It is impossible to beat this game from strategy alone. With that out of the way, I have been playing Liar's Bar for a while and have gathered enough information to confidently say that I fully understand Liar's Deck. It is not just about lying, but about manipulating other players into thinking you are telling the truth through social engineering and pattern recognition.

Despite the table holding 4 players, you are not playing against the other 3. You are only playing against 1 person, and that is the person immediately after you. Why, you ask? Because they are the only one who can call your bluff. That player rotates as they are killed, so be wary.

Why does this matter? You can focus most of your efforts on figuring out how and when this person calls "Liar". Do they call "Liar" every second round? Do they never call it? Do they always call when you place 2 or 3 cards at a time? Using this information, you can play your true cards against their calls.

"But don't we want to keep true cards until the end?" I hear you ask. The answer is "it depends." If your rounds regularly make it to the last couple rounds, it is a good idea to save your true cards. If, however, your "caller" often calls liar on the first round, you may want to use your true cards earlier.

Being able to counter your "caller" to make them think you are always telling the truth may cause them to reduce making calls and letting the rounds play out. Speaking of...

We talked about how you should handle the player after you, but what about the player before you?

It is very easy to call "Liar" on any given hand. My first piece of advice is to recognize what your own pattern might be, and break it. Don't do the same thing twice. Don't become accustomed to calling liar every second round or when they play 2 or 3 cards, etc. Break your own pattern, and be as un-readable as possible. You are more likely to catch a liar when they least expect it.

There is also strategy to not calling "Liar" at all (or at least, almost never).
I shall explain:

• If a player is calling liar in the first 2 rounds, that means that a minimum of 2 cards will be played for that round. It is very east to play 1 true card each round and stay 100% safe. You do not want anyone to feel safe.
  
• Calling liar shuffles the deck. You just got a good hand. Another player calls liar. You lose that hand.
  
• Calling liar guarantees your own "trial". What I mean is, you face a 50% chance of losing that round, the player you called faces 50% chance, while the other 2 players face 0% chance. On the other hand, not calling liar means that the round may progress, and one of the other players will face the consequences. You want to avoid this "trial" as much as possible. Instead of being the player calling liar and subjecting yourself to "trial", just play out your hand. Let other players call liar and take the chance.

Try to be the player that faces 0% chance of losing, or if you are called a Liar, be 100% safe. There is 1 winner and 3 losers.

There are only a handful of card patterns which you can play based on how many true cards you get.

• Do not play the same pattern twice
  
• Do not play true cards with lie cards (you will only hurt yourself)

50/50 (2-3 or 3-2)
This pattern is high risk for not a huge payoff, unless you hold 5 true cards. The odds of you being called "Liar" are almost guaranteed for either of your 2 claims. Therefor, this pattern should be used sparingly.

Roulette (1-1-1-1-1)
This is the safest, but longest pattern. You will have the least chance of being on trial, but also you might be the last one at the table and auto-call liar, revealing a true card. Be wary of your table, and make sure you're not the last player.

3-Turn

• 1-1-3
  
• 1-3-1
  
• 3-1-1
  
• 1-2-2
  
• 2-1-2
  
• 2-2-1

4-Turn

• 1-1-1-2
  
• 1-1-2-1
  
• 1-2-1-1
  
• 2-1-1-1

The average novice hand is about 3 turns. Many new players can't help but call Liar. If you have at 2 safe cards in your hand, you can tell the truth at least 66% of the time. Those are good odds!

On the contrary, the average pro hand (taking less risks) is about 4 turns. Highly-skilled players almost never call liar. It is safest to not force yourself on "trial".

While you cannot call liar on more than one player, you can try to convince another player to call liar. This puts the "trial" on whichever 2 players are involved. One of them will take the bullet, not you (unless it's Devil's Deck, in which case there's a chance you could). A very social person can manipulate other players to always be making the wrong calls.

To counter this, do not respond to another player's suggestion to call Liar. You take 50% of the risk, while they take 0%, if that person is across the table. Ignore the other players' "strategic" advice. They do not want you to win.

At the end of the day, it's a luck of the draw, both with your deck, and with your revolver. However, if you can make the other players pull the trigger more often, your odds of winning are higher.

If you enjoyed this guide, please leave a rating so others can see it too.