Game 98: Trumpet

 OK, it's really ridiculous that it's been very nearly 2 months since we played a "NEW" game to count from our shelves.  To be fair, mid-to-late semester is super busy for me and my husband in our particular teaching jobs.  But enough of that!  Trumpet is an AWESOME game, so much so that when I hauled out my camera to record it tonight, everyone was SURE that it was already on the blog; shockingly, it wasn't.  It's a great game - one that we used to play much more frequently, especially with our friends Chuck and Sue, but it's kind of taken a back seat for our family to more recent pure strategy games such as Stone Age, Seven Wonders, Splendor, etc.  I'm honestly not sure whether to classify this as a card game or a board game.  It does have a board, so I guess, technically, it's a board game. But it plays so much like a standard trump card game - like Hearts, Spades, Pinochle, etc. - that it seems like a pure card game, so I'm categorizing it as both.  This is the first game for which I've done that.

 To begin with, there is no trump.  Whatever card is played first in the hand is the winning suit.  Each time a player wins a hand they move forward one space on the board.  One they hit a "Choose Trump" space they get to place a circular token, with the trump of their choice, on the hierarchy track in the middle of the board.  The suit depicted at the top then becomes the dominant trump suit.  There are, for all intents and purposes, the standard suits of spades, diamonds, clubs (clovers), and hearts, but there are also crowns and stars.  The highest card in any suit is an 11.

When play ensues, you must always follow the suit led if possible  There are also two wild cards, known as "trumpets," one of which you can see in the discard tray in the picture above. Tokens/pawns never occupy the same space on the board but rather jump over each other, which makes for an interesting set-up in terms of who might get to choose trump next.  At the outset, as players land on the "Choose Trump" spaces they get to choose from the trump tokens that are left to put into the next highest space in the hierarchy.

 First we had Diamonds as the only trump, but, as the game progressed, we had Diamonds, then Stars, then Clovers as trump.  It's kind of a bummer to be the sixth person to land on a "Choose Trump" space, because you really don't have any choice  .  .  .

 As you can see, the next person who lands on "Choose Trump" (usually a pretty exciting event) doesn't really have anything to choose (at this point, below), as only Crowns are left and must be placed in the last open space on the track.

 The game does get more interesting again quite soon however.  But before getting to that, I thought I'd record my position in last place.  I always play green, and there I am in last.  I don't really care, since my joy in games comes with interacting with my family.  But, it's also always the case in this game - especially with the ability to jump other pawns, that an upset may occur, so I'm certainly not despairing at this point.

   .  .  .  yet they just keep pulling father ahead of me  .  .  .

 We got "interrupted" (pleasantly) mid-game by a call from our oldest son and his family (who will be arriving in 4 days for an early Christmas!).  So I took opportunity while we had him on speaker phone (yes, we DO still have a land line!!) to take a picture of my hand - reasonably sweet as stars are highest trump .  .  .  at least for now!

 Well, despite how this game CAN turn around, the others did manage to stay ahead of me.  Here we have two players in the green zone.  Once you're in the green zone, if you win a hand you can choose to move yourself forward one space or to move another player who is also in the green zone back one space.  These can often be very serious decisions, depending on how far into the green zone another player is and whether or not their next space is a "Choose Trump" space.

 But yellow (aka Jacob) maintained his lead throughout to win the game!  Good job, Jacob!

Though we hadn't played it in a while, we all really like this game.  It has the best elements of a card game and a board game.  It's a standard card game of trump but with a twist that makes it even better (if such a thing is possible!).  We're not the only one's who feel so, as this game, in fact, won the Games Magazine GAME OF THE YEAR in 1991.  Yeah, we've had it for a long time, but, even though we don't play it super frequently we still love it, and we find that it has stood the test of time!