Use a deck of N cards with no suits, just natural numbers from 1 to N. (as in Rack-O)
Shuffle and deal N cards evenly to X players and a kitty.
For each round:
- Reveal a card from the kitty. This is the 'prize card'.
- Each player selects a 'bid' from his/her hand.
- Bids are revealed: highest bid wins points according to value of the prize card.
After all rounds, player with most points wins.
Deck is [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9]
John's hand is [2,4,9] Alice's hand is [1,3,8] kitty is [5,6,7]
Round 1, prize card is 5 John bids 4, Alice bids 8 -> Alice wins 5 pts
Round 2, prize card is 6 John bids 9, Alice bids 1 -> John wins 6 pts
Round 3, prize card is 7 John bids 2, Alice bids 3 -> Alice wins 7 pts
Alice wins (12 pts) over John (6 pts)