Get Lucky is a game by James Ernest, published by Cheapass Games. It is for 2-6 players. In this game, players will be revisiting the classic board game of Kill Doctor Lucky, but in card form. Each player will be doing their best to be the one to kill Doctor Lucky. However that’s easier said than done. The person that’s best able to “Get Lucky”, will be declared the winner.
To begin, shuffle all the character cards. Depending on the number of players, deal each player a number of character cards which will be played face up on their side of the table. Then, lay out the top 3 cards of the character deck face up. The rest of these cards will be set aside. You will then shuffle the main deck of cards and depending on the number of players deal out a set amount of cards to each player. The rest of the deck is placed face down. The Doctor Lucky pawn is placed on the lowest numbered character card on the table. That player will be the start player. Play now begins.
On a player’s turn, they may do one of 5 things; draw a card, play a card, swap a character, make a murder attempt or pass. To draw a card, simply take the top card off the main deck. There is no hand limit so you can hold as many cards as you’d like.
Playing a card is a little bit more involved as there are different types of cards and different ways to use them. Each character card has a corresponding set of weapon, motive and opportunity cards. If you play a card that matches one of your characters, that gives that character a +2 to their murder attempt. These perfect match cards must be played sideways on the character card to keep things straight. If it doesn’t match it will only be a +1. A character can only have one of each type of card played on it. Spite cards are played on other player’s characters and reduce the character’s attempt by -1.
To swap a character, simply exchange one of your character cards with one of the cards in the middle of the play area, known as the drawing room. Any cards that are attached to a card will go with it.
To make a murder attempt, the Doctor Lucky pawn must be the character card that’s trying to kill him. The player will add and subtract all the cards on the character to get a point value. The character automatically gets a base of 1. If all 3 cards are perfect matches, then a perfect attempt will be at 7 points. Unless someone stops that player, by playing luck points, spite cards or a perfect stop from their hand, then Doctor Lucky dies and the player wins. Luck points are shown in little green shamrocks on some cards. Cards have from 0-2 shamrocks. Each shamrock counts as 1 point. In play order, each player can play cards from their hand to try to stop the attempt. If the murder attempt fails, the cards are discarded, however spite cards that are played remain attached to the character. A perfect stop is done by playing a weapon, motive or opportunity card from your hand that matches the character that is attempting the murder.
Doctor Lucky will continue to move around to each character in numerical order from lowest to highest until someone is able to kill him. When he moves into the drawing room area, players that hold less cards than the character card the pawn is on will be able to draw a card. This all continues until Doctor Lucky is finally killed. The player that’s able to do that will be declared the winner.
COMPONENTS
There are only a few components in this game. The first thing is the Doctor Lucky pawn. Simply put, it’s a nice colored plastic pawn. Nothing spectacular, but it gets the job done. The cards are the major playing pieces to this game. The character cards are very nicely done. Each one has a great portrait and lots of history and back stories for each character. The weapons, motives and opportunity cards are really nice as well, as they too have lots of great text on them. I really enjoy reading each one to get the full story to the game. All in all, the cards look great and are sturdy enough for lots of continued play. I really like how nice everything looks here.
9 out of 10
RULEBOOK
The rulebook is made of a long folded sheet of glossy paper. The rules aren’t long so there’s not much to read here. It does have some nice pictures in full color and plenty of great explanations on gameplay. Nothing is hard to understand or read. It has lots of info for varying amounts of players. Nicely done.
9 out of 10
GAMEPLAY
This game is really simple and quick to play. It has a reverse Clue type of feel to it. Instead of finding the murderer, YOU are the murderer. I love the richness of text on the cards. They really tend to draw you into the Doctor Lucky world. The game is simple enough that it can be played by most anyone. It does have a little bit of strategy to it, as you try to get all the right cards played on one of your characters before someone else is able to attempt a murder. You really have to be watching what the other players are doing and trying to predict when they will attempt a murder. I really enjoy playing this one.
9 out of 10
OVERALL
Get Lucky is a light game of hand management and murder. The rich card text is really enjoyable to read. The artwork is nice to look at and the game is lots of fun too. Anyone that enjoys playing Clue should really enjoy this one. Having never played the original Kill Doctor Lucky game, I’m not sure how this compares. However, if it’s this much fun then it must be great. I really think that this is a really fun game to play with the family. I played it with my mother. She had a little bit of trouble figuring out how everything worked but still seemed to enjoy playing it. For me, the game is a great filler game, as it only takes 15 – 20 minutes to play. I definitely recommend giving this one a try.
9 out of 10
For more information about this and other great games, please check out Cheapass Games at their site.
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