A cuddly little game from the design duo of Aaron Weissblum and Norman Woods.
End Game Scoring
When a player’s score goes above 21 for the first time in a Panda Head game, that player becomes a Drowsy Panda. Reduce their score to match the next highest score in the game. If a Drowsy Panda goes over 21, they become a Pooped Panda and are out of the game. When all but one Panda is pooped, we have a winner of the Panda Head game!
The goal of Panda Head
Be the last Panda player to stay awake. Pandas who score 21 twice become Pooped Pandas and lose the game. That’s right… points are bad!
Play of Panda Head
The role of the dealer rotates clockwise, starting with the player wearing the most black and white. Deal 7 cards to each player. Place the remaining deck of cards off to one side.
In Panda Head, your primary objective is to NOT win the seventh (last) Pile as that will cause you to collect points.
Start the first Panda Pile!
The player left of the dealer chooses one of his 7 cards and places it face up in the middle of the table.
Now, in clockwise order, each other player must choose one of the following actions:
A) Play a Panda equal to or higher than the highest Panda played so far on the Pile.
B) Play their lowest Panda.
Once everyone has played one Panda, the Pile is complete and the winner is the player who played the highest Panda. If there is a tie for the highest Panda, the winner of Panda Head is the last to play the highest Panda. The cards are set aside and the winner starts the next Pile.
Scoring
The first six Piles have no effect on the score. Only the LAST Pile scores points. Remember
those? Those are bad. The winner of the last trick is actually the loser and will score points equal to all the cards played on that pile. So remember to get rid of those high numbered Pandas otherwise you will lose the Panda Head game!
Poor Panda Rule
If there is a tie on the last Pile, the last player to play the highest Panda scores points as usual. However, every other player who played the same number gets negative points equal to that number. No player may go below zero
After scoring, the next dealer shuffles the deck and deals 7 cards to each player. Play repeats as described above.
Special Cards
Big Panda
If you lead (start a Pile) with a Big Panda, discard it and use the top card from the deck instead. If the top card is a Big Panda or a Bamboo, discard it and use the next one.
If you follow a card played with a Big Panda, it counts as one higher than the highest Panda played so far in the Pile.
Bamboo
You may play a Bamboo card along with a regular Panda. The Bamboo card is a ‘power snack’ that adds 2 to the number of the Panda played. After playing Bamboo, draw a replacement card from the deck immediately.
Ages 7+ | 2 to 5 players | Playing time 10-20 minutes
