This is a great card game that combines memory, luck and tactics. It is easy to learn but there are some big twists to the game so it does not get boring and can be played for hours.
Players: 3 – 10 (you would need two decks of cards if more than 6 players)
Equipment: A deck of cards (or two if more than 6 players), paper and pen for scoring
Objective: To have the lowest score
Game Over: When a player reaches over 100 points
Card Values:
Red Kings – 0
Ace – 1
Numbers 2 to 10 are worth their face value
Jack – 11
Queen – 12
Black Kings – 13
Deal: The dealer lays out four cards face down in front of each player. The rest of the deck is placed face down in a pile in the middle.
Game Play:
After dealing, each player is allowed to look at only 2 of their cards for a few seconds and then place them back face down in front of them.
The dealer then turns up the first card from the middle pile and places it next to the deck. This then becomes the discard pile.
Player to the dealer’s left can choose either to take the face up card and swap it for one of his cards, or to draw from the deck. If he draws from the deck he can choose to either swap that card with one of his own or discard it.
The idea is to obtain the lowest value cards for each round.
Play continues in a clock wise direction until a player ends the round by knocking twice on the table to signify that he believes he has the lowest score out of all players. He can ONLY do this on his turn, after making his move.
Play then continues around with each player having one last chance to get a lower score, until it reaches the player who knocked and he also has one last chance to improve his score.
Ending the Round:
Players then reveal their cards and add their points. If the knocking player does NOT have the lowest score, his points are doubled.
Scoring:
Players points are counted per the card values above and added to their game score.
If a player manages to reach exactly 25, 50, 75 or 100 points then 25 points are subtracted from their score.
In this way it is possible for a player to reach 25 exact, and then reduce their score back to 0.
Discarding:
At any point during the game, regardless of whose turn it is, a player can discard any of their cards that match the top card of the discard pile. For example if the top card is a queen, any player that knows they have a queen in front of them can quickly throw it out. The card must be discarded while the queen is still the top card (ie before the player whose turn it is has discarded another number).
If a player makes a mistake and throws out a card that does not match, they must take back their card AND draw a card from the deck which they place face down in front of them; they are not allowed to look at this card.
It is possible that a player might throw out all of their cards before the round ends, in which case the round continues back around to the player whose turn it was when the player who went out threw out the last of his cards. The players then reveal their cards and the one who has none scores 0. If someone has already knocked before a player goes out, then that person’s points would double because they do not have the lowest score (unless they only have red Kings in which case they also score 0).
Rule Cards:
There are also two rule cards in this game, the Jack and the Queen.
Jack: when this card is drawn from the deck, the player MUST swap one of his cards for one of another player’s cards. Neither player is allowed to look at the new card. This rule has to be obeyed any time the jack is drawn, however if a player wants to keep the jack for its points they are allowed to do so but they must first obey the rule.*
Queen: if a player draws a queen then they are allowed to look at one (only one) of their cards. As with the jack, they are allowed to keep the queen also if they wish.
*you may be wondering why a player would ever want to keep the jack or queen as they are worth so much. A player might wish to do this if they are aiming for 25, 50, 75 or 100 points.
Game end:
The game ends once a player has exceeded 100 points and the winner is the player with the lowest score.
*If a player reaches 100 points exactly, the game does not end because that player would go back to a score of 75.