Shadowing Practice: Cat In The Box - How To Play - Learn English Speaking with Video

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Hi and welcome to Watch It Played.

My name is Rodney Smith and in this video we're going to learn the two to five player

Cat in the Box designed by Munayuki Yokoyoshi and published by Bezier Games who helped sponsor this video.

So is this a card game or is it a cat game or is it a game all about avoiding paradoxes?

Yes, the answer is yes to all of that.

So join me at the table and let's learn how to play.

To set up, place this research board in the center of the play area

and collect the double -sided research cards which show purple on one side and white on the other.

Then refer to this table from the rule book and examine the row for your number of players.

In this video, we'll assume we have three players.

It tells us that we can use either the white

or purple sides of the research cards but recommends white for our first game.

You then order the cards from left to right so that the numbers go from the lowest values to the highest,

ensuring that the card full of cats is on the far right.

Then, one by one, slide each card into the slots found at the top of the research board

so that it looks like this when you're done.

At some player counts it tells you to use what are known as these observed tokens.

For example, with four players you're told to fill in every space showing a 9.

However, in a 3 -player game, you just don't use these at all and they can be left in the box.

Now find the cat cards with this back, which have numbers on their faces going from 1 to 9,

and refer to this table in the rulebook.

On the row for our number of players, it says we only use the cat's number from 1 to 6,

so we can return all of them that are numbered from 7 to 9 back to the box.

The rest will shuffle into a face -down deck that you placed beside the board.

Now, the numbers on the board relate to the cards found in the deck, and because the 7, 8s,

and 9s have been removed from the game, and these cat symbols are never used,

it means we only need to use these spaces so we can just fold the board in half like this.

Each player now takes one of these boards, flip to the side, showing your number of players here in the bottom corner.

Everyone also takes a set of 12 tokens in a chosen color,

putting one token onto each of the four X spaces of their personal board.

The player who most recently encountered a cat is now given this start player card, or you can just pick someone randomly.

And that's the setup.

Now there are some changes in a two -player game, but we'll discuss those briefly at the end of this video.

Cat in the Box is a style of card game known as trick -taking, which, like a lot of games,

you win by scoring the most points.

But if you've never played a trick -taking game before, don't worry, you'll learn everything you need to know right in this video.

If you have played a trick -taking game before, well, I think this one is quite unique, so expect a few surprises.

The game is played over a series of rounds equal to the number of players.

So in this three -player game, we'll play three rounds, and each round is broken into three phases, starting with the preparation phase.

Here, you shuffle together all of the cat cards, and then deal them around and around the table until the deck is gone.

And with the magic of editing, let's make that happen.

There.

The cards have all been dealt, and in a three -player game like we have here,

it means each player will end up with a total of ten cards in their hand.

And you can always examine your own cards, but you must keep them a secret from the other players.

Each person now picks a single card in their hand to put face down beside the research board,

and no one should see what the other players discarded.

Those chosen cards will not be used during this round, so you'll want to pick a card to get rid of that suits your strategy.

Now at this point, you don't know enough of the rules to know why you'd pick one card over another,

but this will make more sense as the video goes on.

Before we continue though, there's an important concept that would be helpful to understand.

As I mentioned earlier, Cat in the Box is a style of game known as trick -taking.

In games like this, players will usually take turns playing a single card from their hand onto the table.

This is known as playing a trick.

These cards make up the trick.

Why is it called the trick?

I don't know.

It just is.

One of the cards in the trick will beat out all of the others,

and the person who played that card is said to have won the trick.

They will usually collect all of those played cards and set them in a single pile in front of themselves.

Then a new trick is played where everyone adds a new card to the center, and again, one of the players will win that trick.

As you earn multiple tricks, you'll usually stack them in such a way

that it makes it easy to see exactly how many tricks you've earned so far.

For example, if this player wanted another trick, they might offset them like this.

So it's clear this represents two tricks.

Okay, with that general understanding of trick -taking established, at this point in the preparation phase,

after everyone has discarded one card from their hand and set it face down beside the research board,

the first player will now examine the rest of their cards

and try to predict how many tricks they think they'll win during this round.

You're holding nine cards, and a round lasts once everyone has one card remaining in their hand, so that means at most,

eight tricks will be played.

So, at most, if you want all of them, you'd win eight tricks.

Now, that said, you can only predict a number of tricks to win from the options showing here on the center of your board,

either one, three, or four.

If you have a different player count, the values shown on the other side are different.

Maybe in this case, though, I look at my hand and I think I can win four tricks.

To show this, I then add one of my markers to this four space.

Now going clockwise around the table, each other player also makes their own prediction,

which can be the same or different from what other players have chosen.

And with the prediction complete, we now move on to the trick phase of the game.

Here, the start player picks any one card from their hand

and plays it face up on the table to start the first trick.

Every card in the deck has a value, and there are five copies of each value in the deck.

But not only that, each card has a color, and I'm not talking about the black and white you think you're seeing.

Each of these cats is either red, blue, yellow, or green.

What, you can't see the color?

Well, that's because in this game, you decide what color a cat is as you play it.

If I want to say this three card is blue, then as I play the card I just say that it is.

I would announce I'm playing a blue three.

To make it clear to all the other players that this is blue,

I set the card by the side of my player board that has this blue highlight.

If I wanted to make this green, I'd set it here instead.

Now after playing a card and declaring its color, you add one of your tokens to this board in the matching colored space with that value.

This is really important because although I said there were five copies of every number in the deck, 5 1s, 5 2s, 5 3s,

and so on, there can be only one copy of each number in each color that's actually played.

In other words, there can only be one blue 3 played during the round, and since I said this is a blue 3,

no one else can play a 3 and say it's also blue

because it would be impossible for another blue 3 to exist.

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Every token on this board reminds us of what cards have already been played this round, and it means those cards cannot be played again.

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If somebody else had a three, they'd have to play it as another color.

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Another important concept to understand is

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that the color first played to a trick is known as the lead color or lead color.

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As the first player, I played a blue three, so blue is the lead color for this trick.

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Now the next player in clockwise order must play a card from their hand, and normally players have to match the lead color.

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Maybe they play a one and declare it as blue by putting it here.

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Now because a blue one has been played no more blue ones can exist

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so no one else can play a one

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and say it's blue now our third player here goes

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and they play a blue five adding their card here

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and marking that space of the board once everyone has played a single card the trick is over

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and we see who won it now as we'll learn later

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there are situations where other players can play a card into a trick that doesn't match the lead color.

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But when everyone does play the lead color, you check to see who played the highest value, and that person wins the trick.

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Here, this player had the highest value in the suit lead, so they win the trick and collect the cards played,

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putting them in a face -down pile in front of themselves so everyone can see they won one trick.

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The player who won the trick now starts the next one by playing a card from their hand

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and declaring its color

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but keep in mind they cannot declare a card that's already been marked with a token on the research board.

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And with that understood, there are a few other rules we need to be aware of.

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I had said earlier that after a card has been played, everyone must play a card that matches the lead color.

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For example, let's say that this player starts by playing a green 4.

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And going around the table, it's now my turn and I have to play a green card as well.

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But what if I don't have a green card?

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Now I can imagine what some of you might be thinking.

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How can a player not have one?

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Can't they say that any card they're holding is green?

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If I'm holding this one, couldn't it be a green and in that case I'd have a green card to play?

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Well yes, but the important thing to understand is

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that a card in my hand doesn't become a particular color until I decide it's that color.

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This isn't a green one, this is just a one, for now.

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I might look at my entire hand and decide, nope, none of these are green.

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Once you declare you can't follow the lead color because you don't have it,

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you must remove the marker sitting on that color of your personal board.

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The X that is exposed reminds you and everyone else that you don't have any of that color in your hand.

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In other words, during later tricks, I can't suddenly discover, oh, well, what do you know, I do have another green card in my hand.

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The exposed X in the green area of my board means I previously said I don't have any green.

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So that means I don't.

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And if I don't have the color that was lead, in that case, I am allowed to play a card of a different color.

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I might play this one and say it's red by setting it here and marking the red one space with my token.

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Then the next player would go, and they'd have to follow the lead green color, unless they decide they don't have any of it either.

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But we'll say they declare this as a green five.

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And with that, let's see who won the trick.

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Based on what we saw before, you might think this green five has won.

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After all, it followed the color that was lead, and it has the highest value.

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But there's one exception to winning tricks based on value.

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Notice the cat symbol here, beside the red row?

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This tells us that the red color is Trump.

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Trump is another special term found in trick -taking games.

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It represents a type of card that is stronger than all other types.

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In Cat in the Box, red is Trump, and always beats other colors that were played.

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So even though this is a 5 in the color that was lead, I played a red, and red is stronger than any other color,

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so it wins, and I would take the trick.

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Now just to be clear, only red beats other colors.

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Let's say I had instead played a yellow 6.

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Even though this is the highest valued card that was played, it's not in the color that was lead,

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and it's not trump, so it can't win.

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I should also mention, if more than one trump card is played into a trick, then the highest valued trump wins.

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Remember, when you win a trick, collect the cards that were played into a face down pile that you set in front of yourself.

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But make sure that you keep each trick you have separate so everyone can see how many tricks you've won so far.

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With that understood, we now know the main rules of playing tricks, but I need to make something else clear about the red trump cards.

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When you're starting a new trick, you can't lead with a red card unless Trump has already been broken.

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Breaking Trump is another common trick -taking term.

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In the previous trick, remember how the player led with green, and then I said, I don't have any green,

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and I played a one red instead?

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When you can't follow the color that was led, you're allowed to play any color that you're allowed to, including red.

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And the first time a red is played like this, it's called breaking Trump.

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Once Trump has been broken, now any player can start a trick by playing red.

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Again, normally you cannot start a trick with a red card, not until red, which is Trump, has been broken.

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It's easy to see if Trump has been broken because there'll be at least one player token on the red row.

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Now there is one exception that allows you to lead with red before

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Trump's been broken.

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You could decide the only color you have left in your hand is red.

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Then you can lead with red, even if it hasn't been broken yet, because you're saying it's the only option you have.

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If you do this though, you must remove the tokens from all the other colors on your personal board as a reminder

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that you can no longer play those colors, since you declared you only have red.

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And now with red broken, anyone else can lead with it.

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So just to summarize, when starting a trick, you can play any color you want, except for red unless red has already been broken,

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or you're declaring that red is the only color you have to play.

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But no matter what color was lead, every other person must play a card in that same color, unless they're declaring they don't have that color,

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in which case they remove the token from the matching color on their player board, and then they can play any other color,

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including red, that isn't already showing an X on their board.

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And those are all of the rules for playing a trick.

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And after each trick, the person who won it starts the next one

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and you'll keep going until each player has only one card left in their hand.

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At that point, you don't play a final trick, the round just ends and you go to final scoring.

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However, it is possible the round will end before that, if a paradox occurs.

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If it's your turn to play a card into a trick, you may not have a valid card to play.

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Let's say it was later in the game and this player started the trick with a blue 2.

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Looking at my hand, I have a 3, but I can't play it because a blue 3 was played earlier in the round.

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So I can't say I also have one.

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That would be impossible.

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The red 3 and yellow 3 were also already played.

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But the green 3 space is open.

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So could I say this is green and play it?

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Well, no, because earlier I said I have no greens in my hand.

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So I can't now say this is a green.

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So I can't play this card.

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I also can't play this 5 because every color in 5 has already been played.

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So I'm holding cards, but I can't play any of them without them being cards

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that technically I shouldn't be able to have.

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These shouldn't even exist.

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And that means I've created a paradox.

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Just keep in mind, you can't create a paradox on purpose.

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If I had a card I could play legally, then I must.

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But if a paradox is created, you reveal your entire hand to show that you have no valid options, and the trick ends right there.

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No one else goes, and everyone moves right to the scoring phase.

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So again, tricks are played until everyone is holding only one card, or someone's created a paradox.

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In either situation, you go straight to the scoring phase.

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First, each player scores one point for every trick they won.

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I won one, two, three tricks, so I'd score three points.

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Now, if a player had caused a paradox, they instead lose one point for every trick they won.

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This could cause them to have a negative score.

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So if I had caused a paradox, I would now have minus three points.

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And you score your tricks even if the number of tricks you earned didn't equal the amount you predicted you'd gain.

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I thought I'd get four, but I only got three.

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I still score my three points.

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On the other hand, if, like the purple player here, you do earn as many tricks as you predicted,

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in addition to the points for the tricks, you also receive a bonus.

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Your bonus is equal to the largest number of your tokens that are adjacent to each other on the research board.

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Pieces are only adjacent if they are up, down, left, or right of each other, not diagonally.

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So these two pieces are adjacent, but these two are not.

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Now in a case like this, the purple player's largest group of adjacent pieces are these here.

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So since they match their prediction, they would also score 1, 2, 3, 4 bonus points.

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To keep track of your scores, use the included score pad.

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And after the scoring phase, it's time to prepare for the next round.

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Here, each player collects back all of their tokens from the research board and their player board,

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but then sets back one token on each of their X's.

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You also collect all of the cat cards

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and shuffle them into a single deck to be dealt out during the next round's preparation phase.

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The person who started the round with the start player card then passes it to their left, so that player can begin the next round.

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And you'll keep playing rounds until you've completed as many as the number of players, so three in this case.

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You then total all of the scores from the rounds that were played, and the person with the highest score wins.

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If there's a tie, the tied player with the highest score during the final round wins.

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And if there was still a tie, the tied players would share the victory.

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With that understood, let me quickly go over the rules changes for a two -player game.

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First, you'll only use cat cards numbered from 1 to 5, so you'll block the value 6 spaces on the board with these tokens.

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You'll then shuffle and deal 10 cards to each player, which will leave 5 left over that you'll keep face down.

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You then reveal 3 of them and place an unused player token on the green row of each number revealed.

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So here we'd add a marker to the green 2 space, to the green 4 space.

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And if you happen to draw a duplicate number, you instead place a token on the matching yellow value.

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If all three cards had happened to be matching, you'd put the tokens on the matching green, yellow, and blue values.

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And that completes the setup for a two -player game.

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In a two -player game, players do not make a prediction.

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Instead, when the round is over, they score one point for each trick that they won,

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and a player that wins four or fewer tricks also receives the bonus score for their largest group of adjacent pieces.

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However, a player who causes a paradox is penalized just like in the 3 -5 player game.

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Otherwise, the rest of the rules are played the same.

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And that's everything you need to know to play

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Cat in the Box.

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If you have any questions about anything you saw here, feel free to put them in the comments below,

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and I'll gladly answer them as soon as I get a chance.

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You'll also find forums for discussion, pictures, other videos, and lots more over on the games page at BoardGameGeek,

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and I'll put a link to that in the description below.

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And if you found this video helpful, please consider giving it a like,

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subscribing, and clicking that little bell icon so you get notification anytime we post a new video.

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And if you'd like to support us directly, you can join our Patreon team, which I'll have linked below.

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But until next time, thanks for watching.

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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson

This speaking lesson is built on the video “Cat In The Box - How To Play”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: card, trick, player, color, played. This video has 258 sentences and 3810 words to shadow. The speech runs for 19:06. The speaker talks fast, about 200 words per minute, so expect linked and reduced sounds. 87% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is easy to follow.

Key vocabulary in this video

15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:

Word	Pronunciation	Meaning
trick noun	/ˈtɹɪk/	Something designed to fool, dupe, outsmart, mislead or swindle.
token noun	/ˈtoʊkən/	Something serving as an expression of something else.
declare verb	/dɪˈklɛɚ/	To assert or announce formally, officially, explicitly, or emphatically.
paradox noun	/ˈpæ.ɹəˌdɒks/	An apparently self-contradictory statement, which can only be true if it is false, and vice versa.
deck noun	/ˈdɛk/	Any raised flat surface that can be walked on: a balcony; a porch; a raised patio; a flat rooftop.
collect verb	/ˈkɑlɪkt/	To gather together; amass.
adjacent adjective	/əˈd͡ʒeɪ.sənt/	Lying next to, close, or contiguous; neighboring; bordering on.
earn verb	/ɝn/	To gain (success, reward, recognition) through applied effort or work.
bonus noun	/ˈbəʊ.nəs/	Something extra that is good; an added benefit.
purple noun	/ˈpɝ.pl̩/	A colour between red and blue; violet, though often closer to magenta.
beside	/bɪˈsaɪd/	Next to; at the side of.
predict verb	/pɹɪˈdɪkt/	To make a prediction: to forecast, foretell, or estimate a future event on the basis of knowledge and reasoning; to prophesy a future event on the basis of…
prediction noun	/pɹɪˈdɪkʃən/	A statement of what will happen in the future.
reveal verb	/ɹɪˈviːl/	To uncover; to show and display that which was hidden.
preparation noun	/ˌpɹɛpəˈɹeɪʃ(ə)n/	The act of preparing or getting ready.

Phrasal verbs you will hear

Word	Pronunciation	Meaning
beat out verb		To sound a rhythm on a percussion instrument such as a drum.
go around verb		To move or spread from person to person.
go over verb		To look at carefully; to scrutinize; to analyze.
make up verb	/ˌmeɪk ˈʌp/	To constitute, to compose.
set back verb		To delay or obstruct.
set up verb	/ˌsɛt ˈʌp/	To make ready for use.

Sentences worth repeating

Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:

What, you can't see the color?
I would announce I'm playing a blue three.
But what if I don't have a green card?

Grammar in this video

The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:

Structure	In the video
Conditional sentences if + clause, will/would + verb — a condition and its result	if you want all of them, you'd win
Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now	have been removed · you've never played · have played
Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it	are known · can be left · have been removed
Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing	back, which have · person who played · red, which is

Pronunciation to watch

The speaker uses 90 contractions and reduced forms, such as can't, don't, you'll. Say them the short way, as you hear them.

The “sh” and “zh” sounds: prediction /pɹɪˈdɪkʃən/, preparation /ˌpɹɛpəˈɹeɪʃ(ə)n/, exception /əkˈsɛpʃən/, establish /ɪˈstæb.lɪʃ/, notification /ˌnoʊtɪfɪˈkeɪʃn̩/
Long words — get the stress right: preparation /ˌpɹɛpəˈɹeɪʃ(ə)n/, technically /ˈtɛk.nɪˌkəl.i/, notification /ˌnoʊtɪfɪˈkeɪʃn̩/, diagonally /daɪˈæɡ.nə.li/

How to practise with this video

Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like trick, token, declare.

What is the Shadowing Technique?

Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.

Shadowing technique: read the full step-by-step guide →

Shadowing Practice: Cat In The Box - How To Play - Learn English Speaking with Video

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