Matching Owls - Heads'n'Tails with cards

This is a version of our coin-tossing Ken game, Two Down, based on the silver tetradrachm, first minted around 510 BCE, that featured the helmeted head of Athena on the obverse and her sacred owl on the reverse. These coins became so ubiquitous throughout the Mediterranean that they were nicknamed "owls" and symbolized Athenian wealth, power, and cultural influence for centuries.

The fundamental premise of Matching Owls mirrors the duality of the coin itself – heads or tails, match or mismatch – creating a game that's intuitive to learn but offers surprising strategic depth.

An ancient Athenian Tetradrachm showing Athena and her owl

Our version is based on an elegant 19th century diagram from a coin catalogue. Here are the three types of cards

No win, Heads, Tails

The Matching Owls deck consists of 64 cards:

• 24 Athena cards (featuring the helmeted goddess)

• 24 Owl cards (featuring her sacred bird)

• 16 No Winner cards (featuring an empty circle)

Unlike our ken games where all players follow the same winning conditions, Matching Owls assigns different roles to each player:

• The Odds Player wins when cards do not match (one Athena, one Owl)

• The Evens Player wins when cards match (both Athena or both Owl)

This asymmetrical approach creates a fascinating dynamic where each player pursues a different objective using the same deck.

How It Works

The game-play follows the Martingale approach of the other Ken games:

1. Players are assigned roles as either the Odds Player or Evens Player

2. Each player is dealt 8 cards

3. Both players place 4 cards face-down in a north-south orientation

4. Cards are revealed one pair at a time

5. The Evens Player wins tricks with matching pairs; the Odds Player wins tricks with mismatched pairs

6. No Winner cards neutralize tricks, with special handling for double-neutral situations

7. The player who wins the most tricks wins the round

Buy a set of Matching Owls cards printed on demand at Make Playing Cards here.