Bang! (card game)

For other uses, see Bang (disambiguation).

Bang!

Designers	Emiliano Sciarra
Illustrators	Alex Pierangelini
Publishers	DV Giochi Mayfair Games
Players	4–7 (3–8 with expansion sets)
Setup time	approx. 5–10 min.
Playing time	20–90 minutes
Chance	Card drawing
Skills	Card playing

Bang! is a Spaghetti Western-themed social deduction card game designed by Emiliano Sciarra and released by Italian publisher DV Giochi in 2002. In 2004, Bang! won the Origins Award for Best Traditional Card Game of 2003 and Best Graphic Design of a Card Game or Expansion.

The game is known worldwide as Bang!, except in France, where it was known as Wanted! until September 2009.

Overview

The game is played by four to seven players (up to eight players with variants and expansions). Each player receives a unique character card with special abilities and a number of 'bullets' (representing their lives), and takes one of four face-down roles:

• Sheriff (always one in the base game), who must kill the Outlaws and the Renegade(s), and whose role is revealed to other players
• Deputy (from zero to two), who must kill the Outlaws and the Renegade(s).
• Outlaw (from two to three), who must kill the Sheriff,
• Renegade (one in the base game, expansions can add an extra one), whose objective is to be the last player in play, with the sheriff being the final death.

The game is played in turns, in clockwise order, starting with the Sheriff. Each player's turn has three phases:

Draw: Draw cards (default two) from the draw pile.

Play: Play cards to heal or buff their character (any number can be played, although some have timing limitations), or attack other players in an attempt to eliminate them.

Discard: Discard cards down to the hand size limit (equal to the number of bullets shown on the player's character card)

Each character has a different ability . For instance in the base set, which has 16 character cards, "Bart Cassidy" (parodying Butch Cassidy) starts with 4 bullets and draws a card every time he loses a life point, while "Willy the Kid" (parodying Billy the Kid) can play any number of "Bang!" cards during his turn.

A player who loses their last bullet is considered dead, and reveals their role card. Penalties and rewards exist to encourage the social deduction aspects of the game. For example, if the Sheriff eliminates a Deputy, the Sheriff must discard all the cards in hand and in play.

The game ends as soon as the Sheriff dies, after which the winner(s) are determined. Players who are already dead when the game ends are still considered to have won if their team's win condition is met.

Strategy

In 2002, designer Emiliano Sciarra posted strategy tips on BoardGameGeek.

As only the Sheriff is known, it is hard to know who has what role. Generally, a player's role is implied if they try to shoot, or otherwise harm, the Sheriff. Others' roles can be implied if they try to harm those who harmed the Sheriff. The advantage of keeping one's role hidden from enemies must be weighed against the need to accomplish one's goal.

Since the Renegade loses if the Sheriff dies when there are still others in the game, that player must defend the Sheriff to some extent. On the other hand, their ultimate goal is killing the Sheriff. This leads to a "two faced" nature of the Renegade, trying to weaken each side (Outlaws and Deputies) while keeping the Sheriff alive until the end. This also makes it harder to ascertain who is an Outlaw, who is a Deputy, and who is a Renegade, as their actions may be similar.

Expansions

• BANG! High Noon (2003): The expansion's name is inspired by the 1952 Western film High Noon, and gives thirteen scenario cards to the Sheriff. They reveal one at the start of each of their turns, which is effective until the next scenario card has been revealed. Cards include "Shootout", where each player can play an extra "Bang!" attack on their turn, and "High Noon", the final card where for the remainder of the game where each player loses 1 life when they start their turn.
• BANG! Dodge City (2004): The expansion's name is an homage to the 1939 Western film Dodge City, and has 15 new characters, 40 new play cards, and 8 "role" cards (7 duplicates) allowing up to 8 people to play. It features also a new symbol, meaning "discard another card from your hand in order to play this card", and a new green-bordered card type which take effect in the next opponent's turn (in case of a Missed! effect) or the owner's next turn (in all other cases).
• BANG! A Fistful Of Cards: The expansion's name is a play on the 1964 Western film A Fistful of Dollars, and contains fifteen new scenario cards, designed by players around the world and selected by the original author, which can be mixed with the High Noon expansion. The titular "Fistful of Cards" is used as an alternative to "High Noon" as the last scenario card, and makes each player the target of as many "Bang!" as the number of cards in hand at the start of their turn.
• BANG! Wild West Show (2010): The expansion features characters that parody actors iconic to the western movie genre such as "Flint Westwood" (Clint Eastwood) and "John Pain" (John Wayne), instead of historical figures. 10 special cards play similarly to the scenario cards in High Noon and A Fistful of Cards, and are revealed every time a "Stagecoach" or "Wells Fargo" is played. With the titular "Wild West Show", killing the Sheriff no longer ends the game (although roles otherwise apply as normal), and the goal becomes to be the last player alive.
• BANG! Gold Rush (2011): The set introduced a new gameplay mechanic called the shadow-gunslinger. Players who are shadow-gunslingers may re-enter the game as if they were still alive. It includes 8 new characters, 24 equipment cards, and introduced the resource of gold nuggets, which are mainly used to purchase equipment.
• BANG! The Valley of Shadows (2014): The expansion consists of 20 cards, mostly playing cards and several new character cards. It was first unofficially released in September 2011 in Czechia and Slovakia, and officially released on October 16, 2014 by the Czech editor ALBI check ALBI webpage. It contains 8 new characters, 5 new blue border cards, and 10 new brown border cards.
• BANG! Armed & Dangerous (2017): The expansion includes a new Load resource. It includes 8 characters, including "Mexicali Kid", who may pay 2 loads to shoot an extra "Bang!", and 13 orange-border cards which require Loads to be used, such as "Beer Keg", which gives a life point for 3 Loads.
• BANG! Great Train Robbery (2021): The expansion introduces Station (14), Railcar (16), and Locomotive (1) cards to the game. It includes 8 new characters and 16 additional playing cards. Players must pay a station's cost (for instance, discarding a Spade at "Creepy Creek") to take a corresponding railcar from the train. Railcars provide benefits, such as "Circus Wagon", which can be discarded to make each other player discard one of their cards in play, or "Private Car", which provides immunity against being targeted with "Bang!" cards while empty-handed.
• BANG! Legends (2024): The expansion contains “Legendary” versions of the classic BANG! characters with new lethal abilities that can be used by completing feats, which replace the original base game characters. It includes 16 feat cards, and 35 wooden Fame tokens in 7 different shapes and colors.

Special Releases

• BANG! The Bullet! (2007): This deluxe version included the base game (3rd ed) High Noon (2nd ed), Dodge City (2nd ed), and A Fistful of Cards (2nd edition), along two additional High Noon cards, and three special character cards: "Uncle Will" (referencing Will Niebling, former CEO of Mayfair Games which published the game in the USA until 2008); "Johnny Kisch" (referencing Jo Nikisch, CEO of Abacus Spiele, the German publisher of the game), and 'Claus "The Saint"' (who gives an extra card to other players each turn and which the author considers to be unbalanced and not suited for serious play; it was originally a a bonus "unglued" card included in the online daVinci newsletter).. The 2009 reprint , which follows the 4th edition rules of the basic game and the 3rd edition rules of Dodge City, does not include player boards or wooden bullets as found in the boxed version of BANG! 4th edition.
• BANG! 10th Anniversary Edition (2012): The set comes in a metal tin, and contained the complete most recent version of the base game with the original 16 characters. It also contains 30 wooden bullet markers for keeping track of health, 7 player boards with different artwork, and 10 extra characters — "Annie Versary", who may use any card as a "Bang!" card, and nine characters from previous expansions.
• BANG! Dynamite Box Standard Edition (2023): Released to celebrate the game's 20th Anniversary, it contains a storage box designed to store the BANG! base game and expansions (not included). It also contains a Stick of Dynamite used in a new game variant, 34 wooden bullet markers for keeping track of health, and 8 premium dual-layer player boards with different artwork and recessed slots to house cards and wooden bullets.
• BANG! Dynamite Box Collector's Edition (2023): The set contains the contents from the Standard Edition as well as the base game and expansions, and 9 promo cards including "Annie Versary", and a new "Emiliano" character named after BANG! designer Emiliano Sciarra

BANG! The Duel

This is a 2 players standalone game. One player controls a team of law enforcers, while another player controls a team of bandits. It contains 12 enforcer and 12 bandit characters.

Computer versions

Official

On October 29, 2009, Palzoun Entertainment (which acquired the official license from DaVinci Games) announced the development of a Bang! video game. The game was developed in partnership with SpinVector. It was published on the iTunes App Store on December 18, 2010. A console version was also expected to arrive in March 2011 but has been delayed.

A live action trailer of the game was released on November 2, 2010.

Unofficial

On May 14, 2012, Christopher Gordon Carr's Software Developer Portfolio released Kraplow!, an open source online Bang! clone, which can be played in-browser with chatbot or with other players. Kraplow! features all the rules from version 4.0 of Bang! and is open source.

The Starcraft II mod Barcraft is a copy of Bang! which replaces the wild west theme with themes and characters from the Warcraft, Starcraft and Diablo franchises.

Some other online versions of Bang! have been released during the years, however they have received DMCA takedown notices as they were using copyrighted assets. Some online versions have managed to provide a playable experience by replacing the images such as PewPew! which has been available online since Q1 2021.

BoardGameArena (BGA) is a real time board game online game system that allows to play Bang! along with some of its expansions. It was published on the 23 February 2022.

Lawsuit

In 2014, DaVinci Editrice initiated a lawsuit against Ziko Games, the Chinese manufacturer that had published Legends of the Three Kingdoms, a game that DaVinci claimed was a clone of Bang!, simply changing the Wild West theme and art to that of ancient China. While the court found there was potential for copyright infringement on its initial hearing, it ultimately ruled in favor of Ziko Games and dismissed the case in 2016.

Reviews

• Pyramid
• Family Games: The 100 Best

See also

• Mafia (party game)

External links

• Bang! the Official Video Game (offline)
• dV Games (formerly daVinci Editrice) official website
• FAQ, editions, designer's notes and other info at the author's personal website
• Bang! at BoardGameGeek
• BANG!cz {en, cz}: Eldorado, MartinCity, Bang! Card Generator, Forum, Downloads and more
• The Bang! Blog: Death Mesa, Robbers' Roost, character strategy guides, card explanations, variants, modding, and more
• Bang! at Boardgaming.com