How to Play Blüf with Sedis
Some games that we’ve created for Sedis are completely new creations and others are inspired by other games we’ve played. Blüf, my favorite Sedis game with an umlaut, is based off poker – specifically stud poker. We are also working on a variant based on Texas Hold’em called Blüf Tejas.
What you may not know about me is that I used to be a pretty serious recreational poker player. As in, I played 7 days a week for a few years in my 20s. I’ve won a couple of large tournaments and even moonlighted as a pit boss for a company for several years. I had a reputation as a conservative player, which gave me ample ability to bluff – I almost never got caught.
Blüf is a fun betting/gambling game which requires a bit of luck and skill. Here are first-time Blüf players learning how to play with inventor Neal Murthy.
How to Play Blüf with Sedis
Sedis Betting
Recommended Number of Players: 2 to 6 players
Estimated Time: Varies
Objective: Win the wager
Difficulty Level:◦◦◦•◦
Setup
- Place all 60 tiles face down and shuffle them.
- Players must ante – placing an agreed-upon initial bet in order to play.
- Players who have anted draws five tiles into a hand. Player may look at their tiles but should not show them to rival players.
Play
- Each player attempts to arrange their five tiles in such a way as to have the highest score or to make other players believe they have the highest score. Players may reorder or rotate tiles in their hand. Hands are scored by counting the number of matching pips between vertically stacked tiles.
- After each player has decided the order and orientation of their tiles, place them on the playing surface in a face up stack with only the top tile showing.
- Once all players have placed their full stack in front of them, betting begins. Starting with a designated starting player, each player in turn bets. Subsequent players have the option of calling the bet, raising the bet, or withdrawing from play.
- Once all players have called the highest bet or withdrawn, players enter the reveal phase of play. During this phase, all players remove the top tile from their stack of play, placing this tile next to the unrevealed tiles, in order.
- As each tile is removed from each player’s stack, betting is revisited, with each player declaring the number of points they have currently revealed before betting continues. At each step of the reveal phase of betting, players have the option of checking (if no raise has occurred), calling the current bet, raising the bet further, or withdrawing from play.
Win
If all players but one have withdrawn, the remaining player is the winner and receives the full pool of bets placed. If two or more players continue until the last reveal, the player with the highest total matching pip count wins. If two or more players have the same total matching pip count in the end, they split the pot evenly.
What other classic card games can you recreate with Sedis? We have only a few days left in the Sedis Kickstarter campaign. We’ve met our minimum goal, so getting a set of Sedis tiles won’t be a gamble.