Disunyer rules

The essentials

• Each round every player gets one card. Every round at least one player is knocked out.
• The last player standing wins. If everyone still in the game is knocked out in the same round, the game ends with no winner.
• On your turn you keep your card or pass it (you swap it with the next player).
• At the end of the round, whoever holds the lowest card is out.
• If you are dealt an Ace, you must call “Disunyer!” and challenge a rival to guess its suit.

The deck

The 40-card Spanish deck: coins, cups, swords and clubs, with Ace, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, Jack, Knight and King.

From lowest to highest: Ace < 2 < 3 < 4 < 5 < 6 < 7 < Jack < Knight < King. Suits don’t affect the value.

The deck is not shuffled every round: used cards go to the discard pile and, when the deck runs out, the discard pile is shuffled and play continues from it. Remembering which cards have already come out pays off.

Players sit in a circle, in an order drawn at random when the game starts that stays the same for the whole game.

How a round goes

1. Every player still standing is dealt one card.
2. Disunyer phase: if anyone has an Ace, it is resolved (see below) and the round ends there.
3. If nobody had an Ace, turn phase: in seating order, each player keeps or passes their card.
4. Reveal: everyone’s card is shown.
5. Knock-out: whoever has the lowest card is out. If several players tie for the lowest card, they are all out.

Turns: keep or pass

• You have 10 seconds to decide. If you don’t answer, you keep your card.
• Passing is a swap: you give your card and receive the next player’s card, and they can decide with it on their turn. Both of you know the card you got.
• The last player of the round has nobody to pass to: if they pass, they swap their card for one drawn from the deck, which everyone sees. The card they let go is not shown.
• An Ace you get from a swap or from the deck is not a Disunyer: it is simply the lowest card.

Disunyer!

• Only an Ace dealt at the start of the round counts. With it you must call “Disunyer!”: you pick a rival who is still standing.
• If you don’t pick anyone within 10 seconds, you are out for not calling it.
• The rival has 10 seconds to guess your Ace’s suit. If they guess right, you are out. If they guess wrong or don’t answer, they are out.
• If there are several Disunyers in the same round, they are resolved in seating order and each one knocks out one player. If the player who would call it has already been knocked out before their turn, their Disunyer is cancelled.
• If only one player is left standing, any pending Disunyers are cancelled and that player wins.
• In a round with a Disunyer there are no turns, no reveal and no card comparison.

Examples

Normal round (4 players). Cards: Ann 5, Bea Jack, Carl 3, Dan 7. Ann passes: Ann has the Jack and Bea the 5. Bea keeps the 5. Carl passes: Carl has the 7 and Dan the 3. Dan, who is last, passes and draws a 6. In the end: Ann Jack, Bea 5, Carl 7, Dan 6. Bea is out.

Tie for the lowest card. Ann 3 of coins, Bea 3 of cups, Carl King: Ann and Bea are out, and Carl wins.

Final tie. Two players are left with the 5 of coins and the 5 of cups: both are out and the game ends with no winner.

Disunyer. Ann has the Ace of coins and picks Carl. If Carl says “coins”, Ann is out. If he names another suit, or doesn’t answer, Carl is out. The round ends there.

Cancelled Disunyer. Ann and Bea both have an Ace. Ann picks Bea and Bea guesses wrong: Bea is out, and her own Disunyer is never called.

Stuck King mode

Each room has a mode, chosen when it is created: Standard (everything above) or Stuck King. Stuck King plays with the same rules plus one more:

• The Disunyer phase is played first, as always. Having a King does not protect you from a Disunyer: if you are picked and guess the suit wrong, you are out.
• If there was no Disunyer in the round, the Kings dealt to the players still standing are turned face up for everyone to see. Those Kings are stuck: nobody can take yours and you can’t pass it.
• With a stuck King you don’t decide: on your turn you keep it.
• If the next player (the one you would pass to) has a stuck King, you can’t pass: you have to keep your card.
• The last player still draws from the deck if they pass. If they draw a King, it is the highest card, but it doesn’t get stuck.
• Everything else stays the same: if both finalists have a King, they tie, both are out and nobody wins.

Example. Ann 2, Bea King, Carl 5. There is no Ace, so Bea’s King is shown. Ann wanted to pass, but Bea has a stuck King: Ann keeps the 2. Bea keeps the King. Carl, the last player, decides as usual and keeps the 5. Ann is out.

Points are shared out the same way in both modes and go to the same leaderboard; the leaderboard and your profile also show how many games you have played and won in each mode.

Games, bots and spectators

• Create a room (public or private) and share its 4-letter code. The game starts by itself when there are 8 players.
• If the room isn’t full 3 minutes after it was created, it is filled with bots and starts. The host can also add or remove bots.
• If you disconnect during a game you keep your seat and can come back; meanwhile, the default choices are played for you.
• You can watch any game as a spectator. Players can send emojis and spectators can send hearts.

Accounts and leaderboard

• You can play as a guest without saving anything, or create an account with a username and password to appear on the leaderboard.
• Each finished game gives points according to your place: at a table of 8 the winner gets 8 and the first one out gets 1.
• If there were no bots at the table, the points are doubled.
• Players knocked out in the same round share the best place of the group.