Game rules and guide

Rooms

Every game is played in a room. Pick a game and join a room; ordinary games take a diamond entry fee (some are free), and the special games of higher levels take coins.

• A room starts when it is full (2, 4 or 8 players) and stays open for 12 minutes from then (season rooms run their stage's time).
• After 10 minutes of waiting for the room to fill, we ask whether you still want to wait. With no answer in 5 minutes you leave the room and your entry fee is returned.
• Leaving on your own before the room starts also returns the fee.
• Once a room has ended, only its chat stays open.

Duels

Inside a room, any player can invite another player from the same room to a duel. Both play exactly the same game: the same questions or the same puzzle board.

• Only one invitation can be waiting between two players at a time, and two players can have at most 6 duels with each other in a room, 8 in the quiz (each game sets its own number; declined and expired invitations count too). Overtime has no such limit.
• The invited player has 3 minutes to answer. With no answer the invitation expires and counts as a win for the inviter.
• If a duel is accepted but one side does not play within 3 minutes (a puzzle game: its time limit plus a minute), that side is recorded as no answer and the result is scored as usual.
• No new invitations in the last 3 minutes of a room. When the room ends, open invitations are cancelled without a result and an accepted duel that was not played counts as no answer, so every result is in before the winner is chosen.
• Once your invitation to a player has expired, you can invite them again only after they finish a duel in the room.
• A player who lets one invitation from every other player in the room expire, without finishing a duel in between, is eliminated: no more duels, ranked last and cannot win the prize. They get a warning while the last of those invitations is still open. If only one active player is left, the room ends at once. It also ends at once when no player may invite anybody any more (every pair has used its duels) and no duel is still in play.

Coin stakes and declining

The inviter can put coins on a duel. Those coins are set aside from their balance straight away.

• The invited player can play for the same amount, a smaller amount, or no stake.
• The winner gains the stake and the loser loses it. In a draw both players get their coins back.
• If the invitation expires, the inviter's coins are returned.

An invitation can be declined in two ways:

• Decline with score: the inviter gains 2 points and the invited player loses 2.
• Decline with a coin: the invited player pays 1 coin, which goes to the game, not to the inviter, and nobody's score changes. In season rooms the stage sets the price and the limit.

Score, room winner and level

Every duel counts towards the room score:

• win +2, loss -2, draw 0.
• Buying points: in any room, while it runs, you can buy room points with coins. Each game sets the price and how many you may buy per room (in season rooms, the stage does). The coins leave the game, and bought points count toward the rank and are shown to everyone.

When the room ends, the player with the highest score wins the room, as long as that score is above zero, and receives the game's prize: diamonds in ordinary rooms, coins in special rooms. If players are level at the top, they play overtime: rounds of 6 minutes in which only they may duel each other, until one is ahead. If a whole round passes without a single invitation between them, the room ends with no winner and no prize. A season stage room gets only one overtime round: if the players are still level after it, the room also ends with no winner.

Every finished room also adds to your overall score: 5 points for first place, 2 for second and third, and 1 for everyone else.

Your level comes from your overall score and rises as it grows. Some games have a minimum level, and you cannot join their rooms until you reach it.

The games

• Quiz: four-option general-knowledge questions, with 15 seconds for each one. More right answers wins. With the same number right, whoever answered more than 2 seconds faster in total wins; a smaller gap is a draw.
• Hidden word: work out the hidden word from its letters.
• Doll (live room): there are no duels. Once the room is full, everyone has 60 seconds to press “I'm ready”; whoever doesn't is taken out with the entry fee back. Then everyone runs one race together: run while the doll sings, stop when she turns. The server judges the race. Places: first those who finished, by time in tenths of a second, then the rest by distance. First place takes the prize, and players level in first share it. Before the race you can tap a room-mate's name and stake up to 20 coins with them; whoever places higher wins the stake.
• Recon and the puzzle games: both players get exactly the same board and build the best result they can within each game's time limit. Mirror, balance, lock and the other stage puzzles are played only in seasons.

The full guide for each game is shown just before you play it.

Fair play

• Both sides of a duel get exactly the same questions or the same board.
• The server keeps each game's clock, not your phone. A late answer does not count.
• Every duel is judged on the server and a phone cannot change the result.
• Bots, multiple accounts and collusion between players are forbidden and can lead to the account being closed and its prizes being cancelled.

Coins: buying and withdrawing

Each player's coin balance is always calculated from their transaction ledger, where every coin in and out is recorded.

• Coins can be bought in the app (Cafe Bazaar) or on the website.
• Coins are also won from special-room prizes and duel stakes.
• To withdraw, submit a withdrawal request with your Sheba (IBAN) number in the wallet section. The request is reviewed and paid to that account.
• Coins bought through Cafe Bazaar cannot be withdrawn for 24 hours after the purchase, because Bazaar may reverse the purchase. If Bazaar reverses a purchase, its coins are taken back.
• Diamonds are a second currency with a ledger of their own. They pay the entry fee and the prize of ordinary rooms. They are bought with coins, one way only, and are also given for signing up, for your first finished room each day, for every new level and for inviting friends.
• Diamonds can never be withdrawn or turned back into coins.

Seasons

A season is a multi-stage competition with a cash prize for the champion. Every date, capacity, limit and the prize are announced before it starts and do not change once it is published.

• Registration is free and open until the qualifier ends.
• In the qualifier you play a fixed number of rooms of the games the season names, and the best players are invited to the next stages.
• Knockout stages lead to a live one-on-one final, and the whole prize goes to the champion.
• Before each stage, its players may practise each of its games once in a two-player room with each other; practice has no prize and no score.
• Anyone can watch the final live: the board 5 seconds behind, the duel results, cheers for the finalists, a free pick of the champion and a watchers' chat. The two finalists can't see that page or its chat until the final is over.

The full rules of each season are on the season page.