How to Play Sorry Sorry is a strategy board game that requires the players to move all 4 of their pawns to home from start. Keep reading further to know more about how to play sorry board game.
- Sorry game objective – To be the first player to get all four your pawns from the color corresponding START space to HOME.
- Total Number of Players – 2-4 Players
- Game Materials – Sorry game board, 16 pawns (4 of each of the 4 colors), deck of cards (without 6’s or 9’s)
- Game Type – Strategy Board Game
- Game Audience – Kids and adults
Contents
How to Set Up
To begin with, all the players select a color, pick up the corresponding pawns and then place them at the start of that color.
Now, remove the 6s and 9s and shuffle the cards. Place the deck of cards faced down on ‘Place Pack Here’. This forms the draw pile.
Pick any player to start the game. It can be the player who is the youngest or the eldest or someone who picked the highest card. The game will move to the left and the pawns on the board move clockwise.
How to Play
Starting the Pawns
In order to move your pawns from the START, you have to draw either a 1 or 2 from the deck. When you draw 1, you can move your pawn out of the start and put it on the space that is marked with a circle.
When you draw a 2, you can move pawn to the circle and get a chance to draw again. Note that, a 2 and a 1 are the only cards that can start the pawn.
So when you do not draw these cards, you will have to put a card in the discard pile and your turn is over. Then pick cards from the top of the draw pile and move the respective amount of spaces, if possible.
You can dispose the cards in discard pile.
Moving Pawns
In the Sorry board game, two pawns cannot occupy the same space on the board. And hence pawns can jump and bump other pawns.
In case a pawn is situated in your path, and if you have the enough moves, you can jump over that pawn. But if you have to land on the same space as the other pawn, then you can bump that pawn back to it’s start.
Note – No pawns of the same color can occupy the same space. In case you get a move where you have no other option than to land in the same space, your turn is over.
If you draw a 4 or a 10, pawns can also move backwards. In case you have moved your pawn at least 2 spaces beyond START, on the next turn, you can move into Safety Zone without moving across the board.
When a player lands on a space with a triangle, they can slide along the marked places until the end, irrespective of the card drawn.
But you can along only those triangles that are not of the same color as your pawn. If you land on such a triangle of the same color, just stay there, you cannot slide then.
The players are required to move if they can, even if it means a disadvantage for their game. In case the draw pile is exhausted, you can shuffle the discard pile and use that to draw cards.
Safety Zone
Safety Zones are similar to Slide Zones, but only larger in size. At the end of Safety Zones is the Home.
Players can enter only those Safety Zones that are of the same color as their pawns. The safety zone is no exception of the normal rules of the game.
The players cannot enter Safety Zone directly through a backward move but if the card instructs so, they can move backward out of the safety zone. Then in the next turn, the pawn can be moved back into the zone.
Who Wins Sorry Board Game?
The player who first gets all 4 of their pawns to the color corresponding the Home space wins the game. If the game has to be continued further, the winner starts the game.
Card Values
- Used to start the pawn. Move pawn 1 space forward.
- Used to start the pawn. Move pawn 2 spaces forward.
- Move one of your pawns 3 spaces forward.
- Move one of your pawns 4 spaces backward.
- Move one of your pawns 5 spaces forward.
- A player can either move one pawn forward 7 spaces OR split the move between 2 of your pawns. In case you use part of 7 to move a pawn home, you have to be able to spilt the move with another pawn.
- Move one of your pawns 8 spaces forward.
- Players can either move one pawn 10 spaces forward OR move one pawn 1 space backward.
- Players can either move one pawn 11 spaces forward OR switch one pawn of theirs with one of the opponents. If it’s not possible to move 11 spaces forward and also do not want to switch places, then your turn will be lost.
- 12 Move one of your pawns 12 spaces forward.
If there is a pawn at their Start, a player can put it on any legal space occupied by another player and bump that player’s pawn back to the Start. However, the Safety Zone, Start and Home are exceptions to this.
In case you do not have a pawn on Start, or if there are no spaces the opponent occupies from where you can bump them out of, you will lose your turn.
How to Score
For every piece that makes it home, the players get 5 points.
The winner gets points for the below –
1. 5 Points for every opponent’s pawn that is not home.
2. 25 Points if none of the opponents have more than 2 pawns home.
3. 50 Points if none of the opponents have more than 1 pawn home.
4. 100 points if none of the opponents have any pawns home.
Variations
Playing for Points
This version of Sorry board game is very similar to the original game but has only a few changes –
- The game begins with just 3 pawns at the start and the 4th pawn has to be on the circle outside.
- The deck of cards is shuffled and 5 cards are distributed to each player. The remaining of the cards are placed to form the Draw pile.
- Choose a card from your hand and move the pawns accordingly.
- The discard and replace the card from draw pile such that you maintain 5 cards in your hand all the time.
- In case the cards in your hand do not let you move, you can discard a card and replace it from the draw pile. Your turn ends here, you will not be able to move a pawn now.
In this game version of sorry too, the player who manages to get all 4 of their pawns home first is the winner.
Team Rules
In this Sorry game version, the players with Red and Yellow partner up and those with Blue and Green partner up. This is the rule of the original sorry game. The first team that takes all of their 8 pawns home, wins sorry.
- If players draw a 7 card, they are allowed to split it between all of the 8 pawns, including your partner’s.
- If the card drawn gives such moves, then Partners are allowed to bump their partner’s pawn.
- Players have to use Sorry! Cards even if that will send back their partner’s pawn to the start.
- Start or Draw cards, i.e. 1 or 2 can be allowed for either partner’s pawns.
