There is a Codenames incident from last summer that we do not discuss in detail, but which involved the clue 'mineral, three,' a disastrous guess on the word 'Rock,' and a spymaster who was apparently thinking of something entirely different. The team lost. The spymaster stood up, bowed, and walked to the bar. Codenames does this to people.
How to Play
Codenames is a word-association party game for four or more players, split into two teams. A five-by-five grid of word cards is laid out on the table. Each team has a spymaster who can see a secret key card showing which words belong to their team (blue or red), which belong to the other team, which are neutral bystanders, and crucially — which one is the assassin. Spymasters take turns giving a single-word clue and a number: the clue should relate to multiple words in the grid that belong to their team. Teammates then guess which words match the clue, touching cards one at a time. They can guess up to the clue number plus one. The round ends when they guess wrong (or choose to stop). First team to reveal all their words wins. Touching the assassin ends the game immediately — for the other team.
Our Experience
Our Friday night record is a spymaster connecting five words with a single clue — the word was 'ancient' and the targets were pyramid, sphinx, scroll, temple, and ruin. The team got all five. The other spymaster conceded before the next turn. We also have a house rule that if a team immediately guesses the assassin, the spymaster must buy the table a round. It has happened twice. The second time was not even close — the clue was 'white, two' and someone immediately pressed 'SNOW' and 'GHOST' and then said 'wait' but it was already too late.