A printable Codenames round log lives or dies on a guess nobody can reconstruct from the player who made it, because the player who made it is the least reliable witness in the room. The word that ended the game has already been quietly covered with the black assassin card, and the round that mattered is no longer a round at all. It cannot say whether a guess was a team's own agent or merely a word its spymaster happened to point at, because a list of guesses with no identity column shows who touched the cards and calls that a result. It cannot say whether a clue was legal at all, because a clue list with no count column cannot show that the team that guessed four words on a clue of three had already spent its one bonus guess. And it cannot say whether the assassin was touched or merely threatened, because a result list with no covered-card column cannot show that the word the loser claims was never touched was in fact the word that ended the game. Nothing was miscounted on purpose. The log just never recorded the one thing that mattered: every clue with its number, every guess with its true identity, and every covered card beside the guess that covered it, because a finished round cannot say whether its winner won on clean agents, a rival's agent gifted across the table, or a guess that should never have been made.
That is the product. Not a prettier blank score pad. A record that survives the three arguments every Codenames round has: the agent dismissed because nobody wrote down whether the guessed word belonged to the guessing team, the clue struck because a team guessed one word past its bonus, and the game that should never have counted because the assassin was touched on a guess nobody logged. A log that stores only the round result loses all three. A log that stores the clue, the count, the guess, and the identity beside every play settles all three in thirty seconds, and that is what a buyer reorders.
What a printable Codenames round log actually contains (and why the identity column is the product)
A round log that sells is four pages, and every page earns its place by answering one question the table will ask at the final guess. The first page is the grid record: one row per word, twenty-five rows in a five-by-five grid, with the word, its position, and its secret identity, because a guess claimed from memory after three more rounds will quietly become a clean result or no result at all, and every scoring error in the game starts there. The second page is the clue ledger: one row per clue, with the spymaster, the clue word, its number, and the maximum guesses that number allows, because a team that cannot be pointed to on an exact clue row cannot be checked, and a log that records only which words were guessed has hidden the only evidence that proves whether a guess was inside the clue's allowance or past it. The third page is the guess ledger: one row per guess, in order, with the team, the word touched, and the card that covered it, because a guess is the one moment a round rewards restraint, and a log with no cover column cannot prove a guess was an agent, a bystander, a rival's agent, or the assassin. The fourth page is the campaign tally: one row per round, with the starting team, the rounds played, the assassin touched or not, and the winner, because a round result without its per-round components cannot be audited, and a round result that cannot be audited will be trusted right up until the game it decides is over.
The rules every buyer assumes (and the checks that enforce them)
The first rule every buyer assumes is the setup, and it is not negotiable: twenty-five word cards, laid face up in a five-by-five grid, because a grid with twenty-four words has invented a board. Two teams, red and blue, each with one spymaster, because a team with two spymasters has invented a hint. One key card, seen only by the spymasters, shows every word's secret identity, because a key seen by the guessers has invented a game. The starting team has nine agents to find and the other team has eight, plus seven innocent bystanders and one assassin, because a board with two assassins has invented a loss. The second rule is the clue, and it is one word plus one number, not a sentence: the spymaster says a single word and a number, and the number says how many of the team's agents that clue connects to, because a clue with two words has invented a hint. A clue word may not be a word visible on the grid, because a clue that names a grid word has invented a pointer. The third rule is the guess, and it is at least one and at most the number plus one: the team must guess at least one word, may keep guessing while every guess is correct, and may make at most one bonus guess beyond the clue's number, because a team that guesses two past its number has invented a turn. A correct agent is covered with the team's colour and guessing may continue, because a correct guess that ends the turn has invented a penalty. A bystander ends the turn at once, because a bystander that lets guessing continue has invented a free pass. An opposing agent ends the turn and helps the other side, because a rival's agent kept by the guesser has invented a gift. The assassin ends the game at once and the team that touched it loses, because an assassin that merely ends a turn has invented a second chance. The fourth rule is the ending, and it is immediate: the first team to cover all of its agents wins the moment the last one is covered, because a game played past its last agent has invented rounds. Note the scope: this log is built for the classic two-team game with twenty-five words, nine and eight agents, seven bystanders, and one assassin; the cooperative Duet variant with its shared grid and turn limit, and the Pictures variant with its image cards instead of words, need their own columns, not this log with the names relabelled.
A worked round, and the arithmetic, checked the hard way
Five clues, fourteen guesses, nine red agents found, four blue agents found, one bystander covered, and one round won, and every word, clue, and guess accounted for. Two teams: red starts, so red has nine agents and blue has eight, plus seven bystanders and one assassin, and nine plus eight plus seven plus one equals twenty-five, because a board count that does not sum to twenty-five has invented a word. The grid, row by row: row one, OCEAN, SHIP, FOREST, PIANO, WAVE; row two, TREE, SAIL, GUITAR, TIDE, APPLE; row three, COMPASS, CHAIR, MAP, LEAF, CLOCK; row four, RIVER, ANCHOR, BRIDGE, STONE, MARKET; row five, MOUNTAIN, ISLAND, CAVE, BEAR, BOMB. Red's nine agents are OCEAN, SHIP, SAIL, WAVE, TIDE, COMPASS, MAP, ISLAND, and ANCHOR. Blue's eight agents are FOREST, TREE, LEAF, RIVER, STONE, MOUNTAIN, CAVE, and BEAR. The seven bystanders are PIANO, GUITAR, APPLE, CHAIR, CLOCK, BRIDGE, and MARKET. The assassin is BOMB. No clue word in this round is a word on the grid, because a clue that names a grid word has invented a pointer.
Turn one, red: the spymaster gives SEA, three, so the team may guess at most four. They guess OCEAN, red, covered red; SHIP, red, covered red; WAVE, red, covered red; and stop at three, inside the allowance, three red agents found. Turn two, blue: the spymaster gives WOOD, two, so the team may guess at most three. They guess FOREST, blue, covered blue; TREE, blue, covered blue; and stop at two, inside the allowance, two blue agents found. Turn three, red: the spymaster gives NAVIGATION, three, so the team may guess at most four. They guess COMPASS, red, covered red; MAP, red, covered red; ANCHOR, red, covered red; and stop at three, inside the allowance, six red agents found. Turn four, blue: the spymaster gives EARTH, three, so the team may guess at most four. They guess STONE, blue, covered blue; MOUNTAIN, blue, covered blue; then spend the bonus guess on BRIDGE, a bystander, covered beige, and the turn ends at once, four blue agents found and one bystander covered, because a bonus guess that lands on a bystander has spent the turn, not extended it. Turn five, red: the spymaster gives VOYAGE, three, so the team may guess at most four. They guess SAIL, red, covered red; TIDE, red, covered red; ISLAND, red, covered red; and the round ends at once, nine red agents found, because a ninth agent covered is a win the moment it is covered, not at the end of the turn. The clues read five in total, three red and two blue, because a clue count that does not sum to its rows has invented a turn. The guesses read fourteen in total: red three plus three plus three equals nine, blue two plus three equals five, and nine plus five equals fourteen, because a guess count that does not sum to its rows has invented a touch. The covered cards read fourteen in total: nine red, four blue, and one beige bystander, and nine plus four plus one equals fourteen, because a cover count that does not sum to its guesses has invented a card. The uncovered words read eleven in total: four blue agents still hidden, LEAF, RIVER, CAVE, and BEAR; six bystanders still hidden, PIANO, GUITAR, APPLE, CHAIR, CLOCK, and MARKET; and the assassin, BOMB, untouched; and fourteen covered plus eleven uncovered equals twenty-five, because a board count that does not sum to the grid has invented a word. The assassin was never touched, and the log proves it, because every guess in the ledger has a cover colour beside it and none of them is black.
The change-one-line box writes the counterfactual the buyer needs. Change one line and the result moves: if turn four's BRIDGE guess is recorded as blue instead of beige, because the log shows no cover column to check against, blue reads as five agents found instead of four, the next blue clue reads as chasing three agents instead of four, and the campaign tally reads one agent ahead of where it actually stands, because a log with no cover column looks complete right up until the next dispute it cannot settle. If turn five's VOYAGE clue is recorded as number two instead of three, because the log shows no count column to check against, red's three guesses read as one past the allowance, the ninth agent reads as illegally guessed, and the round reads as disputed instead of won, because a log that hides a count cannot say whether a win was inside the clue or past it. If BOMB is recorded as guessed on turn four instead of BRIDGE, because the log shows no identity column to check against, blue reads as the team that lost on the spot, red reads as the winner by forfeit rather than by nine agents, and the next round's starting team reads as chosen by a loss that never happened, because a log that hides an identity cannot say whether a game was won or merely ended. A log that cannot show those three sentences cannot explain why a round was won by agents or lost by a touch, and a buyer who cannot explain a round does not reorder.
The endings your round log must also handle
There are three ways for a Codenames round to produce a log that looks wrong, and the log must handle all three without a footnote. First, a rival's agent gifted across the table: a red guesser touches a blue word, the log credits the guess and marks it red anyway, so a tracker that records guesses without their cover colours has invented a gift, and a log that marks every guess with its true colour catches it. Second, a bonus guess spent twice: a team on a clue of two guesses four words, all correct, and the log records all four without the allowance, so a log that accepts guesses without their clue numbers has invented a turn, and a log that ties every guess to a clue row with its maximum catches it, sending the fourth guess back unpaid rather than letting it stand. Third, an assassin touched and denied: a guesser touches BOMB, the table argues it was never touched, and the log records the guess without its black cover, so a tracker that records guesses without their identities has invented a second chance, and a log that marks every guess with its cover catches it. And when a night runs long, the campaign tally must keep working across every round to a settled match score, because a round log that restarts every game has hidden the rounds that decide who won the night.
If you sell printable round logs, this is the log your Codenames buyer actually needs: a grid record with every word beside its identity, a clue ledger that shows every clue beside its number and its maximum, a guess ledger that marks every guess with its cover, and a campaign tally that shows every round beside its winner and its assassin. Sell the record, not the pad. The pad is already in every box. The record is what settles the argument.
This guide describes a printable record-keeping sheet for a classic word game. It is not affiliated with or endorsed by the game's publisher, and it does not reproduce any copyrighted game materials.
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