GULL
A downloadable game
What is GULL?
GULL is a 2-to-5 player card game about Seagulls scrounging for scraps, getting braver and bolder until they are ready to snap up a proper snack straight from the hands of an unsuspecting human.
A game of risk-reward, Gull sees each Seagull draw from a pile of scraps, increasing their boldness until they successfully steal a meal or get too bold they are punished with a swift shooing off! Do you have the ruthlessness to take on the role of a seagull? Or will you fall to the bottom of the pecking order?
GULL was created in a month and released first on the Tall Shepherd Press Patreon. Tall Shepherd Press is a project aiming to create and release print-and-play games over short periods of time. It was created by Jack Shepherd (@jjjjshep). Please note that as the game was created over a short period of time you may encounter small issues that haven't had the chance to be play-tested out, please let me know if you run into any and I can work on them.
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/tallshepherdpress
Twitter: https://twitter.com/TallShepherd / https://twitter.com/jjjjshep
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tallshepherdpress/
Purchase
In order to download this game you must purchase it at or above the minimum price of $3 USD. You will get access to the following files:
Comments
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The rulebook for this game could use some extra detail.
1. When cards are discarded, are discarded cards shuffled back into the Scraps deck? Are they shuffled back in when the Scraps deck is empty, or whenever cards are discarded?
2. When a snack is purchased using Boldness, are the scraps that were used discarded, or do they stay in the hand?
3. Can more than one snack be purchased in a single turn?
4. Snack cards have victory points, but these are not mentioned in the rulebook. Are they used to score the overall winner, or do only the snack cards that are held in your hand count towards victory?
5. It would be good to clarify on Event cards' texts that they only apply to the person who drew the event, not to every player who drew cards so far in this round. "Discard all cards drawn this round" sounds like it might apply to everyone, but "Discard all of the cards you drew this round" is better.
6. The text for Swoop is confusing. My understanding is that Snack cards don't become part of your hand normally --- although the rulebook makes it sound like they do with the text: "the cards you already have in your hand (other than Snack cards)". So when you play Swoop, the player you're swooping shuffles their hand and their snack cards together, then holds the bundle out to you so that you can steal a random card (which may be a snack). After the card is stolen, the player again separates their snacks from their hand.
First of all, thank you so much for the feedback! This is exactly the type of comment I LOVE to see and yeah, you've cut right to the heart of some stuff I worried about when writing the instructions, it’s really good to hear someone’s thoughts about stuff that is unclear.
I’m gonna go through the instructions and address the issues you brought up and then I’ll update the files here! I’ll see if I can send out a notification when it’s been updated.
I’ll try and answer the specific rules here, but honestly if you find anything unsatisfying feel free to adjust the rules, it’s all about what feels fun. I definitely want to iterate on the rules anyway.
1. Scraps are added to a discard pile next to the Scraps deck, then, when the main Scraps deck is empty, the discard pile is shuffled and becomes the new Scraps deck. When Event cards come up, once resolved they are put into the discard pile too.
2. Scraps are discarded when a Snack is purchased, yeah. The decks cycle quite a lot.
3. Only one snack can be purchased a turn, purchasing counts as an action.
4. The Snack card victory points in used in the event of a tie, or to decide the order of players who don’t come first / are unable to obtain the necessary Snacks. I think that is addressed in the instructions but I will make it clearer.
5. Yeah, you’re right that’s something I didn’t consider but makes a lot of sense.
6. Yeah you have it right, the hand and the snacks are combined only for that action, I worried that that would be unclear and it seems it is, so i’ll rewrite that section too and adjust the card wording!
Again, thank you so much for the thorough feedback, I really do appreciate the effort you put into your comment, makes it very easy for me to adjust things!
Thanks for the clarification, looking forward to more of your games!
Just bought a few games to give out as Christmas gifts and I'm very excited about it! I see you usually print your games on linen paper, but do you have any recommendations for adding a coating or anything like that?
Thanks!
Hey! Thanks so much! Yeah, what I tend to do is print the files on a sheet of linen paper (around 120gsm) and then fold + glue as per instructions and then give it a quick spray of clear lacquer to set the ink and make sure it doesn't bleed/smudge. I tend to use the lacquer from Halfords (a car shop in the UK) but you can find it anywhere that does spray paint really. It's not necessary but helps when you are handling the cards a lot! Hope that helps, let me know if you need any more info and I hope you like the games! All feedback is appreciated so I can improve them all.