After Captbnut’s play:
Castle: K♣ attack 20 health 40, + 1 more
Discard: 5♦, + 31 more
Tavern: 2
A♥ A♣ 8♥ 10♣ 9♠ A♦
Q♥ J♠ 10♦ 6♥ 10♥ A♠
Jester 7♠ K♠ 5♣ J♦ 6♣
@Phil to play.
(Sorry, I’ve been out all day playing games in person…)
I came very close to posting a move, and realised at the last moment that it wasn’t my turn : )
Actually @Captbnut to play again, having dealt the final blow to the K♥.
That restock was excellent timing, but I note that the tavern is now doing extremely poor business (although the King of Hearts can probably afford to give good tips? : )
So after this one it’s going to be diamonds.
I can help with the Tavern (I think this is allowed communication)
Q 
with A 
I believe that is 16 attack,16 are reshuffled into the tavern and 16 damage is shielded (allowing @Phil to keep that King of Spades).
Discard 6 for damage
Apologies for last night’s error. Yes, that’s 16 (hearts + spades) as you say.
(I can’t easily call it “shield”, though - the term “spade” is from spada, a sword, while the symbol is from a pike head. There was briefly a Swiss-German shield suit, but… eh, never mind.)
Castle: K♣ attack 4 health 24, + 1 more
Current damage done: (Q♥ A♠)
Discard: 6♥, + 16 more
Tavern: 18
A♥ A♣ 8♥ 10♣ 9♠ A♦
J♠ 10♦ 10♥
Jester 7♠ K♠ 5♣ J♦ 6♣
And now I think it’s @Phil to play.
Nice. In that case I shall play 7♠ which deals with the remainder of the King’s attack.
Strictly speaking I believe it isn’t (any such hints are covered by “Players may not at any time communicate to the other players what they have in their hand”); but my comment was really just a thinly-veiled request for @Captbnut to play the Queen of Hearts : ) (or to ensure that the tavern had been considered, at minimum).
Castle: K♣ attack 0 health 17, + 1 more
Current damage done: (Q♥ A♠) 7♠
Discard: 6♥, + 16 more
Tavern: 18
A♥ A♣ 8♥ 10♣ 9♠ A♦
J♠ 10♦ 10♥
Jester K♠ 5♣ J♦ 6♣
and over to @COMaestro.
Play 8 
with A 
I think I was remembering the Jester section, where it says “Players may not discuss specific cards in their hand at any time during the game”. Hinting that I have a particular suit does not discuss a “specific” card.
Even the part of the rules you quoted is ambiguous, as suggesting I have a heart in hand is very different than saying “I have the 5 
in hand”. But it could also be interpreted as not being allowed to communicate any information at all. Probably something that should be clarified in the rules, or just agreed upon by all players at the start of the game.
The restrictions as stated are indeed open to interpretation. I’ve seen a couple of clarifications from the designers:
But in the end…
…and anywhere in the middle if (as you say) it’s agreed by the players, as a form of group-specific difficulty control.
I think we’ve played this game very much at the intended end of the comms scale, and I think we’ve done fantastically well.
Castle: K♣ attack 0 health 8, + 1 more
Current damage done: (Q♥ A♠) 7♠ (8♥ A♥)
Discard: 4♠, + 7 more
Tavern: 21
A♣ 10♣ 9♠ A♦ K♥ 4♥
J♠ 10♦ 10♥ 9♥ 2♣ 3♦
Jester K♠ 5♣ J♦ 6♣ J♥
@Captbnut to play.
9 for the kill
Jack against the new King. Discard 10
OK, after both of those:
Castle: K♦ attack 10 health 30, + 0 more
Current damage done: J♠
Discard: 10♦, + 7 more
Tavern: 29
A♣ 10♣ 9♠ A♦ K♥ 4♥
10♥ 2♣ 3♦
Jester K♠ 5♣ J♦ 6♣ J♥
@Phil to play.
Given public knowledge I think you’ve got this.
I play a Jester to disable the diamonds immunity (because why not stick to my plan to hobble this King entirely, even if it’s now entirely unnecessary? : ), and then choose myself to go next, and play the K♠.
Castle: K() attack 0 health 10, + 0 more
Current damage done: J♠ Jester K♠
Discard: 10♦, + 7 more
Tavern: 29
A♣ 10♣ 9♠ A♦ K♥ 4♥
10♥ 2♣ 3♦
5♣ J♦ 6♣ J♥
@COMaestro to play.
It does seem pretty safe, doesn’t it? : )
It started seeming really promising quite a while back, but I didn’t want to celebrate too soon and then find that one of us ended up with a catastrophic hand that couldn’t defend.
In the middle of the game, I was not predicting this outcome – when the third Queen in a row disappeared into the discard pile, I was pretty much expecting us to crash and burn when we hit the Kings! – so congratulations are definitely in order!
Well, almost… bring it home, @COMaestro !
Just for fun, let’s use 9 and A for an exact kill.
After my final play I’d looked to see what all the hands were, and I and couldn’t decide whether you were going to go for the exact kill with 10 damage or the ludicrous overkill with 42 damage : )