What you need and how to set up
A 52-card deck, no jokers. Each player gets four cards, which stay in front of them for the whole game. The rest of the deck builds the pyramid: five rows, from five cards at the base to a single card at the top, fifteen cards face down.
In the express version, the pyramid has only three rows, six cards, for a game half as long. The host chooses before dealing.
Two to twelve players. With two, everything becomes a face-off; above eight, claims multiply and the pyramid comes alive. Count on ten to twenty minutes.
The four prediction rounds
Each player receives their cards one at a time and must predict something about each one before seeing it. Round 1: red or black. Round 2: higher, lower or equal to their first card. Round 3: between their first two cards, or outside. Round 4: the exact suit, hearts, diamonds, clubs or spades.
The stake follows the round number. A missed prediction in round 1 costs one sip, in round 4 four sips. A correct prediction gives the same number of sips to hand to any player you choose.
After the four rounds, everyone has four cards in front of them and knows them. Time to memorise.
Memorising, then the pyramid
Before the pyramid starts, everyone's cards are turned face down. Nobody can look at them again. Everything that follows runs on memory and nerve.
The host turns the pyramid cards over one at a time, starting from the base. The bottom row is worth one sip, the next two, and so on up to the top, worth five. The higher you go, the more a claim costs.
Claim, accept, challenge
When a card is turned over, any player can claim to hold a card of the same rank and point at someone to drink the row's stake. One claim per player per card, but several players can claim on the same card, each against their own target.
The player pointed at has two options. Accept, and drink the stake. Or challenge. The claimer must then turn over one of their cards: if it really is the claimed rank, the challenger drinks double the stake. If it is not the right card, or if the claimer would rather own up to the bluff without showing anything, the claimer drinks double.
A card turned over during a challenge stays visible to everyone until the end of the game. Challenging also costs information to the player who told the truth.
Bluffing, or why the Pyramid is a game of eye contact
Nothing forces you to hold the card you claim. A bluff accepted without a challenge is a won claim like any other, and the game counts them separately in the final tally. All the tension comes from there: the stake rises with the rows, other people's memory fades, and everyone knows the cards revealed in challenges tell part of the claimer's hand.
Two tips from our tables. Challenging early, on the one- or two-sip rows, costs little and teaches a lot. And bluffing on the top card, five sips doubled, is done once per evening, never twice.
The final guesses
When the last pyramid card has been played, each player must guess their own four cards, still face down, one by one and in order. The first is worth one sip, the fourth four.
Exact rank and suit: you hand out the stake. Rank only: neither won nor lost. Miss: you drink the stake. It is the revenge of faithful memories and the punishment of bluffers who turned their cards over too often.
The tally shows sips drunk, sips handed out and successful bluffs. The winner is the one who made others drink the most, not the one who drank the least.
Without alcohol, with real cards, or online
Without alcohol, every sip becomes a point or a dare. The game does not change: stakes, challenges and the double stay the same, only the currency changes. Some tables play with one designated drinker per round, others with sips of water.
With a real deck, the only difficulty is keeping track of stakes and open challenges. Pick someone to turn the pyramid and referee.
Online, everyone plays from their phone: the deal, the stakes, the double on a challenge and the tally are kept by the game, and a TV can show the pyramid in the middle of the table. Nothing to install, a room opens in thirty seconds.