Secret Hitler is the best hidden role game, and nobody can convince us otherwise. Bang, Ultimate Werewolf, Avalon, and Mafia are great options, but the political machinations and end-game trust freakout make SH our top title in a highly competitive board game genre. We’ve played this game time and time again, and it never gets old!

Know what’s even better? It’s FREE.

Official game sets can be purchased, but Secret Hitler also has a Print-and-Play option on their website . In this article, we’re going to show you where to find it, how to make your set, and a few options for improving your self-made boards! By the time you’re done, you’ll have a quality game board for one of the best hidden role games ever made.

Please enjoy our friendly guide on…

How to create your own Secret Hitler game set

Step 1: Printing

Head over the Secret Hitler website if you haven’t already. Here, you can find more information about the game, including the print links for the Game Set and Rule Book .

Once you’ve downloaded the PDF’s, just print ’em. That’s all there is to it!

Step 2: Cut it Out!

Get ye some scissors and cut them out! Be careful to follow the lines, make sure everything’s nice and neat.

Now comes a decision: how nice of a game set do you want? If you’re playing this once with family members at Christmas, you can simply play as is. If you want your game to look pretty, head to the next step on card stock. If you want your game to last, go on to Step 3, lamination. If you just want somewhere to store it, voyage to the final instructions on making a box!

Step 3: Card stock

Why use card stock on a Secret Hitler set? First, it’s a great way to make everything sturdier. Two, it’s a decently effective way to tie the game board pieces together, since they print in two parts. Finally, for the paranoid players, card stock ensures light won’t shine through your cards and allow others to see them.

They’re cheaters, the lot of ’em!

Head to your nearest Staples, Walmart, or scrapbooking store. Pick up your favorite color of card stock (we suggest 10 9 x 12-inch pieces at least) and a good number of glue sticks. Or, if you’re a madman, grab a glue bottle.

At this point, glue your Secret Hitler pieces to the card stock. If you’re using 9×10 papers they can be divided thusly:

Step 3: Laminate

To make your cards water resistant, tear resistant, and glue-getting-old resistant, you should laminate them . A well-laminated deck looks professional and stays around much longer!

Personal suggestion from us to you: if you don’t own a laminator yourself, ask friends and family first, then buy your own lamination pouches if they have one. It’ll make life easier.

Once you have the materials, using the laminator shouldn’t be too difficult: the real trick is fitting as many game cards inside one lamination pouch at a time. It all depends on how much material you want on the sides, and how uniform they’ll look afterward.

As usual, the game boards will be an issue, since they’re so long. We put two lamination pouches over them, on opposite sides, with overlap in the middle. Before you run this beast through the laminator, make sure to wait a while for it the machine to get hot. It may struggle to heat up the center.

When that’s all finished, pull a Step 2 and cut the lamination off!

“Final” step: The extras

To play Secret Hitler, there are just a few more housecleaning items:

Bonus round: Making a box!

We made this box ourselves, which turned out looking pretty great!

You may be wondering: why put in the effort? Aside from looking fly, Secret Hitler game sets are so long and thin that no box on earth seems to fit them perfectly. However, with a little wood, spray paint, and a few key items, you can have a comfy box too!

You can do it. Seriously. We aren’t carpentry professionals by any stretch.

Let’s run through the steps quickly!

Enjoy the box! At the very least, we hope it carries your game set well. At best, we hope you’re proud of your work and can show it off at game nights.

A few more things (IMPORTANT!)

Secret Hitler has a specific creative commons license: you can print off as many copies as you like, but you may not sell them for profit . You can remake the game as you wish (we made a Homestuck version for fun, you can see Jack Noir above), but any new version must be released under the same license, and still cannot be used for profit.

Thanks for reading, we hope you enjoy creating your Secret Hitler game set! After just a few hours of work, you and your friends can enjoy many more hours of fun, learning tells and forming trust issues.

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