Ship & Treasure is a card game I made up. I play-tested it a few times and arrived at the following set of rules:

Goal: Collect a 4 of a kind. But not in face cards.

Dealing cards:

Treasure:

Give each player 6 cards for their treasure. Each player looks at the cards, aligns them in a row in front of them, and chooses exactly three to show face up. Players can have no more than 6 cards in their treasure, and may at times have less.

Ship:

Deal 3 cards to each player. Each player forms the cards into a triangle, arranges two cards face up, one face down.

A turn:

(Start with player to left of dealer. Go clockwise.)

A player will move and point their ship toward one opponent.

Both players in the battle then show the secret, face down card in their ship.

The player whose cards have the most points wins that battle.

Points:

Ace - 14
King - 13
Queen - 12
Jack - 11
10 - 10, etc. (numbered cards equal same amount of points.)

Rules:

The player that loses a battle has to wait until their next turn to draw enough cards to build another ship.

The winner of a battle is allowed to place any of the losing ship’s cards in their treasure, discarding any cards they don’t want.

You can attack a player even if they don’t have a ship! In that case, you attack their treasure!

A player who is being attacked is allowed to form a ship from their treasure as a last defense.

If a player forms a ship with their last 3 treasure cards and loses the battle, they have to skip a turn before drawing the 9 cards to re-up both their ship and treasure.

After a ship wins 3 battles, that ship can battle no more. Immediately after the third win, the player must discard their winning ship. They then form a new ship from the losing opponent’s ship and their own treasure, placing the remainder into their treasure.

Discard pile:

Place cards face up, but with only the top card showing. Players are not allowed to browse, pick up, or otherwise tamper with the discard pile. Except for shuffling to renew the draw pile.

WIN:

A player wins the game when they have a 4 of a kind in their treasure.

Works with 2 or more players. Haven’t tried it with more than 4.

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