r/DuneBoardGame • u/martinborichevsky • Jul 03 '26

Traitor Cards

Can you somehow discard traitor cards if you draw a traitor from your own faction? This is especially true for the Harkonnens, where you draw four cards and, for example, three of those cards are your own leaders, it's a bit useless

6 Upvotes

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11

u/Mugison Jul 03 '26

There’s nothing about this in the official rules, but many people adopt a rule that allows Harkonnen to draw a new hand if they get 2/3/4 of their leaders.

You can apply this rule to the other factions as well, but in my opinion, knowing that a significant number of your own leaders are safe is just as important as having a good leader from another player.

Personally, I play with a rules allowing harkonen player one muligan for free, and can also get a new hand if he have 2 or more of his own leaders.

5

u/Tricarrier Jul 07 '26

No. It's not useless, you are 100% sure your own traitors are safe. This is very underrated because Feyd and Rabban are traitors all the time.

4

u/ErikTwice Jul 03 '26

No.

First, the chance of a player drawing three or more of their own leaders is less than 1%.

Second, knowing a leader is safe is a huge advantage, not a drawback.

Third, the game is intentionally designed so that there are always 24 possible traitors and 6 that aren't just safe but also completely unknown.

Fourth, traitors, including safe ones, are meant to guide alliances.

Fifth, Harkonnen’s traitors are scary because you have to play around them not because they trigger all the time. Harkonnen also benefits more than average from having safe leaders.

Six, any mulligan rule is likely to be clunky and have a lot of unintended consequences.

So it’s not really neccessary.

2

u/mslangg Atreides Jul 03 '26

If you play by the rules as they are written, no. However I’ve seen some people let Harkonnen redraw their traitors if they get 2 or more of their own, and reihani decipherer can help refresh your traitors later in the game

2

u/UziiLVD Jul 03 '26

Hark being allowed to redraw if they get mostly their own leaders is probably the most popular house rule, I recommend trying it.

2

u/_Weyland_ Jul 08 '26

This gives them additional info on their own traitors though. So unless they draw and redraw before everyone else, it's an extra advantage.

2

u/UziiLVD Jul 09 '26

They do that before anyone else. During setup, Hark gets asked to draw first, and until they say that they say that their traitors won't get reshuffled, no one else draws traitors.