Overview
At a glance
Is this game right for my group?
ABG editorial scores on a 1–5 scale.
Harder to teach
High replayability
Highly interactive
Scales well
Deep strategy
How it plays
How does it play?
The Red Dragon is a trick-taking playing card game for 3-6 players. It is played with 60 cards (4 colours, each with a value 0-14).
Core mechanisms
Key systems that shape the decisions players make.
Read the full game description
The Red Dragon is a trick-taking playing card game for 3-6 players. It is played with 60 cards (4 colours, each with a value 0-14). The goal is to have the most points by the end of the game (containing as many rounds as the number of the players). At the beginning of the round cards are dealt equally to the players (10 cards each by 6 players, 12 by 5 players etc.). Each player chooses cards from the hand and places them face down in the middle of the table (3/4/5/6 players 4/3/2/2 cards). After turning them up, each player picks cards from the table (3/4/5/6 players 4/3/2/2 cards). The player on turn plays a card. The player on left must play a card of the same colour as the card of the player that started the round (but no trick compulsion). If he does not have such a card, he can play any card. Other players play a card according to the above mentioned rules as well in clockwise direction. The player whose card has the highest rank of the led colour gets the trick. He puts the trick onto his pile (face down). The round ends when players are out of cards. Scoring: Each trick is worth 6/8/10/12 points by 3/4/5/6 players. Each red dragon card taken in a trick scores as many penalty point against the player winning the trick, as the rank of the card, except for the „red dragon 11” that costs 26 penalty points. If any of the player manage to do the slam, i.e. to take all the tricks he immediately wins the whole game. Players who take no tricks in a deal gain points depending on the number of the players and the number of the players taking no tricks either in the round.