Card game
Encyclopedia
A card game is any game
using playing card
s as the primary device with which the game is played, be they traditional or game-specific. Countless card games exist, including families of related games (such as poker
). A small number of card games played with traditional decks have formally standardized rules, but most are folk games whose rules vary by region, culture, and person.
Many games that are not generally placed in the family of card games do in fact use cards for some aspect of their gameplay. Similarly, some games that are placed in the card game genre involve a board. The distinction is that the gameplay of a card game primarily depends on the use of the cards by players (the board is simply a guide for scorekeeping or for card placement), while board games (the principal non-card game genre to use cards) generally focus on the players' positions on the board, and use the cards for some secondary purpose.
A card game is played with a deck or pack of playing card
s which are identical in size and shape. Each card has two sides, the face and the back. Normally the backs of the cards are indistinguishable. The faces of the cards may all be unique, or there can be duplicates. The composition of a deck is known to each player. In some cases several decks are shuffled together to form a single pack or shoe.
The first playing cards appeared in the ninth century during Tang dynasty
China
.
The first reference to the card game in world history dates no later than the 9th century, when the Collection of Miscellanea at Duyang, written by Tang Dynasty writer Su E, described Princess Tongchang (daughter of Emperor Yizong of Tang
) playing the "leaf game" in 868 with members of the Wei clan
(the family of the princess' husband). The Song dynasty
statesman and historian Ouyang Xiu
has noted that paper playing cards arose in connection to an earlier development in the book format from scrolls to pages. During the Ming Dynasty
(1368-1644), characters from popular novel
s such as the Water Margin
were widely featured on the faces of playing cards. A precise description of Chinese money playing cards (in four suits) survived from the 15th century. Mahjong tiles are a 19th century invention based on three-suited money playing card decks, similar to the way in which Rummikub tiles were derived recently from modern Western playing cards.
The same kind of games can also be played with tiles made of wood, plastic, bone, or similar materials. The most notable examples of such tile sets are dominoes
, mahjong tiles
and Rummikub
tiles. Chinese dominoes
are also available as playing cards. It is not clear whether Emperor Muzong of Liao
really played with domino cards as early as 969, though. Legend dates the invention of dominoes in the year 1112, and the earliest known domino rules are from the following decade. 500 years later domino cards were reported as a new invention.
Playing cards first appeared in Europe in the last quarter of the 14th century. The earliest European references speak of a Saracen
or Moorish
game called naib, and in fact an almost complete Mamluk
Egyptian deck of 52 cards in a distinct oriental design has survived from around the same time, with the four suits swords, polo sticks, cups and coins and the ranks king, governor, second governor, and ten to one.
The 1430s in Italy saw the invention of the tarot deck, a full Latin-suited deck augmented by suitless cards with painted motifs that played a special role as trumps. Tarot, tarock and tarocchi games
are still played with (subsets of) these decks in parts of Central Europe. The replacement of these decks by French-suited tarot decks in France is a relatively recent development.
The French suits came up around 1480 and were cheaper to print. In France, they mostly replaced the earlier Latin suits swords, clubs, cups and coins (which are still common in Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking countries as well as in some northern regions of Italy), a full tarrot deck contains 14 cards in each suit, low cards labeled 1-10, and court cards Valet, chevalier (Knight),Queen, and Roi (King), the fool or exuse card, and 21 trump cards. In the 18th century decks were created with occult images on the trump cards for cartomancy
; today most full taro decks in North America are the occult type, and are associated with fortune telling.
After the French Revolution some games started to use the ace or 1 as the highest card which symbolized the lowest in society rising above the King.
Many regional variations of card decks do not contain the full 78 cards but a lesser number of cards needed for local games. Optionally, such decks may come with up to four additional suitless cards known as joker
s. As many continental European games are played with less than 52 cards, smaller decks that lack the highest or lowest numerical ranks (other than the ace) are more common than 52-card decks in some countries. Most notably, the French-suited 32-card piquet deck only has the ranks from king, queen etc. down to seven and ace.The traditional playing cards in Central Europe
have German suits and are generally more similar to Latin-suited cards than to French-suited cards. Switzerland has a distinct variant of German suits. However, in many areas German-suited cards have been replaced by French-suited cards. A Latin-suited deck generally consists of only 48 cards, lacking the tens. Instead of queens it has knights or cavaliers, and instead of jacks it has servants or valets. But nowadays the most common Latin-suited deck has only 40 cards, dropping ranks eight to ten. In Japan, a distinct 48-card hanafuda
deck is popular. It is derived from 16th century Portuguese decks. Apart from general-purpose decks of playing cards, dedicated decks are manufactured for various purposes.
The best-known deck internationally is the French-suited deck with English styling. This deck contains 4 × 13 = 52 unique cards – one for each combination of the four French suits
spades, hearts, diamonds and clubs and the thirteen ranks running from king, queen, knave, ten, nine down to two (or deuce) and ace; the trump cards and knight cards are not included. The Knave had been called a Jack as part of the terminology of All-Fours
since the 17th century, but this was not common usage because the word was considered vulgar. However, because the card abbreviation for knave was so close to that of the king, it was very easy to confuse them, especially after suits and rankings were moved to the corners of the card in order to enable people to fan them in one hand and still see all the values. The earliest known deck to place suits and rankings in the corner of the card is from 1693, but these cards did not become common until after 1864 when Hart reintroduced them along with the knave-to-jack change. However, books of card games published in the third quarter of the 19th century evidently still referred to the "knave", and the term with this definition is still recognized in the United Kingdom
. (Note the exclamation by Estella in Charles Dickens
's novel Great Expectations
: "He calls the knaves, Jacks, this boy!")
Since the 19th century some decks have been specially printed for certain games. Old maid, abd Uno are both examples of games that can be played with a 52 card deck but are usually played with custom decks. Cards play an imprtant role in board games like Risk
and Monopoly
contains Community Chest and Chance cards.
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Any specific card game imposes restrictions on the number of players. The most significant dividing lines run between one-player games and two-player games, and between two-player games and multi-player games. Card games for one player are known as solitaire or patience card games. (See list of solitaire card games.) Generally speaking, they are in many ways special and atypical, although some of them have given rise to two- or multi-player games such as Spite and Malice
.
In card games for two players, usually not all cards are distributed to the players, as they would otherwise have perfect information about the game state. Two-player games have always been immensely popular and include some of the most significant card games such as piquet
, bezique
, sixty-six
, klaberjass
, gin rummy
and cribbage
. Many multi-player games started as two-player games that were adapted to a greater number of players. For such adaptations a number of non-obvious choices must be made beginning with the choice of a game orientation.
One way of extending a two-player game to more players is by building two teams of equal size. A common case is four players in two fixed partnerships, sitting crosswise as in whist
and contract bridge
. Partners sit opposite to each other and cannot see each other's hands. If communication between the partners is allowed at all, then it is usually restricted to a specific list of permitted signs and signals. 17th century French partnership games such as triomphe were special in that partners sat next to each other and were allowed to communicate freely so long as they did not exchange cards or played out of order.
Another way of extending a two-player game to more players is as a cut-throat game, in which all players fight on their own, and win or lose alone. Most cut-throat card games are round games, i.e. they can be played by any number of players starting from two or three, so long as there are enough cards for all.
For some of the most interesting games such as ombre
, tarot
and skat (card game), the associations between players change from hand to hand. Ultimately players all play on their own, but for each hand, some game mechanism divides the players into two teams. Most typically these are solo games, i.e. games in which one player becomes the soloist and has to achieve some objective against the others, who form a team and win or lose all their points jointly. But in games for more than three players, there may also be a mechanism that selects two players who then have to play against the others.
Europe is roughly divided into a clockwise area in the north and a counter-clockwise area in the south. The boundary runs between France, Germany, Austria (mostly), the Czech Republic, Poland, Ukraine and Russia (clockwise) and Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, Italy, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, Turkey (counter-clockwise).
Games that originate in a region with a strong preference are often initially played in the original direction, even in regions that prefer the opposite direction. For games that have official rules and are played in tournaments, the direction of play is often prescribed in those rules.
As it can still be an advantage or disadvantage to be the first dealer, there are some standard methods for determining who is the first dealer. A common method is by cutting, which works as follows. One player shuffles the deck and places it on the table. Each player lifts a packet of cards from the top, reveals its bottom card, and returns it to the deck. The player who reveals the highest (or lowest) card becomes dealer. In case of a tie, the process is repeated by the tied players. For some games such as whist this process of cutting is part of the official rules, and the hierarchy of cards for the purpose of cutting (which need not be the same as that used otherwise in the game) is also specified. But in general any method can be used, such as tossing a coin in case of a two-player game, drawing cards until one player draws an ace, or rolling dice.
For casino games that are played for large sums it is vital that the cards are properly randomised, but for many games this is less critical, and in fact player experience can suffer when the cards are shuffled too well. The official skat rules stipulate that the cards are shuffled well, but according to a decision of the German skat court, a one-handed player should ask another player to do the shuffling, rather than use a shuffling machine
, as it would shuffle the cards too well. French belote
rules go so far as to prescribe that the deck is never shuffled between hands.
The dealer takes all of the cards in the pack, arranges them so that they are in a uniform stack, and shuffle
s them. In strict play, the dealer then offers the deck to the previous player (in the sense of the game direction) for cutting. If the deal is clockwise, this is the player to the dealer's right; if counterclockwise, it is the player to the dealer's left. The invitation to cut is made by placing the pack, face downward, on the table near the player who is to cut: who then lifts the upper portion of the pack clear of the lower portion and places it alongside. (Normally the two portions have about equal size. Strict rules often indicate that each portion must contain a certain minimum number of cards, such as three or five.) The formerly lower portion is then replaced on top of the formerly upper portion. Instead of cutting, one may also knock on the deck to indicate that on trusts the dealer to have shuffled fairly.
The actual deal (distribution of cards) is done in the direction of play, beginning with eldest hand. The dealer holds the pack, face down, in one hand, and removes cards from the top of it with his or her other hand to distribute to the players, placing them face down on the table in front of the players to whom they are dealt. The cards may be dealt one at a time, or in batches of more than one card; and all or a determined amount of cards are dealt out. The undealt cards, if any, are left face down in the middle of the table, forming the stock (also called talon, widow or skat).
Throughout the shuffle, cut, and deal, the dealer should prevent the players from seeing the faces of any of the cards. The players should not try to see any of the faces. Should a player accidentally see a card, other than one's own, proper etiquette would be to admit this. It is also dishonest to try to see cards as they are dealt, or to take advantage of having seen a card. Should a card accidentally become exposed, (visible to all), then, normally, any player can demand a redeal (all the cards are gathered up, and the shuffle, cut, and deal are repeated).
When the deal is complete, all players pick up their cards, or 'hand', and hold them in such a way that the faces can be seen by the holder of the cards but not the other players, or vice versa depending on the game. It is helpful to fan one's cards out so that if they have corner indices all their values can be seen at once. In most games, it is also useful to sort one's hand, rearranging the cards in a way appropriate to the game. For example, in a trick-taking game
it may be easier to have all one's cards of the same suit together, whereas in a rummy
game one might sort them by rank or by potential combinations.
When a game becomes sufficiently popular, so that people often play it with strangers, there is a need for a generally accepted set of rules. This need is often met when a particular set of house rules becomes generally recognized. For example, when Whist
became popular in 18th-century England
, players in the Portland Club agreed on a set of house rules for use on its premises. Players in some other clubs then agreed to follow the "Portland Club" rules, rather than go to the trouble of codifying and printing their own sets of rules. The Portland Club rules eventually became generally accepted throughout England and Western cultures.
It should be noted that there is nothing static or "official" about this process. For the majority of games, there is no one set of universal rules by which the game is played, and the most common ruleset is no more or less than that. Many widely played card games, such as Canasta
and Pinochle
, have no official regulating body. The most common ruleset is often determined by the most popular distribution of rulebooks for card games. Perhaps the original compilation of popular playing card games was collected by Edmund Hoyle, a self-made authority on many popular parlor games. The U.S. Playing Card Company now owns the eponymous Hoyle brand, and publishes a series of rulebooks for various families of card games that have largely standardized the games' rules in countries and languages where the rulebooks are widely distributed. However, players are free to, and often do, invent "house rules" to supplement or even largely replace the "standard" rules.
If there is a sense in which a card game can have an "official" set of rules, it is when that card game has an "official" governing body. For example, the rules of tournament bridge
are governed by the World Bridge Federation, and by local bodies in various countries such as the American Contract Bridge League
in the U.S., and the English Bridge Union
in England. The rules of skat are governed by The International Skat Players Association and in Germany
by the Deutscher Skatverband which publishes the Skatordnung. The rules of French tarot are governed by the Fédération Française de Tarot
. The rules of Poker
's variants are largely traditional, but enforced by the World Series of Poker
and the World Poker Tour
organizations which sponsor tournament play. Even in these cases, the rules must only be followed exactly at games sanctioned by these governing bodies; players in less formal settings are free to implement agreed-upon supplemental or substitute rules at will.
In many official sets of rules for card games, the rules specifying the penalties for various infractions occupy more pages than the rules specifying how to play correctly. This is tedious, but necessary for games that are played seriously. Players who intend to play a card game at a high level generally ensure before beginning that all agree on the penalties to be used. When playing privately, this will normally be a question of agreeing house rules. In a tournament there will probably be a tournament director who will enforce the rules when required and arbitrate in cases of doubt.
If a player breaks the rules of a game deliberately, this is cheating. Most card players would refuse to play cards with a known cheat. The rest of this section is therefore about accidental infractions, caused by ignorance, clumsiness, inattention, etc.
As the same game is played repeatedly among a group of players, precedents build up about how a particular infraction of the rules should be handled. For example, "Sheila just led a card when it wasn't her turn. Last week when Jo did that, we agreed ... etc." Sets of such precedents tend to become established among groups of players, and to be regarded as part of the house rules. Sets of house rules become formalized, as described in the previous section. Therefore, for some games, there is a "proper" way of handling infractions of the rules. But for many games, without governing bodies, there is no standard way of handling infractions.
In many circumstances, there is no need for special rules dealing with what happens after an infraction. As a general principle, the person who broke a rule should not benefit by it, and the other players should not lose by it. An exception to this may be made in games with fixed partnerships, in which it may be felt that the partner(s) of the person who broke a rule should also not benefit. The penalty for an accidental infraction should be as mild as reasonable, consistent with there being no possible benefit to the person responsible.
is based on the play of multiple rounds, or tricks, in each of which each player plays a single card from their hand, and based on the values of played cards one player wins or "takes" the trick. The specific object varies with each game and can include taking as many tricks as possible, taking as many scoring cards (or as few penalty cards) within the tricks won as possible, taking as few tricks as possible, or taking an exact number of tricks. Bridge
, Whist
, Euchre
, Spades
, Hearts, Twenty-eight
or Twenty Nine and the various Tarot card games are popular examples. Goofspiel
is another, less popular, example of a trick-taking game.
, and various other melding or matching games, is to acquire the required groups of matching cards before an opponent can do so. In Rummy
, this is done through drawing and discarding, and the groups are called melds. Mahjong
is a very similar game played with tiles instead of cards. Non-Rummy examples of match-type games generally fall into the "fishing" genre and include the children's games Go Fish
and Old Maid
.
, players start with a hand of cards, and the object of the game is to be the first player to discard all cards from one's hand. Some matching-type games are also shedding-type games; some variants of Rummy such as Phase 10
and Rummikub
, as well as the children's game Old Maid
, fall into both categories.
type games, and games involving slapping a discard pile. Egyptian War has both of these features.
is considered one of the national card games of Italy. Cassino
is the only fishing game to be widely played in English-speaking countries.
, blackjack
, and baccarat
are examples of comparing card games.
s using cards, in which the object in playing the game is either to drink or to force others to drink. Many games are simply ordinary card games with the establishment of "drinking rules"; Asshole (Presidents), for instance, is virtually identical to Daihinmin but with additional rules governing drinking. Poker can also be played using a number of drinks as the wager. Some card games are designed specifically to be played as drinking games.
and Go Fish
. However, many multi-genre games involve different stages of play for each hand. The most common multi-stage combination is a "trick-and-meld" game, such as Pinochle
or Belote
. Other multi-stage, multi-genre games include Poke, Flaps, Skitgubbe
and Tichu
. Vici is an example of a multi-genre card game which combines elements of 5-card hands and bluffing techniques from poker, with gathering and matching strategies from rummy and certain partnering aspects from bridge.
and Yu-Gi-Oh!
are well-known collectible card games. Such games are also created to capitalize on the popularity of other forms of entertainment, such as Pokémon
and Marvel Comics
which both have had CCGs created around them.
, players wager against the house.
, for example, players play single cards, and are told whether the play was legal or illegal, in an attempt to discover the underlying rules made up by the dealer.
Most of these games however typically use a specially made deck of cards designed specifically for the game (or variations of it). The decks are thus usually proprietary, but may be created by the game's players.
authors and screenwriters to distance a culture depicted in the story from present-day Western culture. They are commonly used as filler to depict background activities in an atmosphere like a bar or rec room, but sometimes the drama revolves around the play of the game. Some of these games, such as Pyramid from Battlestar Galactica
, become real card games as the holder of the intellectual property develops and markets a suitable deck and ruleset for the game, while others, such as "Exploding Snap" from the Harry Potter
franchise, lack sufficient descriptions of rules, or depend on cards or other hardware that are infeasible or physically impossible.
Game
A game is structured playing, usually undertaken for enjoyment and sometimes used as an educational tool. Games are distinct from work, which is usually carried out for remuneration, and from art, which is more often an expression of aesthetic or ideological elements...
using playing card
Playing card
A playing card is a piece of specially prepared heavy paper, thin cardboard, plastic-coated paper, cotton-paper blend, or thin plastic, marked with distinguishing motifs and used as one of a set for playing card games...
s as the primary device with which the game is played, be they traditional or game-specific. Countless card games exist, including families of related games (such as poker
Poker
Poker is a family of card games that share betting rules and usually hand rankings. Poker games differ in how the cards are dealt, how hands may be formed, whether the high or low hand wins the pot in a showdown , limits on bet sizes, and how many rounds of betting are allowed.In most modern poker...
). A small number of card games played with traditional decks have formally standardized rules, but most are folk games whose rules vary by region, culture, and person.
Many games that are not generally placed in the family of card games do in fact use cards for some aspect of their gameplay. Similarly, some games that are placed in the card game genre involve a board. The distinction is that the gameplay of a card game primarily depends on the use of the cards by players (the board is simply a guide for scorekeeping or for card placement), while board games (the principal non-card game genre to use cards) generally focus on the players' positions on the board, and use the cards for some secondary purpose.
Playing cards
Playing card
A playing card is a piece of specially prepared heavy paper, thin cardboard, plastic-coated paper, cotton-paper blend, or thin plastic, marked with distinguishing motifs and used as one of a set for playing card games...
s which are identical in size and shape. Each card has two sides, the face and the back. Normally the backs of the cards are indistinguishable. The faces of the cards may all be unique, or there can be duplicates. The composition of a deck is known to each player. In some cases several decks are shuffled together to form a single pack or shoe.
The first playing cards appeared in the ninth century during Tang dynasty
Tang Dynasty
The Tang Dynasty was an imperial dynasty of China preceded by the Sui Dynasty and followed by the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period. It was founded by the Li family, who seized power during the decline and collapse of the Sui Empire...
China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
.
The first reference to the card game in world history dates no later than the 9th century, when the Collection of Miscellanea at Duyang, written by Tang Dynasty writer Su E, described Princess Tongchang (daughter of Emperor Yizong of Tang
Emperor Yizong of Tang
Emperor Yizong of Tang , né Li Wen , later changed to Li Cui , was an emperor of the Tang dynasty of China. He reigned from 859 to 873. Yizong was the eldest son of Emperor Xuānzong...
) playing the "leaf game" in 868 with members of the Wei clan
Wei Baoheng
Wei Baoheng , courtesy name Yunyong , was an official of the Chinese dynasty Tang Dynasty. He became extremely powerful late in the reign of his father-in-law Emperor Yizong, rising to the post of chancellor and becoming the most powerful official at court, but after Emperor Yizong's death was...
(the family of the princess' husband). The Song dynasty
Song Dynasty
The Song Dynasty was a ruling dynasty in China between 960 and 1279; it succeeded the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period, and was followed by the Yuan Dynasty. It was the first government in world history to issue banknotes or paper money, and the first Chinese government to establish a...
statesman and historian Ouyang Xiu
Ouyang Xiu
Ouyang Xiu was a Chinese statesman, historian, essayist and poet of the Song Dynasty. He is also known by his courtesy name of Yongshu, and was also self nicknamed The Old Drunkard 醉翁, or Householder of the One of Six 六一居士 in his old age...
has noted that paper playing cards arose in connection to an earlier development in the book format from scrolls to pages. During the Ming Dynasty
Ming Dynasty
The Ming Dynasty, also Empire of the Great Ming, was the ruling dynasty of China from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan Dynasty. The Ming, "one of the greatest eras of orderly government and social stability in human history", was the last dynasty in China ruled by ethnic...
(1368-1644), characters from popular novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....
s such as the Water Margin
Water Margin
Water Margin , also known as Outlaws of the Marsh, All Men Are Brothers, Men of the Marshes, or The Marshes of Mount Liang, is one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature.Attributed to Shi Nai'an and written in vernacular Chinese, the story, set in the Song Dynasty,...
were widely featured on the faces of playing cards. A precise description of Chinese money playing cards (in four suits) survived from the 15th century. Mahjong tiles are a 19th century invention based on three-suited money playing card decks, similar to the way in which Rummikub tiles were derived recently from modern Western playing cards.
The same kind of games can also be played with tiles made of wood, plastic, bone, or similar materials. The most notable examples of such tile sets are dominoes
Dominoes
Dominoes generally refers to the collective gaming pieces making up a domino set or to the subcategory of tile games played with domino pieces. In the area of mathematical tilings and polyominoes, the word domino often refers to any rectangle formed from joining two congruent squares edge to edge...
, mahjong tiles
Mahjong tiles
Mahjong tiles are tiles of Chinese origin that are used to play many games, most notably Mahjong and Mahjong solitaire. Although they are most commonly tiles, they may also refer to playing cards with similar contents as well.- Construction :Traditionally, Mahjong tiles were made of bone, often...
and Rummikub
Rummikub
Rummikub is a tile-based game for two to four players.-History:...
tiles. Chinese dominoes
Chinese dominoes
Chinese dominoes are used in several tile-based games, namely, Tien Gow, Pai Gow, Che Deng, Tiu U and Kap Tai Shap. In Cantonese they are called 骨牌 "Gwat Pai", which literally means "bone tiles", it is also the name of a northern Chinese game, where the rules are quite different from the southern...
are also available as playing cards. It is not clear whether Emperor Muzong of Liao
Emperor Muzong of Liao
The Emperor Muzong of Liao ; born as Yelü Jing , was an emperor of the Liao Dynasty and reigned from 11 October 951 to 12 March 969...
really played with domino cards as early as 969, though. Legend dates the invention of dominoes in the year 1112, and the earliest known domino rules are from the following decade. 500 years later domino cards were reported as a new invention.
Playing cards first appeared in Europe in the last quarter of the 14th century. The earliest European references speak of a Saracen
Saracen
Saracen was a term used by the ancient Romans to refer to a people who lived in desert areas in and around the Roman province of Arabia, and who were distinguished from Arabs. In Europe during the Middle Ages the term was expanded to include Arabs, and then all who professed the religion of Islam...
or Moorish
Moors
The description Moors has referred to several historic and modern populations of the Maghreb region who are predominately of Berber and Arab descent. They came to conquer and rule the Iberian Peninsula for nearly 800 years. At that time they were Muslim, although earlier the people had followed...
game called naib, and in fact an almost complete Mamluk
Mamluk
A Mamluk was a soldier of slave origin, who were predominantly Cumans/Kipchaks The "mamluk phenomenon", as David Ayalon dubbed the creation of the specific warrior...
Egyptian deck of 52 cards in a distinct oriental design has survived from around the same time, with the four suits swords, polo sticks, cups and coins and the ranks king, governor, second governor, and ten to one.
The 1430s in Italy saw the invention of the tarot deck, a full Latin-suited deck augmented by suitless cards with painted motifs that played a special role as trumps. Tarot, tarock and tarocchi games
Tarot, tarock and tarocchi games
Tarot, tarock, tarocchi, etc., are a group of card games played with the tarot deck. The first basic rules appear in the manuscript of Martiano da Tortona written before 1425...
are still played with (subsets of) these decks in parts of Central Europe. The replacement of these decks by French-suited tarot decks in France is a relatively recent development.
The French suits came up around 1480 and were cheaper to print. In France, they mostly replaced the earlier Latin suits swords, clubs, cups and coins (which are still common in Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking countries as well as in some northern regions of Italy), a full tarrot deck contains 14 cards in each suit, low cards labeled 1-10, and court cards Valet, chevalier (Knight),Queen, and Roi (King), the fool or exuse card, and 21 trump cards. In the 18th century decks were created with occult images on the trump cards for cartomancy
Cartomancy
Cartomancy is fortune-telling or divination using a deck of cards. Forms of cartomancy appeared soon after playing cards were first introduced into Europe in the 14th century...
; today most full taro decks in North America are the occult type, and are associated with fortune telling.
After the French Revolution some games started to use the ace or 1 as the highest card which symbolized the lowest in society rising above the King.
Many regional variations of card decks do not contain the full 78 cards but a lesser number of cards needed for local games. Optionally, such decks may come with up to four additional suitless cards known as joker
Joker (playing card)
Joker is a special type of playing card found in most modern decks, or else a type of tile in some Mahjong game sets.-Name:It is believed that the term "Joker" comes from a mispronunciation of Jucker, the German/Alsatian name for the game Euchre. The card was originally introduced in about 1860 for...
s. As many continental European games are played with less than 52 cards, smaller decks that lack the highest or lowest numerical ranks (other than the ace) are more common than 52-card decks in some countries. Most notably, the French-suited 32-card piquet deck only has the ranks from king, queen etc. down to seven and ace.The traditional playing cards in Central Europe
Central Europe
Central Europe or alternatively Middle Europe is a region of the European continent lying between the variously defined areas of Eastern and Western Europe...
have German suits and are generally more similar to Latin-suited cards than to French-suited cards. Switzerland has a distinct variant of German suits. However, in many areas German-suited cards have been replaced by French-suited cards. A Latin-suited deck generally consists of only 48 cards, lacking the tens. Instead of queens it has knights or cavaliers, and instead of jacks it has servants or valets. But nowadays the most common Latin-suited deck has only 40 cards, dropping ranks eight to ten. In Japan, a distinct 48-card hanafuda
Hanafuda
are playing cards of Japanese origin that are used to play a number of games. The name literally translates as "flower cards". The name also refers to games played with those cards.-History:...
deck is popular. It is derived from 16th century Portuguese decks. Apart from general-purpose decks of playing cards, dedicated decks are manufactured for various purposes.
The best-known deck internationally is the French-suited deck with English styling. This deck contains 4 × 13 = 52 unique cards – one for each combination of the four French suits
Suit (cards)
In playing cards, a suit is one of several categories into which the cards of a deck are divided. Most often, each card bears one of several symbols showing to which suit it belongs; the suit may alternatively or in addition be indicated by the color printed on the card...
spades, hearts, diamonds and clubs and the thirteen ranks running from king, queen, knave, ten, nine down to two (or deuce) and ace; the trump cards and knight cards are not included. The Knave had been called a Jack as part of the terminology of All-Fours
All-Fours
All Fours, also known as High-Low-Jack or Seven Up, is an English tavern trick-taking card game that was popular as a gambling game until the end of the 19th century...
since the 17th century, but this was not common usage because the word was considered vulgar. However, because the card abbreviation for knave was so close to that of the king, it was very easy to confuse them, especially after suits and rankings were moved to the corners of the card in order to enable people to fan them in one hand and still see all the values. The earliest known deck to place suits and rankings in the corner of the card is from 1693, but these cards did not become common until after 1864 when Hart reintroduced them along with the knave-to-jack change. However, books of card games published in the third quarter of the 19th century evidently still referred to the "knave", and the term with this definition is still recognized in the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
. (Note the exclamation by Estella in Charles Dickens
Charles Dickens
Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...
's novel Great Expectations
Great Expectations
Great Expectations is a novel by Charles Dickens. It was first published in serial form in the publication All the Year Round from 1 December 1860 to August 1861. It has been adapted for stage and screen over 250 times....
: "He calls the knaves, Jacks, this boy!")
Since the 19th century some decks have been specially printed for certain games. Old maid, abd Uno are both examples of games that can be played with a 52 card deck but are usually played with custom decks. Cards play an imprtant role in board games like Risk
Risk
Risk is the potential that a chosen action or activity will lead to a loss . The notion implies that a choice having an influence on the outcome exists . Potential losses themselves may also be called "risks"...
and Monopoly
Monopoly
A monopoly exists when a specific person or enterprise is the only supplier of a particular commodity...
contains Community Chest and Chance cards.
Number and association of players
Spite and Malice
Spite and Malice, also known as Cat and Mouse, is a card game for two or more players. It is a form of competitive solitaire and has a number of variations that can be played with two or three regular decks of cards. A variation sold by Hasbro is called Spite and Malice, and another variation ...
.
In card games for two players, usually not all cards are distributed to the players, as they would otherwise have perfect information about the game state. Two-player games have always been immensely popular and include some of the most significant card games such as piquet
Piquet
Piquet is an early 16th-century trick-taking card game for two players.- History :Piquet has long been regarded as one of the all-time great card games still being played. It was first mentioned on a written reference dating to 1535, in Gargantua and Pantagruel by Rabelais...
, bezique
Bezique
Bezique is a 19th-century French melding and trick-taking card game for two players derived from Marriage via Briscan by the addition of more scoring features, notably the peculiar liaison of Q and J, under the names Bésigue, Binokel, Pinochle, etc., according to the country.-History:Bezique was...
, sixty-six
Sixty-six (card game)
Sixty-six or Schnapsen is a fast 5- or 6-card point-trick game of the marriage type for 2–4 players, played with 20 or 24 cards. First recorded in 1718 under the name Mariagen-Spiel, it is the national card game of Austria and also popular in Germany and Hungary.Closely related games for various...
, klaberjass
Klaberjass
Klaberjass or Bela is a widespread international trick-taking card game that is most popular in Jewish communities. In its basic form it is a 6-card trick-and-draw game for two players using a 32-card piquet pack....
, gin rummy
Gin rummy
Gin rummy, or simply gin, is a two-player card game created in 1909 by Elwood T. Baker and his son C. Graham Baker. According to John Scarne, Gin evolved from 18th-century Whiskey Poker and was created with the intention of being faster than standard rummy, but less spontaneous than knock...
and cribbage
Cribbage
Cribbage, or crib, is a card game traditionally for two players, but commonly played with three, four or more, that involves playing and grouping cards in combinations which gain points...
. Many multi-player games started as two-player games that were adapted to a greater number of players. For such adaptations a number of non-obvious choices must be made beginning with the choice of a game orientation.
One way of extending a two-player game to more players is by building two teams of equal size. A common case is four players in two fixed partnerships, sitting crosswise as in whist
Whist
Whist is a classic English trick-taking card game which was played widely in the 18th and 19th centuries. It derives from the 16th century game of Trump or Ruff, via Ruff and Honours...
and contract bridge
Contract bridge
Contract bridge, usually known simply as bridge, is a trick-taking card game using a standard deck of 52 playing cards played by four players in two competing partnerships with partners sitting opposite each other around a small table...
. Partners sit opposite to each other and cannot see each other's hands. If communication between the partners is allowed at all, then it is usually restricted to a specific list of permitted signs and signals. 17th century French partnership games such as triomphe were special in that partners sat next to each other and were allowed to communicate freely so long as they did not exchange cards or played out of order.
Another way of extending a two-player game to more players is as a cut-throat game, in which all players fight on their own, and win or lose alone. Most cut-throat card games are round games, i.e. they can be played by any number of players starting from two or three, so long as there are enough cards for all.
For some of the most interesting games such as ombre
Ombre
Ombre, English corruption of the Spanish word Hombre, arising from the muting of the H in Spanish, is a fast-moving seventeenth-century trick-taking card game with an illustrious history which began in Spain around the end of the 16th Century as a four person game...
, tarot
Tarot, tarock and tarocchi games
Tarot, tarock, tarocchi, etc., are a group of card games played with the tarot deck. The first basic rules appear in the manuscript of Martiano da Tortona written before 1425...
and skat (card game), the associations between players change from hand to hand. Ultimately players all play on their own, but for each hand, some game mechanism divides the players into two teams. Most typically these are solo games, i.e. games in which one player becomes the soloist and has to achieve some objective against the others, who form a team and win or lose all their points jointly. But in games for more than three players, there may also be a mechanism that selects two players who then have to play against the others.
Direction of play
The players of a card game normally form a circle around a table or other space that can hold cards. The game orientation or direction of play, which obviously is only relevant for three or more players, can be either clockwise or counter-clockwise. It is the direction in which various roles in the game proceed. Most regions have a traditional direction of play, such as:- Counter-clockwise in most of Asia and in South America.
- Clockwise in North America and Australia.
Europe is roughly divided into a clockwise area in the north and a counter-clockwise area in the south. The boundary runs between France, Germany, Austria (mostly), the Czech Republic, Poland, Ukraine and Russia (clockwise) and Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, Italy, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, Turkey (counter-clockwise).
Games that originate in a region with a strong preference are often initially played in the original direction, even in regions that prefer the opposite direction. For games that have official rules and are played in tournaments, the direction of play is often prescribed in those rules.
Determining who deals
Most games have some form of asymmetry between players. The roles of players are normally expressed in terms of the dealer, i.e. the player whose task it is to shuffle the cards and distribute them to the players. Being the dealer can be a (minor or major) advantage or disadvantage, depending on the game. Therefore, after each played hand, the deal normally passes to the next player according to the game orientation.As it can still be an advantage or disadvantage to be the first dealer, there are some standard methods for determining who is the first dealer. A common method is by cutting, which works as follows. One player shuffles the deck and places it on the table. Each player lifts a packet of cards from the top, reveals its bottom card, and returns it to the deck. The player who reveals the highest (or lowest) card becomes dealer. In case of a tie, the process is repeated by the tied players. For some games such as whist this process of cutting is part of the official rules, and the hierarchy of cards for the purpose of cutting (which need not be the same as that used otherwise in the game) is also specified. But in general any method can be used, such as tossing a coin in case of a two-player game, drawing cards until one player draws an ace, or rolling dice.
Hands, rounds and games
A hand is a unit of the game that begins with the dealer shuffling and dealing the cards as described below, and ends with the players scoring and the next dealer being determined. The set of cards that each player receives and holds in his or her hands is also known as that player's hand. The hand is over when the players have finished playing their hands. Most often this occurs when one player (or all) has no cards left. The player who sits after the dealer in the direction of play is known as eldest hand (or in two-player games as elder hand). A game round consists of as many hands as there are players. After each hand, the deal is passed on in the direction of play, i.e. the previous eldest hand becomes the new dealer. Normally players score points after each hand. A game may consist of a fixed number of rounds. Alternatively it can be played for a fixed number of points. In this case it is over with the hand in which a player reaches the target score.Shuffling
Shuffling is the process of bringing the cards of a pack into a random order. There is a large number of techniques with various advantages and disadvantages. Riffle shuffling is a method in which the deck is divided into two roughly equal-sized halves that are bended and then released, so that the cards interlace. Repeating this process several times randomizes the deck well, but the method is harder to learn than some others and may damage the cards. The overhand shuffle and the Hindu shuffle are two techniques that work by taking batches of cards from the top of the deck and reassembling them in the opposite order. They are easier to learn but must be repeated more often. A method suitable for small children consists in spreading the cards on a large surface and moving them around before picking up the deck again. This is also the most common method for shuffling tiles such as dominoes.For casino games that are played for large sums it is vital that the cards are properly randomised, but for many games this is less critical, and in fact player experience can suffer when the cards are shuffled too well. The official skat rules stipulate that the cards are shuffled well, but according to a decision of the German skat court, a one-handed player should ask another player to do the shuffling, rather than use a shuffling machine
Shuffling machine
A shuffling machine is a machine for randomly shuffling packs of playing cards.Because standard shuffling techniques are seen as weak, and in order to avoid "inside jobs" where employees collaborate with gamblers by performing inadequate shuffles, many casinos employ automatic shuffling machines to...
, as it would shuffle the cards too well. French belote
Belote
Belote is a 32-card trick-taking game played in France, and is currently one of the most popular card games in that country. It was invented around 1920, probably from Klaverjas, Klaverjassen, a game played since at least the 17th century in the Netherlands...
rules go so far as to prescribe that the deck is never shuffled between hands.
Deal
In games where cards are distributed among players, the "deal" is the act of that distribution.The dealer takes all of the cards in the pack, arranges them so that they are in a uniform stack, and shuffle
Shuffle
Shuffling is a procedure used to randomize a deck of playing cards to provide an element of chance in card games. Shuffling is often followed by a cut, to help ensure that the shuffler has not manipulated the outcome.-Shuffling techniques:...
s them. In strict play, the dealer then offers the deck to the previous player (in the sense of the game direction) for cutting. If the deal is clockwise, this is the player to the dealer's right; if counterclockwise, it is the player to the dealer's left. The invitation to cut is made by placing the pack, face downward, on the table near the player who is to cut: who then lifts the upper portion of the pack clear of the lower portion and places it alongside. (Normally the two portions have about equal size. Strict rules often indicate that each portion must contain a certain minimum number of cards, such as three or five.) The formerly lower portion is then replaced on top of the formerly upper portion. Instead of cutting, one may also knock on the deck to indicate that on trusts the dealer to have shuffled fairly.
The actual deal (distribution of cards) is done in the direction of play, beginning with eldest hand. The dealer holds the pack, face down, in one hand, and removes cards from the top of it with his or her other hand to distribute to the players, placing them face down on the table in front of the players to whom they are dealt. The cards may be dealt one at a time, or in batches of more than one card; and all or a determined amount of cards are dealt out. The undealt cards, if any, are left face down in the middle of the table, forming the stock (also called talon, widow or skat).
Throughout the shuffle, cut, and deal, the dealer should prevent the players from seeing the faces of any of the cards. The players should not try to see any of the faces. Should a player accidentally see a card, other than one's own, proper etiquette would be to admit this. It is also dishonest to try to see cards as they are dealt, or to take advantage of having seen a card. Should a card accidentally become exposed, (visible to all), then, normally, any player can demand a redeal (all the cards are gathered up, and the shuffle, cut, and deal are repeated).
When the deal is complete, all players pick up their cards, or 'hand', and hold them in such a way that the faces can be seen by the holder of the cards but not the other players, or vice versa depending on the game. It is helpful to fan one's cards out so that if they have corner indices all their values can be seen at once. In most games, it is also useful to sort one's hand, rearranging the cards in a way appropriate to the game. For example, in a trick-taking game
Trick-taking game
A trick-taking game is a card game or tile-based game in which play centers on a series of finite rounds or units of play, called tricks. The object of such games then may be closely tied to the number of tricks taken, as in plain-trick games such as Whist, Contract Bridge, Napoleon, Rowboat, and...
it may be easier to have all one's cards of the same suit together, whereas in a rummy
Rummy
Rummy is a group of card games notable for gameplay based on the matching of similar playing cards. The Mexican game of Conquian is considered by David Parlett to be ancestral to all rummy games, which itself is derived from a Chinese game called Khanhoo and, going even further back,...
game one might sort them by rank or by potential combinations.
Rules
A new card game starts in a small way, either as someone's invention, or as a modification of an existing game. Those playing it may agree to change the rules as they wish. The rules that they agree on become the "house rules" under which they play the game. A set of house rules may be accepted as valid by a group of players wherever they play, as it may also be accepted as governing all play within a particular house, café, or club.When a game becomes sufficiently popular, so that people often play it with strangers, there is a need for a generally accepted set of rules. This need is often met when a particular set of house rules becomes generally recognized. For example, when Whist
Whist
Whist is a classic English trick-taking card game which was played widely in the 18th and 19th centuries. It derives from the 16th century game of Trump or Ruff, via Ruff and Honours...
became popular in 18th-century England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, players in the Portland Club agreed on a set of house rules for use on its premises. Players in some other clubs then agreed to follow the "Portland Club" rules, rather than go to the trouble of codifying and printing their own sets of rules. The Portland Club rules eventually became generally accepted throughout England and Western cultures.
It should be noted that there is nothing static or "official" about this process. For the majority of games, there is no one set of universal rules by which the game is played, and the most common ruleset is no more or less than that. Many widely played card games, such as Canasta
Canasta
Canasta is a card game of the rummy family of games believed to be a variant of 500 Rum. Although many variations exist for 2, 3, 5 or 6 players, it is most commonly played by four in two partnerships with two standard decks of cards. Players attempt to make melds of 7 cards of the same rank and...
and Pinochle
Pinochle
Pinochle or Binocle is a trick-taking game typically for two to four players and played with a 48 card deck. Derived from the card game bezique, players score points by trick-taking and also by forming combinations of cards into melds. It is thus considered part of a "trick-and-meld" category...
, have no official regulating body. The most common ruleset is often determined by the most popular distribution of rulebooks for card games. Perhaps the original compilation of popular playing card games was collected by Edmund Hoyle, a self-made authority on many popular parlor games. The U.S. Playing Card Company now owns the eponymous Hoyle brand, and publishes a series of rulebooks for various families of card games that have largely standardized the games' rules in countries and languages where the rulebooks are widely distributed. However, players are free to, and often do, invent "house rules" to supplement or even largely replace the "standard" rules.
If there is a sense in which a card game can have an "official" set of rules, it is when that card game has an "official" governing body. For example, the rules of tournament bridge
Contract bridge
Contract bridge, usually known simply as bridge, is a trick-taking card game using a standard deck of 52 playing cards played by four players in two competing partnerships with partners sitting opposite each other around a small table...
are governed by the World Bridge Federation, and by local bodies in various countries such as the American Contract Bridge League
American Contract Bridge League
The American Contract Bridge League is the largest contract bridge organization in North America. It promotes the game of bridge in the United States, Mexico, Bermuda, and Canada, and is a member of the World Bridge Federation...
in the U.S., and the English Bridge Union
English Bridge Union
The English Bridge Union or EBU is a player-funded organisation that promotes and organises the card game of duplicate bridge in England. It has an office in Aylesbury with a staff of more than twenty people...
in England. The rules of skat are governed by The International Skat Players Association and in Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
by the Deutscher Skatverband which publishes the Skatordnung. The rules of French tarot are governed by the Fédération Française de Tarot
Fédération Française de Tarot
The FFT or Fédération Française de Tarot was founded in Paris on October 1, 1973 for establishing official rules and tournaments for the French Tarot card game.-website:http://www.fftarot.fr/...
. The rules of Poker
Poker
Poker is a family of card games that share betting rules and usually hand rankings. Poker games differ in how the cards are dealt, how hands may be formed, whether the high or low hand wins the pot in a showdown , limits on bet sizes, and how many rounds of betting are allowed.In most modern poker...
's variants are largely traditional, but enforced by the World Series of Poker
World Series of Poker
The World Series of Poker is a world-renowned series of poker tournaments held annually in Las Vegas and, since 2005, sponsored by Harrah's Entertainment...
and the World Poker Tour
World Poker Tour
The World Poker Tour is a series of international poker tournaments and associated television series broadcasting the final table of each tournament. It was started in the United States by attorney/television producer Steven Lipscomb, who served as CEO of WPT Enterprises , the firm that...
organizations which sponsor tournament play. Even in these cases, the rules must only be followed exactly at games sanctioned by these governing bodies; players in less formal settings are free to implement agreed-upon supplemental or substitute rules at will.
Rule infractions
An infraction is any action which is against the rules of the game, such as playing a card when it is not one's turn to play or the accidental exposure of a card.In many official sets of rules for card games, the rules specifying the penalties for various infractions occupy more pages than the rules specifying how to play correctly. This is tedious, but necessary for games that are played seriously. Players who intend to play a card game at a high level generally ensure before beginning that all agree on the penalties to be used. When playing privately, this will normally be a question of agreeing house rules. In a tournament there will probably be a tournament director who will enforce the rules when required and arbitrate in cases of doubt.
If a player breaks the rules of a game deliberately, this is cheating. Most card players would refuse to play cards with a known cheat. The rest of this section is therefore about accidental infractions, caused by ignorance, clumsiness, inattention, etc.
As the same game is played repeatedly among a group of players, precedents build up about how a particular infraction of the rules should be handled. For example, "Sheila just led a card when it wasn't her turn. Last week when Jo did that, we agreed ... etc." Sets of such precedents tend to become established among groups of players, and to be regarded as part of the house rules. Sets of house rules become formalized, as described in the previous section. Therefore, for some games, there is a "proper" way of handling infractions of the rules. But for many games, without governing bodies, there is no standard way of handling infractions.
In many circumstances, there is no need for special rules dealing with what happens after an infraction. As a general principle, the person who broke a rule should not benefit by it, and the other players should not lose by it. An exception to this may be made in games with fixed partnerships, in which it may be felt that the partner(s) of the person who broke a rule should also not benefit. The penalty for an accidental infraction should be as mild as reasonable, consistent with there being no possible benefit to the person responsible.
Trick-taking games
The object of a trick-taking gameTrick-taking game
A trick-taking game is a card game or tile-based game in which play centers on a series of finite rounds or units of play, called tricks. The object of such games then may be closely tied to the number of tricks taken, as in plain-trick games such as Whist, Contract Bridge, Napoleon, Rowboat, and...
is based on the play of multiple rounds, or tricks, in each of which each player plays a single card from their hand, and based on the values of played cards one player wins or "takes" the trick. The specific object varies with each game and can include taking as many tricks as possible, taking as many scoring cards (or as few penalty cards) within the tricks won as possible, taking as few tricks as possible, or taking an exact number of tricks. Bridge
Contract bridge
Contract bridge, usually known simply as bridge, is a trick-taking card game using a standard deck of 52 playing cards played by four players in two competing partnerships with partners sitting opposite each other around a small table...
, Whist
Whist
Whist is a classic English trick-taking card game which was played widely in the 18th and 19th centuries. It derives from the 16th century game of Trump or Ruff, via Ruff and Honours...
, Euchre
Euchre
Euchre or eucre, is a trick-taking card game most commonly played with four people in two partnerships with a deck of 24 standard playing cards. It is the game responsible for introducing the joker into modern packs; this was invented around 1860 to act as a top trump or best bower...
, Spades
Spades
Spades is a partnership trick-taking card game devised in the United States in the 1930s, in which the object is for each pair or partnership to take at least the number of tricks they bid on before play began. Spades is a descendant of the Whist family of card games, which also includes Bridge,...
, Hearts, Twenty-eight
Twenty-eight (card game)
This is one of a group of Indian trick-taking card games in which the Jack and the Nine are the highest cards in every suit.-Players and cards:28 is usually played by four players in fixed partnerships, partners facing each other. 32 cards from a standard 52-card pack are used for play. There are...
or Twenty Nine and the various Tarot card games are popular examples. Goofspiel
Goofspiel
Goofspiel, also known as The Game of Pure Strategy or GOPS, is a card game for two or more players. It was invented by Merrill Flood while at Princeton University.It is simple to learn and play, but has a large degree of tactical depth...
is another, less popular, example of a trick-taking game.
Matching games
The object of RummyRummy
Rummy is a group of card games notable for gameplay based on the matching of similar playing cards. The Mexican game of Conquian is considered by David Parlett to be ancestral to all rummy games, which itself is derived from a Chinese game called Khanhoo and, going even further back,...
, and various other melding or matching games, is to acquire the required groups of matching cards before an opponent can do so. In Rummy
Rummy
Rummy is a group of card games notable for gameplay based on the matching of similar playing cards. The Mexican game of Conquian is considered by David Parlett to be ancestral to all rummy games, which itself is derived from a Chinese game called Khanhoo and, going even further back,...
, this is done through drawing and discarding, and the groups are called melds. Mahjong
Mahjong
Mahjong, sometimes spelled Mah Jongg, is a game that originated in China, commonly played by four players...
is a very similar game played with tiles instead of cards. Non-Rummy examples of match-type games generally fall into the "fishing" genre and include the children's games Go Fish
Go Fish
- Basic game :Using a standard 52-card deck, five cards are dealt to each player, or seven if there are four or fewer. The remaining card pack is shared between the players, usually sprawled out in a non-orderly pile referenced as the "ocean" or "pool"....
and Old Maid
Old Maid
Old maid is a Victorian card game for two to eight players probably deriving from an ancient gambling game in which the loser pays for the drinks. It is known in Germany as Schwarzer Peter, in Sweden as Svarte Petter and in Finland as Musta Pekka and in France as le pouilleux or vieux garçon...
.
Shedding games
In a shedding gameShedding-type game
A shedding-type card game is a game in which the object is to empty your hand of all cards before any other player is able to do so. Popular card games of this type include:* action/power/trick cards; win by least number of points** Black Jack** Boom-O...
, players start with a hand of cards, and the object of the game is to be the first player to discard all cards from one's hand. Some matching-type games are also shedding-type games; some variants of Rummy such as Phase 10
Phase 10
Phase 10 is a card game created in 1982 by Kenneth Johnson and currently produced by Fundex Games. Phase 10 is based on a variant of rummy known as Liverpool Rummy. It requires a special deck or two regular decks of cards; it can be played by two to six people...
and Rummikub
Rummikub
Rummikub is a tile-based game for two to four players.-History:...
, as well as the children's game Old Maid
Old Maid
Old maid is a Victorian card game for two to eight players probably deriving from an ancient gambling game in which the loser pays for the drinks. It is known in Germany as Schwarzer Peter, in Sweden as Svarte Petter and in Finland as Musta Pekka and in France as le pouilleux or vieux garçon...
, fall into both categories.
Accumulating games
The object of an accumulating game is to acquire all cards in the deck. Examples include most WarWar (card game)
War is a card game typically involving two players. It uses a standard French playing card deck. Due to its simplicity, it is played most often by children.-Gameplay:The deck is divided evenly among the two players, giving each a down stack...
type games, and games involving slapping a discard pile. Egyptian War has both of these features.
Fishing games
In fishing games, cards from the hand are played against cards in a layout on the table, capturing table cards if they match. Fishing games are popular in many nations, including China, where there are many diverse fishing games. ScopaScopa
Scopa is an Italian card game, and one of the two major national card games in Italy. It is also popular in Brazil, brought in by Italian immigrants, mostly in the Scopa di Quindici variation...
is considered one of the national card games of Italy. Cassino
Cassino (card game)
Cassino, also known as Casino, is an Italian fishing card game for two, three, four players in two partnerships, or even theoretically five players. It is the only one to have penetrated the English-speaking world, via Italian immigrants to America. First recorded just before 1800 , it seems to...
is the only fishing game to be widely played in English-speaking countries.
Comparing games
Comparing card games are those where hand values are compared to determine the winner, also known as "vying" or "showdown" games. PokerPoker
Poker is a family of card games that share betting rules and usually hand rankings. Poker games differ in how the cards are dealt, how hands may be formed, whether the high or low hand wins the pot in a showdown , limits on bet sizes, and how many rounds of betting are allowed.In most modern poker...
, blackjack
Blackjack
Blackjack, also known as Twenty-one or Vingt-et-un , is the most widely played casino banking game in the world...
, and baccarat
Baccarat
Baccarat is a card game, played at casinos and by gamblers. It is believed to have been introduced into France from Italy during the reign of King Charles VIII , and it is similar to Faro and Basset...
are examples of comparing card games.
Solitaire (Patience) games
Solitaire games are designed to be played by one player. Most games begin with a specific layout of cards, called a tableau, and the object is then either to construct a more elaborate final layout, or to clear the tableau and/or the draw pile or stock by moving all cards to one or more "discard" or "foundation" piles.Drinking card games
Drinking card games are, true to their name, a subset of drinking gameDrinking game
Drinking games are games which involve the consumption of alcoholic beverages. These games vary widely in scope and complexity, although the purpose of most is to become intoxicated as quickly as possible...
s using cards, in which the object in playing the game is either to drink or to force others to drink. Many games are simply ordinary card games with the establishment of "drinking rules"; Asshole (Presidents), for instance, is virtually identical to Daihinmin but with additional rules governing drinking. Poker can also be played using a number of drinks as the wager. Some card games are designed specifically to be played as drinking games.
Multi-genre games
Many games borrow elements from more than one type of game. The most common combination is that of matching and shedding, as in some variants of Rummy, Old MaidOld Maid
Old maid is a Victorian card game for two to eight players probably deriving from an ancient gambling game in which the loser pays for the drinks. It is known in Germany as Schwarzer Peter, in Sweden as Svarte Petter and in Finland as Musta Pekka and in France as le pouilleux or vieux garçon...
and Go Fish
Go Fish
- Basic game :Using a standard 52-card deck, five cards are dealt to each player, or seven if there are four or fewer. The remaining card pack is shared between the players, usually sprawled out in a non-orderly pile referenced as the "ocean" or "pool"....
. However, many multi-genre games involve different stages of play for each hand. The most common multi-stage combination is a "trick-and-meld" game, such as Pinochle
Pinochle
Pinochle or Binocle is a trick-taking game typically for two to four players and played with a 48 card deck. Derived from the card game bezique, players score points by trick-taking and also by forming combinations of cards into melds. It is thus considered part of a "trick-and-meld" category...
or Belote
Belote
Belote is a 32-card trick-taking game played in France, and is currently one of the most popular card games in that country. It was invented around 1920, probably from Klaverjas, Klaverjassen, a game played since at least the 17th century in the Netherlands...
. Other multi-stage, multi-genre games include Poke, Flaps, Skitgubbe
Skitgubbe
Skitgubbe is a multi-genre card game that originated in Sweden. The game occurs in two phases. The first phase is a multi-player version of War, in which players accumulate a hand. The second phase is a rummy game, where players attempt to discard the accumulated hand. The last player to go out is...
and Tichu
Tichu
Tichu is a multi-genre card game; primarily a shedding game that includes elements of Bridge, Daihinmin, and Poker played between two teams of two players each. Teams work to accumulate points; the first team to reach a predetermined score is the winner...
. Vici is an example of a multi-genre card game which combines elements of 5-card hands and bluffing techniques from poker, with gathering and matching strategies from rummy and certain partnering aspects from bridge.
Collectible card games (CCGs)
Collectible card games are defined by the use of decks of proprietary cards that differ between players. The contents of these decks are a subset of a very large pool of available cards which have differing effects, costs, and art. A player accumulates his or her deck through purchase or trade for desirable cards, and each player uses their own deck to play against the other. Magic: The GatheringMagic: The Gathering
Magic: The Gathering , also known as Magic, is the first collectible trading card game created by mathematics professor Richard Garfield and introduced in 1993 by Wizards of the Coast. Magic continues to thrive, with approximately twelve million players as of 2011...
and Yu-Gi-Oh!
Yu-Gi-Oh!
is a Japanese manga created by Kazuki Takahashi. It has produced a franchise that includes multiple anime shows, a trading card game and numerous video games...
are well-known collectible card games. Such games are also created to capitalize on the popularity of other forms of entertainment, such as Pokémon
Pokémon
is a media franchise published and owned by the video game company Nintendo and created by Satoshi Tajiri in 1996. Originally released as a pair of interlinkable Game Boy role-playing video games developed by Game Freak, Pokémon has since become the second most successful and lucrative video...
and Marvel Comics
Marvel Comics
Marvel Worldwide, Inc., commonly referred to as Marvel Comics and formerly Marvel Publishing, Inc. and Marvel Comics Group, is an American company that publishes comic books and related media...
which both have had CCGs created around them.
Casino or gambling card games
These games revolve around wagers of money. Though virtually any game in which there are winning and losing outcomes can be wagered on, these games are specifically designed to make the betting process a strategic part of the game. Some of these games involve players betting against each other, such as poker, while in others, like blackjackBlackjack
Blackjack, also known as Twenty-one or Vingt-et-un , is the most widely played casino banking game in the world...
, players wager against the house.
Poker games
Poker is a family of gambling games in which players bet into a pool, called the pot, that the value of their hand will beat all others according to the ranking system. Variants largely differ on how cards are dealt and the methods by which players can improve a hand. For many reasons, including its age and its popularity among Western militaries, it is one of the most universally known card games in existence.Other card games
Many other card games have been designed and published on a commercial or amateur basis. In some cases, the game uses the standard 52-card deck, but the object is unique. In EleusisEleusis (game)
Eleusis is a multi-genre card game where one player chooses a secret rule to determine which cards can be played on top of others, and the other players attempt to determine the rule using inductive logic....
, for example, players play single cards, and are told whether the play was legal or illegal, in an attempt to discover the underlying rules made up by the dealer.
Most of these games however typically use a specially made deck of cards designed specifically for the game (or variations of it). The decks are thus usually proprietary, but may be created by the game's players.
Fictional card games
Many games, including card games, are fabricated by science fictionScience fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
authors and screenwriters to distance a culture depicted in the story from present-day Western culture. They are commonly used as filler to depict background activities in an atmosphere like a bar or rec room, but sometimes the drama revolves around the play of the game. Some of these games, such as Pyramid from Battlestar Galactica
Battlestar Galactica (1978 TV series)
Battlestar Galactica is an American science fiction television series, created by Glen A. Larson. It starred Lorne Greene, Richard Hatch and Dirk Benedict and ran for one season in 1978–79. After cancellation, its story was continued in 1980 as Galactica 1980 with Adama, Lieutenant Boomer and...
, become real card games as the holder of the intellectual property develops and markets a suitable deck and ruleset for the game, while others, such as "Exploding Snap" from the Harry Potter
Harry Potter
Harry Potter is a series of seven fantasy novels written by the British author J. K. Rowling. The books chronicle the adventures of the adolescent wizard Harry Potter and his best friends Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, all of whom are students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry...
franchise, lack sufficient descriptions of rules, or depend on cards or other hardware that are infeasible or physically impossible.
See also
- Playing cardPlaying cardA playing card is a piece of specially prepared heavy paper, thin cardboard, plastic-coated paper, cotton-paper blend, or thin plastic, marked with distinguishing motifs and used as one of a set for playing card games...
- Games of chance
- Games of skill
- R. F. FosterR. F. Foster (games)Robert Frederick Foster of New York City, was a memory training promoter and a prolific author of over 50 books on the rules of play of card, dice and board games.-Biography:...
- Edmond HoyleEdmond HoyleEdmond Hoyle was a writer best known for his works on the rules and play of card games. The phrase "according to Hoyle" came into the language as a reflection of his generally-perceived authority on the subject; since that time, use of the phrase has expanded into general use in situations in...
- Henry Jones (writer)Henry Jones (writer)Henry Jones was an English author well-known as a writer and authority on tennis and card games who wrote under the nom de plume "Cavendish".-Biography:...
who wrote under the pseudonym "Cavendish" - David ParlettDavid ParlettDavid Parlett is a games scholar from South London, who has studied both card games and board games. His published works include many popular books on games and the more academic volumes "Oxford Guide to Card Games" and "Oxford History of Board Games", both now out of print...
- Hubert PhillipsHubert PhillipsHubert Phillips was an economist, puzzleist, bridge player and organiser, journalist, broadcaster, and an author who wrote some 70 books.- Life :...
- John ScarneJohn ScarneJohn Scarne was an American magician and book author who was particularly adept at playing card manipulation. He became known as an expert on cards and other games, and authored a number of popular books on cards, gambling, and related topics.-Early life:...
- Pagat.comPagat.comPagat.com is a website containing rules to hundreds of card games from all over the world. Maintained by John McLeod, it contains information for traditional, commercial, and newly invented card games from all over the world....