Skyjo Action Card Game: Rules for How to Play

Are you looking for the rules for the original game, check out our how to play post for Skyjo.

Looking for a specific Skyjo Action rule?:  |  Setup  |  Playing the Game  | Draw Playing Card | Draw Action Card | Play or Discard Action Card | Star Cards | Removing Rows/Columns | End of Round | Winning the Game | Game Variations | Action Cards | FAQ | Components |

Objective

The objective of Skyjo Action is to score the least points in the game.

Setup

• Sort the cards into two decks. All of the number and star cards should be placed into the playing deck. All of the action cards should be placed into the action deck.
• Shuffle each deck separately.
• Deal twelve cards from the playing deck to each player face down.
• Place the rest of the playing deck face down on the table. Flip over the top card from the deck to form the discard pile.
• Take the top four cards from the action deck and place them face up in a row in the middle of the table. Place the remaining cards from the action deck face down on the table. Flip over the top card from the deck to form the discard pile.

• Each player takes the twelve cards they were dealt and places them in a 4×3 grid (each horizontal row has four cards). You should not look at the cards when you are doing this.
• Each player then randomly chooses two of the cards from their grid and turns them face up.
• Total up the value of the two cards revealed in each players’ grid. The player who has the highest total starts the first round. Play moves left/clockwise during the game.

How to Play Skyjo Action

On each of your turns in Skyjo Action you can choose one of three actions:

1. Draw a Playing Card
2. Draw an Action Card
3. Play or Discard an Action Card

After you have taken one of these actions, play passes to the player on your left.

Draw a Playing Card

When you choose to draw a playing card, you can choose either the top card from the draw pile or the top card from the discard pile. After you draw the card, you need to decide what you want to do with it. You can take one of two actions with the card you drew.

Your first option is to exchange the card you drew with one of the cards in your layout. You can exchange the card with either a face up or face down card. You cannot look at a face down card before choosing to swap it with the card you just drew. The goal of the game is to reduce your points. Therefore you want to exchange high number cards with lower number cards. Once you have chosen which card you want to exchange your new card for, take the card you chose to exchange and place it face up on the top of the discard pile. Then add the card you just drew to the now empty space in your layout.

If you took the top card from the discard pile, you must exchange it for one of the cards in your layout.

Should you take the top card from the draw pile, you have an additional action you may take. First you get to look at the card you just drew. If you want to exchange it with one of the cards in your layout, you can swap the card as explained above. Otherwise if you don’t want the card, you can add it to the discard pile. If you choose to discard the card, you will choose one of your face down cards and flip it over.

Whether you add the drawn card to your layout or discard it, your turn ends.

Draw an Action Card

The second action you can take on your turn is to draw an action card. You can either take one of the four face up action cards from the table, or take the top card from the draw pile. You only want to take action cards that you think you will actually use. If you are stuck with an action card at the end of the round, they are worth ten points during scoring. There is no limit to the number of action cards you can have in front of you.

After you have drawn an action card, you will place it next to your layout of cards. The rules don’t state whether you place the action cards face up or face down. Later in the star cards section it does mention that you place the action card face up, so I assume this applies when you draw an action card as well. If you took one of the face up action cards, you will take the top card from the action card deck and place it face up on the table.

You will have to wait for a future turn in order to use an action card. The “Reactivation” card is the one exception. When you play the card, you will immediately take a card from the action card discard pile and play it right away.

Play or Discard an Action Card

The final action you can take on your turn is to use one of the action cards you chose on a previous turn. You have two options for using an action card.

First you can use an action card for its action. Each action card has a special ability which impacts gameplay. See Skyjo Action Card Meanings post to see what each action card does. After you have taken the action, you will add the card face up to the action card discard pile.

Otherwise if you don’t want to use an action card, you can just discard it. If you discard an action card, you won’t take its associated action. You may want to discard an action card because they are worth ten points at the end of a round if you aren’t able to use them.

You cannot play or discard an action card on your last turn after the end of the round is triggered (see below).

Star Cards

In the playing deck there are some star cards. Whenever you activate a star card, you get to take one of the four face up action cards or the top card from the action card draw pile. This is optional and you can choose not to take an action card. You will place the chosen action card in front of you. This action must be taken on your current turn, or you lose it. You activate a star card in the following situations:

• Place a star card in your layout after either drawing it from the draw or discard pile.
• You flip over a card already in your grid, and it is a star card.
• You flip over a star card at the beginning of the round.

When you use a swap ability to move a star card, you do not activate it.

During the game star cards do not have a fixed number. This is relevant when trying to create rows and columns where all of the numbers are the same (see below). During scoring star cards are worth zero points.

Removing Rows and Columns

At the end of each turn you should look at the cards in each or your rows and columns. You should also do this at the end of the round before you total up all of the cards in your layout. For each row and column look to see if all of the cards are the same number.

If all of the cards in a row or column are the same number, you must discard all of the cards from that row/column. You can choose which of the cards that you discard will be placed on the top of the discard pile. You must always put the cards you discard on top of the card you swapped out of your layout. This includes situations where all of the cards are the same negative number. Should a row or column have less than three cards, you cannot discard the cards.

Should you create a complete row or column of star cards, you have the option to discard them or keep them. At the end of the round the row/column scores you negative points. If you create a row/column with three star cards, they are worth -10 points. If you create a row/column with four star cards, they are worth -15 points. You can’t use the same star card to create a row and column in order to score these negative points. 

End of Round

Players will keep taking turns until all of the cards in one of the players’ layouts are turned face up. A player can either trigger the end of a round by turning over their last card, or turning over the last card from another player’s layout (using an action card).

The rest of the players get one last turn in order to try and improve their score. The player that triggered the end of the round does not get another turn.

Once all of the players have taken their last turn, any face down cards in a players’ layout are flipped over. Each player now counts up the points from all of the cards in their layout. Each card is worth the points printed on the card. Star cards are worth zero points. Each action card is worth ten points. Each player writes their score down on the scorepad sheet.

The player that ended the round (revealed the last card in any of the players’ layouts) compares their score to the scores of the other players. If their score is tied or higher than at least one other player, they must double their score when recording it. If their score is zero or negative though, they do not double it.

The player that ended the current round, starts the next round.

Winning Skyjo Action

The game ends after a player has scored a total of 100 or more points in the game.

Each player totals the points they scored in the game. The player that scored the least points wins Skyjo Action.

Game Variations

To mix up the gameplay, there are a number of things you can tweak in Skyjo Action.

First you can choose to play without an action card deck. Choose 5-10 action cards and shuffle them into the playing card deck. When a player draws or reveals an action card, they can choose to either keep the action card or discard it. The player then draws a new card from the draw pile in order to replace the action card. The rules are otherwise the same as the normal game.

Second you can choose to ignore the action cards entirely. In this game you will only use the number and star cards. All other rules are the same.

Third you can choose to just use the number cards. The star and action cards are kept in the box. The rest of the rules are the same.

Finally you can play with up to eight players if each player is only dealt nine cards at the start of the game. In this game you will create a 3×3 grid. Each player only reveals one of their cards to start the round. Otherwise the rules are the same as the normal game.

Skyjo Action FAQ

If you have any questions about how to play the game, leave a comment below on this post. I will try to answer any questions asked as best and as quickly as possible.

Components

• 120 Playing Cards
• 30 Action Cards
• Score Pad
• Instructions

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Year: 2019 | Publisher: Magilano | Designer: Alexander Bernhardt | Artist: Alexander Bernhardt

Genres: Card, Family, Set Collection

Ages: 8+ | Number of Players: 2-8 | Length of Game: 30 minutes

Difficulty: Light | Strategy: Light | Luck: High

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For more board and card game rules/how to plays, check out our complete alphabetical list of card and board game rules posts.