Relics rewrite the scoring. Scissors thin the deck, which improves every hand you will ever draw again.
Choose a card.
The goal. A run is 8 antes of 3 rounds: Small, Big and Boss. Each round sets a target score. Reach it before your plays run out and you go to the shop; miss it and the run is over. Clear all 24 rounds to win. The first target is 300, the Big round asks for 1.5× the Small and the Boss for 2×, and each ante roughly doubles the last.
A turn. You hold eight letter cards. Tap lettersType a word, or click letters, to spell a word of three letters or more, then press Play word. Tap a letter in the word to take it back. Every round gives you 3 plays and 3 discards. To discard, put the letters you do not want into the word and press Discard: they are swapped for new ones, and it costs no play. Used cards are replaced from your deck, and the whole deck is shuffled afresh each round.
Scoring. A word scores chips × mult. Its length sets both. Each letter then adds its chips, the small number on the card (Scrabble values, so vowels are 1 and Q and Z are 10).
| Letters | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chips | 20 | 35 | 55 | 80 | 110 | 150 |
| Mult | ×1 | ×2 | ×3 | ×5 | ×8 | ×12 |
So CAT scores 25, STONE 180 and REACTED 960. Long words are how you score. Three four-letter words will not reach even the first target of 300; look for five letters or more. (Nine letters, with the Wide Margin relic, is 200 chips ×18.)
Special cards. FOIL scores 30 more chips (already in its number). GLOW adds 4 to the mult. WILD spells any letter: tap it and pick the letter from the alphabet.click it and pick or type the letter; when typing, a wild fills in for a letter you lack. It scores its own number.
Coins. Clearing a round pays $3 (Small), $4 (Big) or $5 (Boss), plus $1 for each play you did not use, plus $1 interest for every $5 you were already holding (at most $5).
The shop. Two relics and two deck edits. Reroll for a new shelf: $3, then $1 more each time in the same shop. Relics change the scoring for the rest of the run. You can hold five; in the shop you can sell one for half its price to make room. Blue ones add chips, red ones add mult, purple ones multiply the mult and are what make the late targets reachable, and green ones give plays, discards, hand size or coins. Tap a relic at any time to read what it does.
Deck edits. Scissors ($3) remove a card of your choice for good: cut the Q, Z, X, J and V and every hand you draw from then on is better. The others add a letter, or make a card Foil, Glow or Wild, or give it 15 more chips (Whetstone). After buying one, pick the card from your deck.
Bosses. Every Boss round bends one rule, shown at the top of the screen. One of: vowels score no chips; S scores no chips; your most-played letter scores no chips; words of five letters or more; no letter twice; at least two vowels; each word longer than the last; one fewer play; no discards; two fewer cards in hand; all mult halved; or a target 60% higher with an extra play.
If you are stuck. Press Hint. It is free and lays out the longest word your hand can spell under the current rules, ready to play. It is not always the best-scoring word. If the hand is all awkward letters, discard them. If no word can be spelled and no discards are left, an End the run button appears: the round cannot go on, so it ends the run as a loss. If the targets are getting away from you, it is the build and not your spelling: buy relics, cut dead letters.
It is a hard game. A bot that always plays the best-scoring word in its hand gets about halfway up the ladder and wins about one run in a thousand; the runs that go all the way are built around a purple relic and a thin deck. No sound, no timer, and it saves after every action, so you can close it mid-word. Today's run deals the same run to everyone today. Any finished daily counts, won or lost. Weekends never break a run of days. Missed a day? Play it the next day.
Gentle. For a calmer game, set Difficulty: Gentle in the Menu. Every round gives you 4 plays, and the first antes ask for less: the first target is 150, rising to the full ladder by ante 5. Words of four and five letters can clear the early antes. Gentle runs keep their own best runs, and their result line says Gentle. The change starts with your next run, or at once if you have not played a word yet.
Stopping. When a boss falls, the run rests before the shop. Stop here and close the tab whenever you like: the game opens on that same screen next time. Next ante goes on to the shop.
Tap letters to spell; tap a letter in the word to take it back. Play word plays it, Discard swaps the letters in the word, Clear empties the word, Hint lays out the longest word. Tap a relic to read it; tap anywhere to close that. Deck shows your cards. Menu has a new run, today's run, stats, the hand's sort order, the difficulty and the motion setting.
| A-Z | spell a word | Backspace | take one back |
| Enter | play it; next round in the shop | Ctrl+D / Del | discard the word's letters |
| Tab | hint, free | Esc | clear the word, or close |
| F1 | this help | F3 / F4 | deck / stats |
Every letter key spells, so the shortcuts that would have been letters are not. With the mouse: click a letter to add it, click it in the word to take it back, and use the buttons.
The run in progress is thrown away, and it does not go on your record.