The Fool's Journey 2016

The Fool's Journey is a solitaire card game designed for use with a standard 78-card Tarot deck. In this game the Fool embarks upon a journey in which he acquires wisdom, takes chances, and overcomes numerous challenges with the aid of mysterious helpers.

The Fool is removed from the deck and placed in the gameplay setup to represent the character. The remaining cards serve as challenges (Trumps), wisdom (coins), strength (batons), volition (swords), vitality (cups), chance (aces), and helpers (royals). An adventure is created by laying out cards in groups of four. Progress is made through the journey by playing three of the four adventure cards. The fourth card serves as the foundation for a new adventure.

Volition cards may be equipped to engage individual challenges, depleting them of their power. Strength may be equipped to endure multiple challenges with any excess power from a challenge depleting the Fool's vitality. Vitality cards are used to replenish this value. Wisdom cards are used to deploy Helpers that double the value of a Vitality, Strength, or Volition card. Chance cards may be used to reshuffle all adventure cards back into the deck and begin a new adventure.

The game ends when the Fool's vitality reaches zero or he overcomes all challenges and successfully completes the journey.

This game was inspired by thematic solitaire playing card games, especially Scoundrel, Donsol, and Card Crawl as well as the Monomyth described by author Joseph Campbell. It was originally created for the 2016 Solitaire Print and Play Contest.