Editing Sorry! (game) (section)

== Classic rules ==
Each player chooses four pawns of one color and places them in their Start. One player is selected to play first.<ref name="Hasbro" />

Each player, in turn, draws one card from the deck and follows its instructions. To begin the game, all of a player's four pawns are in Start and a player can only move them out onto the rest of the board if they draw a 1, 2 or ''Sorry!'' card. A 1 or a 2 places a pawn on the space directly outside of Start (a 2 does not entitle the pawn to move a second space). One must move a pawn if possible; if multiple options are available, they may choose which one to take. If there are no available movements, their turn is forfeited.<ref name="Hasbro" />

A pawn can jump over any other pawn during its move, counting it as one space. However, if a pawn that lands on a square occupied by another player's pawn, the pawn already occupying that square is "bumped" back to its own Start.<ref name="Hasbro" /> Players can not bump their own pawns back to Start; if the only way to complete a move would result in a player bumping their own pawn, the player's pawns remain in place and the player loses their turn.

If a pawn lands at the start of a slide (except those of its own color), either by direct movement or as the result of a switch from an 11 card or a Sorry card, it immediately "slides" to the last square of the slide. (In the 2013 version, each slide contains three colors which are different from the color of that board side, so one may slide at the start of a slide with their color.) All pawns on all spaces of the slide (including those belonging to the sliding player) are sent back to their respective Starts.<ref name="Hasbro">{{cite web|url=http://www.hasbro.com/common/instruct/sorry.pdf|title=Scan of Sorry! rules at hasbro|access-date=29 July 2005|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060104174941/http://www.hasbro.com/common/instruct/sorry.pdf|archive-date=4 January 2006|url-status=live}}</ref>

The last five squares before each player's Home are "Safety Zones", and are specially colored corresponding to the colors of the Homes they lead to. Access is limited to pawns of the same color. Pawns inside the Safety Zones are immune to being bumped by opponents' pawns or being switched with opponents' pawns via 11 or Sorry! cards. However, if a pawn is forced via a 10 or 4 card to move backward out of the Safety Zone, it is no longer considered "safe" and may be bumped by or switched with opponents' pawns as usual until it re-enters the Safety Zone.

A pawn may only move to its Home space by exact count; that is, only cards with the correct number of required spaces can bring the pawn Home. Any pawn that is in its Home space stays there for the rest of the game. The first player to get all of their pawns in their Home space wins.

=== Classic cards and function ===
The modern deck contains 45 cards: there are five 1 cards as well as four each of the other cards (''Sorry!'', 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 10, 11 and 12). The 6s or 9s are omitted to avoid confusion with each other. The first edition of the game had 44 cards (four of each) and the extra 1 card was soon introduced as an option for quicker play.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.hasbro.com/common/instruct/Sorry_1939.pdf|title=Sorry 1939 Instructions|access-date=2 May 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120921011926/http://www.hasbro.com/common/instruct/Sorry_1939.pdf|archive-date=21 September 2012|url-status=live}}</ref> A 1996 board from Waddingtons had five of each card.

Cards are annotated with the following actions:
{|class="wikitable"
!1
|Either move a pawn from Start or move a pawn one space forward. (In the 2013 edition, the player may also "[[Sorry!_(game)#Sorry!_with_Fire_and_Ice_Power-Ups|move ice]]" before doing so.)
|-
!2
|Either move a pawn from Start or move a pawn two spaces forward. Drawing a two, even if it does not enable movement, entitles the player to draw again at the end of their turn. (In the 2013 edition, the "draw again" rule is removed, but the player may also "move fire" as part of this card's effect.)
|-
!3
|Move a pawn three spaces forward.
|-
!4
|Move a pawn four spaces backward.
|-
!5
|Move a pawn five spaces forward.
|-
!7
|Move one pawn seven spaces forward, or split the seven spaces between two pawns (such as four spaces for one pawn and three for another). This makes it possible for two pawns to enter Home on the same turn, for example. The seven cannot be used to move a pawn out of Start, even if the player splits it into a six and one or a five and two. The entire seven spaces must be used or their turn ends. The player cannot move their pawn backwards with a split.
|-
!8
|Move a pawn eight spaces forward.
|-
!10
|Move a pawn ten spaces forward or one space backward. If none of a player's pawns can move forward 10 spaces, then one pawn must move back one space.
|-
!11
|Move eleven spaces forward, or switch the places of one of the player's own pawns and an opponent's pawn. A player who cannot move 11 spaces is not forced to switch and instead can end their turn. An 11 cannot be used to switch a pawn that is in a Safety Zone, or to move a pawn out of Start.
|-
!12
|Move a pawn twelve spaces forward.
|-
!style="white-space:nowrap;"|Sorry!
|Take any one pawn from Start and move it directly to a square occupied by any opponent's pawn, sending that pawn back to its own Start. A ''Sorry!'' card cannot be used on an opponent's pawn in a Safety Zone or at the Home base. If there are no pawns on the player's Start, or no opponent's pawns on any space that can be moved to, the turn ends. (In the 2013 version, the player can also move any of their pawns forward four spaces. If the player cannot move forward 4 after there are no pawns in start or no opponent pawn on any space, their turn is forfeited.)<ref name="Hasbro" />
|}