Designed by: Leo Colovini
That rather unsympathetic title (go ahead and cry in German) refers both to the theme of the game (-onions) and the play, which can cause the hardiest player the occasional bit of upset.
There’s a large deck of cards, made up of vegetables numbered 1-7, with two of each in numerous (onion) suits. You’re trying to collect as many cards as you can, and ideally of the higher numbers, as every card will potentially score its number value at the end of the game. How you collect is simple – from your hand of cards (you always have four) play a card to the growing stack in front of you, face-up. The first catch is it must either be a higher number, or any number of the same suit. The second catch is that if you could legally play the card to either neighbour’s stack, you must play it there instead.
You can avoid gifting your neighbours cards, however, by playing a crying onion. The back of every card is a crying onion so to do so, choose a card and play it to your stack face-down. The upside of this is anything may be played on top of a crying onion. The downside is that come the end of the game – when the cards have all been played – however many crying onions you have in your stack will cancel out every card of the matching number: for instance, if you have played six crying onions, none of your number 6 cards will score. Hence there is a devil and the deep blue sea dynamic here, where not playing crying onions means gifting opponents points, but playing is depriving yourself. The player who bets navigates that path will – along with a not inconsiderable dollop of luck – be the winner.
This is one of those card games which, while not allowing much strategy, makes up for it with a generous helping of comedy moaning. That might not sound like fun, but I find that games of this nature, where you get to gripe at the mixture of your own bad luck and treatment at the hands of the other players, are satisfyingly comic, perhaps even a bit cathartic. The game even comes with a peculiar accessory - a hankie that you can pass to the player you've just made cry.
A little
Almost none at all
Mmm... not a whole lot. There are some decisions to be made, but they're about as weighty as an onion skin.
It depends how you feel about a game as luck-heavy as Heul Doch - the experience doesn't change much, but it's short and sweet
3-6
Players
8+
Years
15-30
Mins
Sam says
I quite enjoy this little card game, which, when you know it - which doesn't take long - flies by in around ten to fifteen minutes depending on the number of players. You can plan to some degree and 'build' a hand that connects, but the overriding experience is that it's more of a lottery - not a tactical or strategic challenge, but kinda fun for what it does all the same.