Kei Haku Tan Sho [軽薄短省]

  KEI HAKU TAN SHO is a cooperative card game that tests your strategy and silent communication skills in a race to protect the economic borders. As international regulators, you and your teammates must stop high-value products from entering the West – but there’s no room for mistakes.

Each round reveals a Product with a market value that you must match or exceed using tax cards. The catch? You can’t discuss strategies, and every play must follow a precise order for the plan to succeed. Silent coordination will be your greatest ally – or your downfall.

The tension rises with every turn: with only 5 shared lives, errors could let Products slip past your defenses. And with limited tax cards in hand, timing your moves carefully is crucial.

Can you synchronize your actions and block the invasion, or will the West be flooded with unchecked Products? KEI HAKU TAN SHO challenges your planning and teamwork in a game where every decision matters!

HOW TO

Kei haku tan sho is a cooperative game where players work together to apply taxes on a product coming from the West, to stop it from entering the East. Players take turns playing cards on the table, to apply taxes to the product, if after adding up, all the players cards equals more than the value of the product, then the product stops circulating and gets stuck in customs. The players win when all product cards are gone

Shuffle all the product cards and tax cards separately, in the middle place the deck of product cards face down, and next to it, the first product of the deck face up to reveal the product and its perceived value, this is the Market.

Next, give each player 3 cards face down, this will become the player’s Hand. Once every player has a Hand, only they can see their own Hand. All players should have 3 cards, no more, no less.

Before the game begins, players must decide the order in which each player will play their cards.

They will do this by each playing one card, whoever has the lowest value card, will play first, and whoever has the highest value card, will play last, this ascending order will apply to all other players as well.

With a conjoined total of 5 lives, players must play their Tax cards in the order defined before beginning.

Each Tax card has a value, this also applies to every Product card. Players must play one card each without knowing what the others have, the value of all the cards added up must equal or be greater than the value of the Product in the middle.

Each time a round ends, players must grab another card from the Tax Deck.

If the added Tax value is greater than the value of the Product, the Product leaves circulation and a new Product enters the market. If the added value is less than the Product, the Product enters the East and the players lose 1 life. If anyone plays in the wrong order, everyone loses 1 life and the Product enters the Eastern market.

Players must never tell each other what cards they have, meaning that to win, they need to add each other’s cards, without knowing for sure what value cards they have. Questions must be vague, and so must the answers. They may however remind other players of any public information such as the value of the card in the middle, or how much another player has said their cards are more or less worth. Some examples of allowed communication are: “I have a card that is worth more than half the Product” or “I have a card that is worth less than a third of the Product”. Some examples of prohibited communication are: “I have a card worth 10” or “I hope someone plays a card worth 1”.

The game ends in a win, when players manage to stop all products from getting in the Eastern market, or when they run out, products that enter the East also count towards a win. The game, however, is only lost if the players lose all lives, or run of out Tax cards.

THE TEAM

Game Designer: Ana Filipa Costa
Game Artist: Ana Margarida Silva
Game Developer: Miguel Silveiro

EXTRA CREDITS

Game Planner: Tiago Carvalho
Game Planner: Miguel Alves
Game Planner: Henrique Borralho

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