Twice as a Clever is a 2019 roll-n-write game and follow up to the acclaimed That’s Pretty Clever. As far as roll-n-write games are concerned, the clever series has everything you could want going on. You are rolling dice similar to Yahtzee but you are using your numbers in completely new, clever, ways. It also has plenty of player action which some criticize is the biggest thing missing from roll-n-write games.
A game as well constructed as this deserves a little attention and we are happy to give it. And for a follow-up, the gameplay you love is there but the completely different scoring mechanics make it feel like a brand new game. This is your guide to how to play Twice As Clever.
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HOW TO PLAY TWICE AS CLEVER – WHAT IS IT?
Twice As Clever has no theme or any backstory to discuss, it’s all about the numbers and the crazy things you need to do with them. In the game, you have a score sheet with five distinct scoring areas that work in different ways. One is a grid where completing specific sets of numbers give bonuses, one scores the difference between two numbers, one has to go in numerical order, etc. It feels like a traditional rolling game that quickly makes you do a double-take and say to yourself, wow that was clever. Even though there is no backstory, the graphics, colors and symbols tell the story of this crazy clever game.
HOW TO PLAY TWICE AS CLEVER – STEP BY STEP
Time Needed: Approximately 30 minutes
This is a step by step guide for how to play Twice As Clever the popular strategy roll-n-write board game. Additional notions and special rules can be found below the list. These will be referenced for your convenience.
1. SETUP | Give Each Player Scoresheet
The game comes with a pad of disposable score sheet. How to play Twice As Clever starts here. Every player gets one and a writing utensil (the game comes with felt pens). At the top of the sheet, it shows how many rounds the game will be based on players. Mark off the rounds you are not playing now so everyone remembers.
2. SETUP | Put Dice Tray and Dice in Center
The game box with its little well and raised art of a tray is used in the game. Place this and the dice in the center. You can roll in the well and as you roll, you will need to put dice on that tray, which will matter. This is the last setup step of how to play Twice As Clever before gameplay begins.
3. GAMEPLAY | Active Player Rolls the Dice in 3 Rounds
Decided who goes first, they will kick off rolling. They roll six dice and go through three rolls to get (hopefully) at least three different scores marked on their sheet per turn. The dice rolling mechanic is unique to the clever games. On your first roll you choose one of the six dice to score (we go more into this below). For your second roll, the die you just chose and ANY DIE LOWER THAN IT is removed. Dice you use are placed temporarily on your score sheet and any dice removed for being lower are put on the silver box tray. This happens again for your third round. It is supposed to get harder as you go but stop you from getting all the best dice right off the bat. This is why you might also not get three scores, maybe you are out of dice by round three.
4. GAMEPLAY | Scoring Spots Explained
You want to match colored dice to their appropriate scoring section and each one is different. To see this in detail see scoring spots explained in the key information spot below. Each number corresponds to its colored section with the exception of the white die. The white die is wild, to be used for any color, and it also gets added to the blue number whenever that is used, which is key to that particular section. Figuring out exactly what to take as you learn how to play Twice As Clever is one of those things that just takes experience.
5. GAMEPLAY | Active Player Uses Any Actions
There are three different bonus actions that you will gain throughout the game that are one-time use, but you can use them whenever you want. They are the (1) Reroll, (2) Return and (2) Double Use. Read more in the bonus actions explained section below. There is a spot on the top of your sheet to circle these when you get them and X them out when you use them.
6. GAMEPLAY | Passive Players Make Score
After the active player does their three rolls, all the other players in the game get to get in on the action. All passive players get to score an action using any one die that is on the active player’s tray. That’s right, the person whose turn it is not needs to pay attention to this how to play Twice As Clever step.
7. GAMEPLAY | Pass and Repeat
After a player is done, they pass the dice clockwise and the next player does it all over again. A round is completed when all players playing have played once. Keep an eye out as sometimes bonuses are triggered in between rounds. Learning how to play Twice As Clever is the easy part, knowing what to put down when is the hard part. There are a few complex things to wrap your head around in how to play Twice As Clever, but it is not that bad.
8. GAME ENDS | Complete Set Number of Rounds
The game ends after a set number of rounds depending on number of players. In a 2-player it is four rounds, 3-player is five rounds and 4-player is six rounds.
9. WINNING | High Score Total Wins
Add up the final totals for each scoring section (see scoring sections explained below for more). Then add in your fox bonus. The fox is equal to whatever your lowest section score was. This is why it is important to be diverse and spread out, not just hitting one section hard. High score wins.
HOW TO PLAY TWICE AS CLEVER – KEY INFORMATION
SCORING SPOTS EXPLAINED
BLUE – When used you add the value of the blue and white dies together regardless of where they are. You have to start in the leftmost section of the blue row. Every number recorded in this section has to be higher than the number to its left (so start low).
GREEN – You can put any number in a green spot. You start from the left and move right. The number you take is multiplied by the number in that box. The greens go in twos. The second number is subtracted from the first number and that gives you a score for that section of two. Put that number in the shape above the two boxes, if you don’t complete a set of two, no points for that.
PINK – You can put any number in the pink section, it just has to follow the rules of the box. As you move from left to right, the spaces have symbols like “less than or equal to 5” so a number has to fit that to be written in.
SILVER – In the silver section, you mark off any copy of the number rolled in the grid. When you get a column completed you get a bonus. Scoring is by taking the number of marks in each of the four rows and collecting the score bonus for each (so you will get four of these).
YELLOW – For yellow, you mark off a spot with a number corresponding to what you rolled. You get bonuses when you complete any column or row. Scoring is based on the total number of boxes you checked off in the entire yellow section.
WHITE – White is wild and has no home. You can use it for any color you would like. If you use it as blue in a roll, you still add it with the existing blue die to determine the total for that section.
BONUS ACTIONS EXPLAINED
REROLL – The Reroll Bonus is the symbol of the three arrows moving in a circle, kind of like a recycling logo. This bonus lets you reroll one or many dice from any roll. You can also use multiple of these in a single roll. You can use them as many times as you want, as long as you have accrued that many to use.
RETURN – The Return Bonus is the symbol of the box with the arrow coming out of it. With this, you are able to return a die that has already placed on the silver tray back into your next roll.
DOUBLE USE – The Double Use Bonus is the “+1” symbol. This symbol lets you double up any used die. So if you scored a white 6, you could use this to create another white six score mark on your sheet without affecting your other rolls.
SCORING BONUSES EXPLAINED
SHEET BONUS TRIGGERS – There are several little colored symbols all over your scoring sheets, under cells and at the end of columns and rows. When you complete a cell or a column or row and you see one of these, it triggers and you get that bonus. If you get a pink question mark from completing a row in yellow, for example, you get to add a bonus score to the pink row. The number is always the best possible number that could be possible (so 6 if you want a high number and 1 if you want a low number).
FOX – One symbol not yet explained is the Fox, a little red cartoonish guy. This is a very important symbol that wins games. The fox is equal to whatever the total of your lowest scoring section is. So if you do great in everything, but have a zero in yellow, the fox is equal to zero. A key to mastering how to play Twice As Clever.
GAME CONTENTS
- 1x Scoring Pad
- 6x Colored Dice
- 4x Felt Pens
HOW TO PLAY TWICE AS CLEVER – IN CLOSING
We hope you can now say you know how to play Twice as Clever. The game is a top-notch roll-n-write board game that has brilliant ingenuity and everything you could want in a game of its type. This 2 – 4 person game is quick and lightweight but there are so many paths to victory and everything works together so much, that you have to be pretty clever to navigate this maze. See what we did there. If you had to choose between That’s Pretty Clever and this, you should start with the former, but there is certainly room for both in your life.
