Good Omens Taboo

The original printed version of Good Omens Taboo was created by the wonderful Sarah for The Ineffable Con in 2019.

Based on the popular board game, the idea is to give other players clues to a series of words without using a list of forbidden – or ‘taboo’ – words.

The online version of is designed to be played by 4+ players, arranged in up to four teams of at least two people per team. It can be varied to be played by 2+ players by working in a circle with each player giving clues to the player on their left (or right, or adapt for Zoom grids!) – you just have to be on your best behaviour if not working in teams and make an honest effort to give reasonable clues!

We have set up the online version using playingcards.io, a tabletop card game simulator. All this does is provide the cards and the layout – it doesn’t know the rules of the game!

Instructions:

1. Download the cards: you can choose from the original Season 1 set (made by Sarah), the Season 2 set (made by Loomey) or the Combined S1 and S2 set.
2. Go to http://playingcards.io/
3. Under “pick a game to create a room” scroll down to the bottom and select “Other/Custom.”
4. Click on “Start Game” and then “Enter.”
5. From the menu on the left, select the briefcase.
   
6. From the menu that pops up at the bottom, select “Room Options” and then under “Import Room”, “Import from file.”
   
7. Upload the file taboo.pcio
8. When the upload is complete, click on the briefcase again to exit Edit mode.
9. From the left menu, click on the Share icon and copy the link.
   
10. Share the link with other players.
11. Click on the names Team 1 – Team 4 to change them.
12. To start, an independent player (not from Team 1) starts a 1-minute timer on their phone or other device.
13. The starting player from Team 1 draws a card by Dragging from the Deck in the upper left into their hand at the bottom of the screen. This makes the card visible only to that player.
14. The player must describe the word or phrase at the top of the card without using any part of the word or phrase, or of the “taboo” words on the lower portion of the card. If their teammate guesses the word or phrase correctly, the player drags the card from their hand into the “Team 1” deck. Click to turn it face up, so that other teams can judge that none of the taboo words were used.
15. If their teammate passes or they use one of the taboo words, the card is moved to the “Discard” pile.
16. The active player draws another card, and play continues until the time expires.
17. Play moves to the next team.
18. Once all teams have played, play returns to Team 1, with a different team member reading the cards.
19. Play continues until the main deck is empty. If there are cards in the Discard pile, these can be moved to the main deck by dragging the counter at the side of the pile (or by dragging the card, if there is only one).
20. The main deck can be shuffled by clicking on the counter at the side of the deck (if there is no counter, there is only one card).
21. Once the main Deck and Discard piles are empty, the winning team is the one with the most cards in their pile (counted by counters at the side of each pile).

Notes:

• If you accidentally turn a card over instead of dragging it to your hand, return it to the main deck and shuffle by clicking on the counter at the side of the deck.
• To start a new game, click on “Recall and shuffle” under the main deck, and then “Recall all” to recall cards in players’ hands (if any).
• If you want to screen share on Zoom, click on “Share Screen” and then “Advanced” and “Portion of Screen” and drag the rectangle so that it excludes your hand area at the bottom of the screen. This will prevent other players from seeing your cards.
• To add extra cards, click on the briefcase to enter Edit mode and then click on the deck of cards and select “Edit Deck.” From the menu, select “Card Data,” scroll to the bottom and click “Add new card type.” The “label” and “word” are the same and are the word or phrase from the top of the card, and underneath you can enter three taboo words. Click on the + icon to add one of this card to the deck. Add as many as you like, and then click on “Done” and click the briefcase to return to Play mode.
• To add more teams, click on the briefcase to enter Edit mode, click on the white menu at the bottom of the screen and select the “Click to add widgets” tab. Click on an empty card holder and drag it into position under the existing card holders. Click on it to edit the text, and click “Player can not edit label” to change it to be editable in Play mode. Click on the briefcase again to return to Play mode and drag a card into this space to resize it – you may need to return to Edit mode to reposition it once it is the correct size.
• If you make any changes to the game that you want to keep, reset to a good starting position and then click on the briefcase to enter Edit mode, click on the white menu at the bottom of the screen and select “Room options” and then “Export to file”.