Absolute Beginner, Read the Rules, still confused!

[MunchkinMan]

Originally Posted by shoggoth

OK! you won't believe how long I've tried to find that answer! Don't know why that was left out of the rule sheet! THANKS!

Just to be clear, it is in the rules. The rules say, under Card Management, subsection Your Hand:

Originally Posted by The Munchkin Cthulhu Rules

At the end of your turn, you may have no more than five cards in your hand.

The rules for Charity, the last phase of any player's turn, also say:

Originally Posted by The Munchkin Cthulhu Rules

Charity: If you have more than five cards in your hand, you must play enough of them to get down to five, or give the excess to the player with the lowest Level. If players are tied for lowest, divide the cards as evenly as possible, but it’s up to you who gets the bigger set(s) of leftovers. If YOU are the lowest or tied for lowest, just discard the excess.

Nowhere else in the rules is it mentioned that you may only ever have 5 cards in your hand, and nowhere is it mentioned that you have to reduce your hand immediately.

[Clipper]

I've just seen one potential misconception that may not have been addressed yet, so I thought I'd put it out there. If you were already understanding this part, shoggoth, please ignore it.

Cards that you draw mostly go into your hand, which is a set of cards you are holding and are hidden from other players. You can play most cards from your hand at any time on your turn (but check the rules as some cards, like monsters, can only be played if you Look for Trouble and others, like curses, can be played on any player's turn). If you play an Item or Class to the table, it stays in-play and is no longer considered in your hand.

So any cards that are drawn face-down are unknown to your opponents and you can wait to play them when you want to. At the end of your turn, you may only be holding onto 5 of them, which is where Charity comes in. The cards in-play on the table don't count towards this limit.

Again, if this was already known, I'm sorry for wasting your time, but an earlier post hinted that the concept of the hidden hand of cards may not have been grasped yet.

[shoggoth]

Thanks to everyone for responding! I realize many of my questions were either answered by you guys or became clear with a second and third re-reading of the rules. It's a great game, but it can be a little confusing at first unless you're playing with a very patient, experienced player. Also, I went out and got Munchkin Bites and noticed some rules explanations were more clear in that version than in Cthulhu.

Still, little things crept up here and there during gameplay, like:

Say I'm a Monster Whacker with some Items that only Monster Whackers can use and I meet a Monster that turns me into a Cultist. This doesn't mean I discard my class card and items right? It just means I can't play as a M.W. with those items, right? I could eventually draw a card (knocked over the head) that would allow me to stop being a cultist. And then does that mean I can go back to being a Monster Whacker or whatever I was before? Does becoming a cultist wipe your slate clean so to speak?

And finally (for now), during the phases:
If you fight a monster and kill it, either on the initial Door Kicking phase or when Looking for Trouble, you can't also loot the room right? Can you only loot the room when there's nothing to fight?

draw a monster and fight
-or-
look for trouble
-or-
loot the room

right?

[ChargerFan2121]

Originally Posted by shoggoth

And finally (for now), during the phases:
If you fight a monster and kill it, either on the initial Door Kicking phase or when Looking for Trouble, you can't also loot the room right? Can you only loot the room when there's nothing to fight?

draw a monster and fight
-or-
look for trouble
-or-
loot the room

right?

You are correct. At the beginning of a player's turn they must kick down the door. If they draw a monster they will not be allowed to Loot the Room, unless a card says otherwise.(Some potions do allow players to Loot the Room after facing a monster) If you do not draw a monster you can Look for Trouble or Loot the Room. Looking for Trouble has the same rules as fighting a monster, except the monster comes from your hand.

[Mister Ed]

Originally Posted by shoggoth

Say I'm a Monster Whacker with some Items that only Monster Whackers can use and I meet a Monster that turns me into a Cultist. This doesn't mean I discard my class card and items right? It just means I can't play as a M.W. with those items, right? I could eventually draw a card (knocked over the head) that would allow me to stop being a cultist. And then does that mean I can go back to being a Monster Whacker or whatever I was before? Does becoming a cultist wipe your slate clean so to speak?

You don't have to discard your "Monster Whacker Only" items, but you must turn them sideways to show that they aren't being used. However, you DO have to discard your Monster Whacker class card. You may only have one class card in play at a time (unless you have a Super Munchkin card, which allows you two). If you are forced to become a Cultist, but later lose your Cultist Class due to some other card, you could play another class card at that point, but the class card you had at the time you were forced to become a Cultist will have already been discarded.

[MunchkinMan]

[PHP][/PHP]For the future: We request that you not add on questions to a thread. Once you have an answer to one question, please create a new thread for your new questions. Since several people rushed to answer, I won't try to do any thread surgery this morning.

The rules state that you can't discard Items just because you want to, and they don't specify that you must discard any Items just because your Class changes. In fact, the rules do say that you can carry (i.e., have in play) any number of small Items, even ones you can't use, which you must turn sideways, so people know that they are not being used. If you change your Class, you need only turn the Items you can no longer use sideways.

As for becoming a Cultist: You can choose to do so willingly, should you end up with one in your hand, but if you are forced to become one, you only do so if one exists in the special discard pile you are supposed to make for discarded cultist cards. If you have a Class already, you must discard it unless you already have Super Munchkin in play, or can play one immediately.