We love our crazy Saturday night gaming sessions and love them even more when we weave a theme or other special idea into the night. Last night was our MUNCHKIN EXTRAVAGANZA. Our friends Jared and Robin own a copy of every single set and expansion for Steve Jackson’s Munchkin card game, and Jared had devised a way to play with all of them at once.
Munchkin itself is a very silly card game, poking fun at traditional role-playing games (Dungeons and Dragons) as well as other RPG and movie genres in its other sets (superheroes, vampires, space, spy movies, kung fu, the wild west, Cthulhu).
You all start as level 1 humans, and the goal of the game is to be the first player to reach level 10. You do this by opening doors (flipping over the top card of the stack of door cards) to reveal what’s inside. Sometimes it’s a race or class card, turning you into an Elf, a Monk, or a British spy. Other times it’s a valuable item - headgear, footgear or armor, or a handy weapon or other helpful trinket. Sometimes it’s a trap. And of course, it could also be a monster.
You fight a monster by adding up your level and all your bonus points from armor, weapons, etc. If you don’t have enough points to beat the monster’s level, you can enlist help from another player. You earn a level for each monster you beat and also are rewarded with a few treasure cards as well.
The basic gameplay is pretty simple. What makes the game fun is announcing the goofy title of the card as you play it (“I am now wearing the Pointy Hat of Power.”) and reading the even sillier text from some of the cards. There are cards that make new rules and that turn the game on its head, so you never know what to expect, and it keeps you guessing. The last time we played Munchkin Fu, both JediBoy (5) and Emily (8) were able to play along with us, though of course some of the jokes and silliness went over their heads.
Jared’s version gives each person around the table (we were lucky enough to have a perfect group of 8 for the evening) one base set to start with. I had Munchkin Impossible and PisecoDad used Munchkin Cthulhu. Once you reach level 3, you start drawing from the deck of the person with the lowest level - which means you’re not in “your” world anymore and many of the bonuses don’t affect you.
It made for some crazy fun, but we did wind up getting stuck in Super Munchkin for two-thirds of the game because poor Robin was in last place and couldn’t get going. Maybe next time we try a Munchkin Extravaganza we can tweak those rules a bit, maybe giving the last place player(s) the choice of ANY deck on the table, the middle-ranked player(s) drawing from any deck EXCEPT their own, and the first place player(s) choosing from the bottom-ranked player’s deck? I’m all for tweaking game rules. (Yahtzee Phase 10, anyone?)
And what about our lovely children on game night? Well… it was a Munchkin night, so the kids ate Dunkin’ Donuts Munchkins, watched The Wizard of Oz, and even enjoyed their own Lollipop Guild.
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