One Letter Better Rules

Here is the complete rules to One Letter Better. This game is still in beta testing so these rules will be updated as we do our play testing. Please check back to see if we have made and changes. If you would like to suggest a change, please go to our Contact Us form here.

ONE LETTER BETTER CURRENT RULES 02/10/2024

Overview

One Letter Better is a rummy style card game that uses letter cards to spell words. The game can be played by 2 to 4 players. It can also be played solo; see the solo section at the end of the rules. OLB is played in Rounds to a pre-agreed-upon number of points or until there are no cards left to draw and no one can make a legal word. Typically, four rounds at somewhere between 50 and 100 points per round is a good starting place. Try a couple of different variations and see what works best for you and your group.

FOR YOUNGER PLAYERS

If you are playing with children under 12, please see the Family Friendly Game section after the section on Stealing words.NOTE: Each player should keep their own score, younger players may need some assistance.

SET UP AND GAME PLAY

To keep things simple, we will lay out the base game for two players who have agreed to play three rounds, 100 points per round. To begin, Player 1 shuffles all of the cards to make them as random as possible. They deal seven cards to both players, alternating back-and-forth. Player 1 places the remaining stack of cards face down on the table and flips the top card face up next to the stack. This becomes the discard pile. The player who does not deal goes first. If there are more than two players, the person to the left of the dealer goes first with play continuing clockwise . Player 2 is the first to go and begins their turn by either picking up the face up card in the discard pile or drawing the top face down card off the stack. Players begin their turn with eight cards in their hand, drawing cards if necessary. If Player 2 can spell a word with any or all of the cards in their hand, they do so at this time. If they have enough letters to spell more than one word they can do so until they have no cards in their hand. The points of all the cards Player 2 lays down are totaled up and this number is placed on their score sheet. Note: all words must be legal words found in the Scrabble® dictionary which is available online. https://scrabblewordfinder.org/dictionary-checker.

CHALLENGES

If one player challenges another player‘s word, the word is looked up in the Scrabble® dictionary. (Note: players may NOT look up words before playing them.) If the word is indeed legal, the player who spelled it gets double the points. If the word is not legal it is removed from the board and the player who challenged gets the number of points and bonuses (see below) on the cards used to spell the illegal word. A player who loses a challenge must discard until there are eight cards in their hand and their turn ends. Players must challenge before the next player makes any play.

STL-1 CARD

If Player 2 draws the steal one card (STL – 1), they can steal one of the cards from Player 1‘s hand and add it to their own even if they have already drawn a card to start their turn.

DISCARDING

If, after drawing or stealing cards Player 2 cannot make a legal word they must discard one to four of the cards in their hand. These go face up in the discard pile and staggered so that all of the cards discarded are visible to all players. Player 2 draws the number of cards discarded so that there are eight cards in their hand. Once Player 2 has played or discarded all of the cards that they legally can, their turn is over and it is Player 1‘s turn. Player 1‘s turn begins the same as Player 2‘s. They either draw a card from the stack in the center or draw one from the discard pile. If Player 2 stole one of Player 1’s cards in the previous round, Player 1 is allowed to draw two cards so that they start with eight cards in their hand.

DRAWING FROM THE DISCARD PILE

A player may pick up as many cards from the discard pile as they wish, however, the card on the bottom of the stack they pick up must be played immediately, either to form a new word, added to an existing word or to steal an opponent’s word. 

STEALING WORDS

In addition to spelling their own words, Player 2 can steal any word that Player 1 has played if they can add a letter to the beginning or end of it and make it another legal word. (See rules for red and blue letters.) Example:If, on Player 2‘s turn they spelled the word TIME, and Player 1 has an R in their hand, they can steal Player 2‘s word by adding an R to the end and making TIMER. If, on a subsequent turn, Player 2 has an S in their hand they would be able to steal the word back by making the word TIMERS. The points for the stolen word are subtracted from the person who had the word originally and added to the score of the person who stole it, along with the points for the letter used to steal. They also get all bonuses (see below). Note: a word may only be stolen three times, regardless of how it is stolen. On the third steal, the points are added to the player who has the word, then the cards are placed face down out of play.

FAMILY FRIENDLY GAME (FOR GROUPS WITH YOUNGER PLAYERS)

The player who steals the word adds the points to their score total but no points are subtracted from the player who had the word originally.

STEAL WITH A WORD

Instead of a single letter, a player may steal a word by joining two words together. For example, if Player 2 has the word STAR and Player 1 has FISH, Player 2 can steal the word from Player 1 and make STARFISH. The new word must be a legal, NON-hyphenated word. Also, the word being used to steal, in this case STAR, cannot contain a wildcard or a green protected letter (see rules below), but the word being stolen MAY contain a wildcard, Either word may be used, i.e., STAR to steal FISH or FISH to steal STAR. Multiple cards used to steal MUST spell a stand alone word, no prefixes or suffixes like PRE- or -ING. The multi-letter cards (ING, ANT, ENT, etc) MAY be used to steal as if they were a single letter. These steals can be played normally or family/friendly style.

MORE THAN THREE CARD BONUS  

If a player makes a word that contains four cards or more they are given a five point bonus for every card above three. For example, if Player 1 plays individual cards that spell TIME, then they’re given the points for the word initially (T=2, I=1, M=5, E=1 ) and an extra five points because the word has four cards, totaling 14 points. This applies to words that are stolen as well. Note: the bonus applies to the number of cards played, NOT the number of letters. Players adding to their own words only score the added points for the new cards played and any multi-card bonuses, not the entire word. If Player 1 has TIME (worth 14 pts. with the bonus) and they add an R for TIMER, they get 2 points for the R and 5 more as a bonus. Players may add as many letters to their words as make new, legal words in a single turn. If you are playing with younger players or beginners, it is recommended that they be given the bonus for the extra cards where as the older or more experienced players either get fewer points per extra card or none altogether. This evens the score a little bit for younger players who might not have as big a vocabulary.

MULTI LETTER CARDS

Any card with two or three letters plays like a single letter card. All the letters must be used in the order they appear on the card. Multi letter cards may be used to steal or extend an existing word following the rules for single letter cards.

COLORED LETTER CARDS

Green letters

Green letters can be used to make or steal a word (at the beginning or end of the word) but once the word is made it is protected. It cannot be stolen by another player. It also cannot be added to by the player who made it. When a protected word is made, the points are totaled, added to the player‘s score then the cards spelling the word are stacked together and placed face down as they are no longer in play.

Blue letters

Blue letters must substituted, either to pull a single card out of the discard pile and put in its place or substituted for letters at the beginning or end of a word to make a new word or steal a word. For instance, if Player 1 has SLANT, and Player 2 has the blue CH, they can remove the S and L cards and substitute the single blue CH card to steal the word and make CHANT. This can be done by the person who has the word or an opponent to steal the word. The number of letters on the blue card must be the same as the number being replaced. Player 2 is playing a CH (two letters) and replacing S and L. The cards removed go into the hand of the person playing the blue letter card. In this example, the S and the L would go into Player 2’s hand. Blue letters can also be used to make and steal words normally at the beginning and end of a word.

Red letters

Red letters can be inserted anywhere in a word to make a new word or steal an opponent’s word but they carry a negative point value. If Player 2 has PINT, Player 1 can steal by inserting a red R and making PRINT. Red letters can be placed anywhere in a word and used to increase the length of a player’s own word and generate a bonus for more than three cards.

Wild cards

A wildcard may be played in place of any single letter to make a legal word. They may NOT be used to steal a word from an opponent but they can be used to lengthen a player’s own word by adding to the beginning or the end of the word and generate a bonus if the word is more than three cards long. The double wildcard is played in place of two, CONSECUTIVE letters and follows all the same rules of the single wildcard.

DISCARDING

Three or Four player game: Play until there are no cards left to draw from and no player can spell or steal a word. Once the deck is empty, players may no longer discard but may continue to spell or steal words with the cards in their hand.

WINNING

The first person to get to the agreed upon number of points per round wins the round. If playing to the end of the deck, the player with the most points after all the cards have been drawn and played wins. At this point anyone else playing subtracts the points in their hand from the score on the score sheet for that round. For example, if Player 1 wins and Player 2 has 75 points on the score sheet, but has 25 points in their hand, their resulting score would be 50. Red letters with negative scores are counted positive for scoring penalties. For example, if Player 2 has a red T with a score of -2 points, they would still add 2 to the rest of their penalty points as if it were positive and subtract it from their score. If playing to the end of the deck, the player with the highest score does NOT subtract points for cards left in their hand.

SOLO PLAY

In solo play mode, cards are shuffled, and the player deals themselves seven cards. They either pick up the first discard or draw from the deck, then spell as many words as possible, drawing and discarding as in a normal game. Cards may be taken from the discard stack as in normal play with the bottom letter being played if more than one card is drawn. After the player has gone through the entire deck, they tally up the points they have for the words made and subtract the points in their hand. This is a “personal best“ type of game where you try to beat your previous score. To make the game even more challenging, also subtract the points of the cards in the discard stack from the ones you have laid down.

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