How to win at Stealr No Mercy

1. Think in three colors

You win with three complete sets in three different colors. A second set of a color you already finished does not count, so spread out instead of doubling up.

• Brown, Dark Blue and Utility need only two cards. They finish fast and are the cheapest way to your first set.
• Railroad needs four cards: a slow set that is easy to break.
• Two-color wild cards keep your options open: moving them to their other color costs no play.

2. No set is safe

Eleven cards can take a finished set apart: Deal Breaker (3), Super Sly Deal (3), Market Crash (3) and Repossession (2). Count which of them have been played already: the fewer are left, the safer your table is.

3. Save Just Say No for what hurts

There are five Just Say No cards. Do not spend yours on a small rent if a Deal Breaker or a Super Sly Deal could still come. When a card hits several players, each of them decides alone: if you lose little, let the others spend their Just Say No.

A Just Say No can itself be stopped by another one. Playing yours first while your opponent may hold a second one is a gamble.

4. Rent: hit everyone, twice

Every rent card charges all opponents. A Shack adds 5M before doubling, so a complete Dark Blue set (8M) with a Shack and a Double Rent card asks 26M from every opponent.

• Put your Shack on your most expensive set, and keep a Double Rent for it.
• A Deal Breaker takes the Shack with the set: protect that set with Just Say No.

5. Keep your bank small and smart

Banks are not safe either. Heist takes the most valuable card from every bank, Tax Collector leaves a player only their best bank card, and Unfair Trade swaps whole banks.

• There is no change: small bills let you pay exactly instead of overpaying with a 10M card.
• Bank actions you cannot use soon; they are worth their value as money.
• A huge bank invites Unfair Trade. Spend value on your table when you can finish a set.

6. Debt is not the end

If you cannot pay, you hand over your bank and your table plus one debt chip, no matter how big the debt was. So when your table is nearly empty anyway, a big demand costs you little: one card from your hand on your next turn.

• Paying back costs plays: each chip uses one of your three plays at the start of your turn.
• With all three chips out, the rest of any debt is forgiven.
• Forced Debt gives you an opponent's chip: on their next turn they must hand you a card from their hand.

7. Your hand is a target

Tough Luck takes all cards of one kind from a hand: properties, money or actions. Do not hoard properties in your hand; put them on the table when they help a set.

• At the end of your turn you choose your discards: throw away what you will not need, not what you might need later.
• Pass Go Go Go! is best with a small hand: you draw up to seven cards.
• Go Again must be your last play; plan your other two plays before it.

8. Read the table

• Watch whoever has two counting sets: that player is one card from winning. Market Crash or Super Sly Deal on their best color resets them.
• A player who keeps cards in hand turn after turn may be holding Just Say No for your big attack.
• With Repossession and Tax Collector the target hands their cards to the other players and decides who gets what, so don't count on getting any yourself (except in a two-player game): use them to cut the leader down.

Practice

Play the bots: Easy, Medium and Hard make more and fewer mistakes, the Boss plans several plays ahead and counts the cards that are still hidden.

New to the game? Start in the Starter mode: a lighter deck with only five kinds of action cards. Mild adds every rule without the five harshest cards, and No Mercy is the full deck. The three modes.