The Auctioneers Guild

Welcome to the Auctioneers’ Guild. You have been initiated into a fraternity whose passion for antiques is unmatched. We spend our days auctioning items for other people to bid on, but by night we delight in the best of those antiques for ourselves.

The only currency that matters in the Guild is “Gavel Cred”. To move up the ranks of this guild you need Gavel Cred. Nothing else matters!

Each night we meet, we play for keeps and the more sets of antiques you display, the more “Gavel Cred” you will receive.

The Auctioneers' Guild is a component based trick-taking game. Rather than using cards with suits and values, the type of the components determines the "suit" and the color, which represents the age of the antique, determines it's value.

The game consists of four rounds, each round containing three phases.

The Bidding phase allows players to bid on randomly chosen antiques.

The Show Off phase is the trick-taking phase where you Show Off the antiques you won in the Bidding phase.

The Display phase is where you make sets of the antiques you have won. These sets earn you Gavel Cred.

At the end of four rounds, the player with the most Gavel Cred is the winner of the Auctioneers' Guild.

Video Overview

Trick taking without cards?

This game is all about collecting antiques. The antiques are represented by 5 different kinds of components.

In a regular trick taking game, cards have suits and values which are used to determine the winner of the tricks.

In The Auctioneers' Guild the suit is one of the kinds of antiques from the image above (books, sculptures etc.)

The value of the item is determined by it's color. With antiques, the older the item, the more valuable it is. The age of the items is represented by it's color. White items are the oldest and most valuable. Black items are the newest and are the least valuable. The colors are ranked as follows: White, Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Purple, Black.

Set Collection with Components?

With the antiques you collect through the trick taking phase, you can build two different types of sets.

You can build a set of the same kind of antique, for example, a set of movie memorabilia antiques. These kind of sets are worth Gavel Cred (victory points).

You can also build a set of the same age of antique, for example, a set of red antiques. These are worth fewer points but they give you a special privilege for future rounds of the game which will give you an advantage over other players.

Here are a couple of examples of sets.

A set of 5 Jewelry Antiques. This is worth 6 Gavel Cred.

A set of 7 Sculpture Antiques. This is worth 15 Gavel Gred.

A set of 4 Red Antiques. This is worth 4 Gavel Cred and gains the player a special privilege which allows her to trade one of their antiques with that of another player before the trick taking phase.