The goal
In Go Fish you collect all four cards of one rank. That is a book, and it scores one point. The player with the most books wins.
The deal
Seven cards each with two or three players, five with four or more. The rest becomes the pond. If you are dealt all four of a rank, it is booked straight away. Nobody deals in turn. Who asks first is drawn at random, so it is not always you.
The play
Name another player and a rank. You must already hold at least one card of that rank yourself. You cannot ask a player whose hand is empty. Every question and every handed card is seen by the whole table, but a card fished from the pond is seen only by you. A rank someone asks for is a rank they hold.
If they have that rank, they hand over every card of it, not just one. Then you ask again. The player you ask must answer: "Here you go" if they hold the rank, "Go fish!" if they do not. Only the true answer is allowed; the table says "Check your hand" to any other. An answer has ten seconds. If the time runs out, the true answer is given for them.
If they do not have it, you go fishing: draw one card from the pond, and your turn ends. Unless you fish the very rank you asked for: show it to the table and ask again. If the pond is empty, a miss draws nothing and the turn still passes. A book that empties your hand passes the turn too, even after a hit.
The moment you hold all four of a rank, the book is set aside and scores. It cannot be asked for again.
Scoring
Every book is one point. Nothing else scores. The cards left in your hand at the end are worth nothing either way.
Winning
The game ends when only one player still holds cards, or when the pond is empty and no two hands share a rank, so no ask can ever hit again. Most books wins. An exact tie has no winner. A player whose hand runs out never draws back in: their turn is skipped until the end.
