The Penguin Book of Card Games: Everything You Need to Know to Play Over 250 Games (91 page)

16 + 24

39 hearts 20-100 ulti open durchmars hearts

16 + 8 + 24

Play The soloist leads first. Players must fol ow suit and head the

trick if possible; must trump and overtrump if unable to fol ow;

and may renounce only if unable to do either. The trick is taken by

the highest card of the suit led, or by the highest trump if any are

played, and the winner of each trick leads to the next.

Inabasic game, any player holding one ormore marriages

announces them upon playing to the first trick, by saying (for

example) ‘Twenty’, ‘Two twenties’, ‘Forty and a Twenty’, or

whatever it may be. Any marriages announced by either partner

count to the credit of the partnership, not of the individual.

In a 20-hundred or 40-hundred contract, only one marriage may

be counted, and that is the Twenty or Forty implicit in the soloist’s

bid. If the soloist did not in fact have a marriage, he of course loses

the contract.

In an ulti contract, the soloist may not lead or play †7 before the

last trick unless he has no other legal play.

Score To win, the soloist must:

in the basic game, win at least one trick and earn more points

from cards and marriages than the other side. (Neither the

soloist nor the partners can win by scoring only for

marriages.)

in a hundred bid, take at least 100;

in a hundred bid, take at least 100;

in a betli, lose every trick; or

in a durchmars, win every trick.

The value of his bid and announcements, with whatever degree

of doubling may apply, is received from each opponent if

successful, or paid to each opponent if not. These values are listed

in the scoring table (see overleaf).

Bonuses A bonus applies for making ulti, hundred, or durchmars,

even if not bid in advance. Thus:

1. Silent ulti. If the soloist or a partner plays †7 to the last trick,

and it wins, he scores 2 points (4 in hearts) for himself or his

side. If the soloist does so, and it loses, he pays twice that

amount to each opponent. If a partner does so, and it loses,

each opponent pays the soloist, even if the trick was won by

the other partner.

2. Silent hundred. For taking 100 or more unannounced, the

score for the basic game is doubled. A silent hundred may

include more than one marriage.

bid

unbid

item

min.

NT min.

game

1

2

-

-

-

conceded

2

4

-

-

-a

100

-

-

-

1

2

40-100

4

8

-

-

-b

20-100

8

16 -

-

-b

ulti (won)

4

8

-

2

4c

ulti (lost)

4+4 8+8 -

4

8 c

betli

-

-

5

-

-

betli hearts

-

-

10 -

-

betli open

-

-

20 -

-

durchmars

6

12 6

3

6 d

hearts durchmars -

(12) 12 -

(6)

open durchmars 12 24 24 -

-

open hearts d.

-

(24) (24) -

-

1. Amount paid if the soloist concedes without play.

2. Only one marriage can be counted towards the 100.

3. When ulti is bid, doubled (etc.), and lost, the doubling applies

only to the first 4 points (8 in hearts), not to the extra 4 (8)

for losing the ulti bid.

4. Unbid durchmars replaces the score for a basic game, if any. If

the basic game was doubled (etc.), any bonus for unbid

durchmars is also doubled (etc.).

3. Silent durchmars. Winning every trick without having bid

durchmars earns a bonus of 3 (6 in hearts).

The silent hundred and silent durchmars are af ected by any

doubling or redoubling that may have been announced, but not the

silent ulti.

Ending the game By tradition, a player can bring the game to a

close by announcing ‘Ace of hearts deals and deals not’ (‘Piros ász

oszt, nem oszt’). At the end of the hand fol owing this

announcement it is noted who held A when the auction ended.

When that player deals next, three more hands are played, and the

session ends when the said player would have been about to deal

again.

Comment It may take a while to grasp the details and relative

values of the various contracts. Once these are overcome, the play

of the game, though requiring much skil , of ers a greater degree of

clarity than many other three-handers similar in format, such as

Skat and Tysiacha. Its greatest and most original feature is the fact

Skat and Tysiacha. Its greatest and most original feature is the fact

that the talon changes from bid to bid. This enables players to see

and even use one another’s discards, and to convey genuine or

misleading information through them. With helpful discards, it may

be possible to build up a stronger hand, which in turn tends to

make the bidding more competitive.

Pip-Pip!

4-10 players, 104 cards (2 × 52)

This jol y lit le game is of unknown provenance. First described in

the 1920s,it looks as ifit was invented by an English player with

animperfect knowledge of European marriage games, possibly

picked up during the First World War.

Preliminaries From four to ten players use two 52-card packs

shuf led together. Deal seven each, turn the next for trumps, and

stack the rest face down on top of it. The aim is to score points for

(a) declaring marriages and thereby changing the trump suit, and

(b) capturing card-points in tricks. For this purpose cards rank and

count as fol ows:

2 A K Q J T9876543

11 10 5 4 3 0 each

(But the game works just as wel with the more authentic European

schedule of Ace 11, Ten 10, King 4, Queen 3, Jack 2.)

Play Eldest leads first. Subsequent players must fol ow suit if

possible, but otherwise may play any card. The trick is taken by the

highest card of the suit led, or by the highest trump if any are

highest card of the suit led, or by the highest trump if any are

played. Of identical winning cards, the second played beats the first.

The winner of each trick draws the top card of stock (so long as any

remain), then waits for the others to do likewise in rotation from

his left before leading to the next.

Pipping Immediately before the first card is led to a trick, any

player holding a King and Queen of the same suit other than trump

may change the trump suit to that of the marriage by laying it face

up on the table in front of him and cal ing ‘Pip-pip!’, thereby

scoring 50 points. The two cards remain on the table but continue

to belong to his hand until played to tricks. Neither of them may be

remarried to the other partner of the same suit, but there is nothing

to stop the same suit from being pipped again when the other King

and Queen are both shown together. If two players pip before the

same trick, both score 50, and the suit is changed to that of the

second one cal ed (or, if cal ed simultaneously, that ofthe player

nearest the dealer’s left, dealer counting as furthest from his own

left).

Ending and scoring When the last card is drawn from stock, play

continues until everyone has played out al their cards. It doesn’t

mat er if some players have no card left to play to the last trick.

Each player scores for al the marriages he has made, and adds to

this total that of al the counters in the tricks he has won.

Zetema

2-6 players, 65 cards

Zetema is not a traditional marriage game but an invented one, first

Zetema is not a traditional marriage game but an invented one, first

marketed by J. Hunt around 1870. It seems to have been soon

forgot en, but (fortunately) not before making its way into Cassel ’s

Book of Indoor Amusements, Card Games and Fireside Fun (1881),

whence it was enthusiastical y rescued and revised by Sid Sackson

in A Gamut of Games (1969). It is in fact an excel ent and unusual

game, obviously inspired by Bezique and Poker – then relative

novelties – but less earnest and more fun than either. The fol owing

account incorporates Sackson’s improvements to the scoring system.

It also drops the word ‘trick’, original y used to denote a set of five

discards, as it conveyed the false impression of a conventional trick-

play game. These sets of discards are bet er cal ed ‘zetemas’ in order

to give employment to the otherwise redundant and unexplained

title.

Preliminaries From two to six may play, three being an ideal

number, and four or six playing best in partnerships. Make a 65-

card pack by shuf ling in a whole suit – it doesn’t mat er which –

from a second pack of identical back design and colour. Deal six

each (or five if six play), and stack the rest, face down.

Object To score points for declaring melds in the hand and for

winning zetemas. A zetema is a set of five discards of the same

rank.

Play Each in turn, starting with eldest, draws a card from stock, adds

it to his hand, may declare a meld if he has one, and (usual y) ends

by making one discard, face up, to the table. Discards are made in

sets of the same rank. That is, thirteen wastepiles are formed, one

for each rank. A completed wastepile is cal ed a zetema and is