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Chop Moves

The Trash Chop Move (TCM)​

  • The Trash Chop Move is covered at level 4.

The 5's Chop Move (5CM)​

  • The 5's Chop Move is covered at level 4.

The Order Chop Move (OCM)​

  • The Order Chop Move is covered at level 4.

The Tempo Clue Chop Move (TCCM)​

  • The Tempo Clue Chop Move is covered at level 6.

The Scream Discard Chop Move (SDCM)​

  • The Scream Discard Chop Move is covered at level 7.

The Shout Discard Chop Move​

  • The Shout Discard Chop Move is covered at level 7.

The Trash Order Chop Move (TOCM)​

  • The Trash Order Chop Move is covered at level 14.

The Shout Discard Order Chop Move​

  • The Shout Discard Order Chop Move is covered at level 14.

The Assisted Trash Chop Move​

  • The Assisted Trash Chop Move is covered at level 17.

The Time Travel Chop Move​

  • The Time Travel Chop Move is covered at level 17.

The Echo Scream Discard Chop Move (ESDCM)​

  • The Echo Scream Discard Chop Move is covered at level 22.

The Transfer Chop Move​

  • First, see the section on blind playing Chop Moved cards.
  • Sometimes, duplicated cards are accidentally Chop Moved through a mistake or through a complicated situation. When this happens, it is pointless to use a clue to "undo" the Chop Move - the team can just continue to allow the player to discard normally.
  • Subsequently, if someone does use a clue to undo the Chop Move, there must be a good reason. This means that the card they were about to discard is important, so the player should discard the now-known useless card and then permanently Chop Move their new chop.

The Misplay Chop Move​

  • Sometimes, a desirable card is on the next player's chop and it is not directly cluable. In this situation, players can cleverly use the various kinds of Chop Moves in order to save the card, like the Trash Chop Move, 5's Chop Move, Tempo Clue Chop Move, and so on.
  • However, none of these Chop Moves may be available to perform. In such a situation, players can Chop Move the very next player by giving them a clue to make them intentionally misplay the clued card. This works in a similar way as a Trash Chop Move, except that:
    • the trash is not known to the player receiving the clue
    • it costs the team a strike
  • If multiple cards are touched in a Misplay Chop Move, then:
    • All of the touched cards to the right of the focused/misplayed card should be kept. Good Touch Principle applies to those cards.
    • All of the non-touched cards to the right of the focused/misplayed card should be Chop Moved. (This means that Misplay Chop Moves work slightly differently than Trash Chop Moves.)
  • For example, in a 3-player game:
    • All of the 2's are played on the stacks.
    • Bob's hand is completely unclued. Bob also has three critical cards in a row on his chop.
    • Alice sees that it would require three separate clues to clue all of Bob's critical cards. However, Alice can obviously only give one clue.
    • Alice clues blue to Bob, touching a card in slot 1 and slot 3 as a Play Clue.
    • Bob knows that the clue is focused on his slot 1 card. Therefore, the slot 1 card must be the blue 3. He tries to play the card, but it is actually a blue 4 and misplays.
    • Bob knows that if Alice is not making a mistake, she is communicating a Misplay Chop Move. Bob marks his slot 2, slot 4, and slot 5 cards as being Chop Moved. Additionally, Bob marks his other blue card in slot 3 as being a blue 3, a blue 4, or a blue 5. Bob's chop is now his slot 1 card.
AliceClue GiverClue GiverBobPlayb3b4, b5After Bob misplays the blue 4...Bobcmcmcm
  • The Misplay Chop Move is the most costly type of Chop Move, so it should only be performed in a situation where no other kind of Chop Move would work.

Double Order Chop Move (for 3-Player Games)​

  • This convention only applies to 3-player games.
  • In the Order Chop Move, players can play 1's in a certain order to Chop Move a specific player of their choosing.
  • In a 4 or 5-player game, skipping over three 1's would Chop Move the player three seats away. However, in a 3-player game, this would be nonsensical, since there are only 3 players in total.
  • Thus, in a 3-player game, skipping over three 1's should Double Chop Move the very next player.
  • In the rare case where four things are skipped over, it should skip over the next player and Double Chop Move the player after that.
AliceDoubleChopMoveChopMoveBobClue GiverClue Giver1DoubleChopMoveAlice1DoubleChopMoveCathy1ChopMoveAlice1ChopMoveCathy1PlayCathyDoubleChopMoveChopMove

Spillover Chop Move​

  • If an Order Chop Move or a Trash Order Chop Move is performed, but the player who is supposed to Chop Move already has every single card in their hand clued, then this is very strange.
  • In this situation, the Chop Move should "skip" over that player and Chop Move the next person after that.

The Negative Self-Chop Move​

  • If a card has negative 1, 2, 3, and 4 on it, then it is explicitly known to be a 5, while not directly clued.
  • In this situation, it would be a waste of a clue for the team to clue it directly.
  • Thus, the player should Chop Move the card.

The Asymmetric Chop Move Dilemma​

  • Sometimes, an asymmetric Chop Move occurs during a game.
  • For example, in a 3-player game:
    • During the Early Game, Alice clues number 5 to Cathy, touching a 5 that is one-away-from-chop.
    • Bob does not see anything else for Alice to do, so Alice's clue is probably just a 5 Stall.
    • However, it is also possible that Bob has a playable or savable card in his hand. If this is true, then Alice's clue would instead be an Early 5's Chop Move.
    • Next, Alice clues Cathy, causing Bob to blind-play a card as an Unknown Trash Discharge.
    • In this situation, Bob cannot determine whether or not the Unknown Trash Discharge was an Unnecessary Move. Thus, without any other conventions, Bob is not sure where Cathy's chop card is.
  • In such cases, we agree that Bob should assume that all moves are Necessary. This follows from Occam's Razor; assume the simplest possible thing is happening.