are killed, you are out of the game. Play continues until only one player has Beans (or Bean) remaining and that player walks away victorious. Includes: 54 Cards, 15 Animated Bean Death Cards, 1 XL Die, Rules Booklet