Decksplain

Basic rules for a suit game

Objective: Win each trick with the best card, end the game with the highest score

Vocabulary:

• A trick is when each player plays one card (a round of cards)
• A trump card is a special suit (or set of cards) that beats all other suits in a trick, regardless of rank

Setup:

1. Discard 2's, 3's, 4's, 5's, 6's, Jokers
2. Each player gets 1 row of 4 cards face down
3. One player then gets 4 face up cards on top of their face down cards and chooses a suit to be trumps
4. 4 more face up cards are placed on the remaining face down row
5. 2 more rows are added to each player in the same way

Play:

1. The player who chose trumps (or won the last play) plays a card
2. The second player then plays a card in return - they must play in the same suit if possible
3. The best played card wins
4. Exposed face down cards are flipped
5. Play again until all cards are used

The winning card:

The order from high to low is:

1. Jacks in order: ♣ Clubs, ♠ Spades, ♥ Hearts, ♦ Diamonds
2. Trumps suit in order: A-10-K-Q-9-8-7
3. First played card suit: A-10-K-Q-9-8-7
4. Any other card loses