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The Game of Hearts, Ricketts House Variant
The game of Hearts is a reasonably common trick-based card game. A
description of what I assume is its most common form is given
here or elsewhere.
Here I will describe the primary variant with which I am
accustomed. I refer to it as the Ricketts House Variant
after the Caltech
undergraduate house where I learned it.
Players:
Reliably four.
Deck:
Standard 52-card deck with the jokers removed. Decreasing order of
card value is (Ace,King,Queen,Jack,10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2).
Deal and Lead:
Deal begins arbitrarily, and proceeds to the left (clockwise). The
player to the left of the dealer leads. The "2 of Clubs" lead that
many are used to is not used here.
Pass:
After the deal, the players look at their cards and may then pass
three cards to another player. The sequence of passes rotates
between Left, Right, Across, Scatter, and Hold every five hands.
- Left: each player must pass three cards to the player on his
left.
- Right: each player must pass three cards to the player on his
right.
- Across: each player must pass three cards to the player
opposite him.
- Scatter: each player must pass one card to each of the other
players.
- Hold: no cards are passed.
Play:
The player to the left of the dealer leads any permitted card (see
below). Play continues clockwise, and each player must follow suit
if possible. If following suit is impossible, then any card may be
sloughed. Once each player has played a card, the trick is taken.
The player of the highest-valued card in the suit of the first card
on the trick wins it and collects the cards. Leading hearts is not
permitted (as above) if hearts are not 'broken'. Hearts are broken
if and only if the Queen of Spades or any heart has been played.
Any lead that does not violate this last rule is always permitted.
Of course, a player could hold only hearts at some point when
hearts are not broken. Then they are allowed to lead hearts.
Scoring:
Points are accumulated from hand to hand. They are only evaluated
at that point. Normally, for each heart collected by a player in
any of their tricks they take one point. If they took the Queen of
Spades, then they take another 13 points. The exception to this is
when they take all 13 hearts and the Queen of Spades. Then instead
of taking 26 points they "Shoot the Moon" (see below). If, at the
end of score evaluation, they are at a "wrap point", then they wrap
to 0 points (see below). At this point, each player's score is
checked to see if the game is over (see below).
Shooting the Moon:
Upon taking all 13 hearts and the Queen of Spades in a single hand,
the player typically stays at their score, and each of the other
players takes 26 points. If this would cause the game to end and
the shooting player to lose, then that player will instead lose 26
points and all others will remain constant.
Wrapping:
Generally the wrap points are at 104 and 126 points. That means
that once points have been assessed for a given hand, any player
that is at one of these scores immediately jumps to a score of 0.
Is the game over?
This takes place only after points for a hand have been assessed
and any wraps resolved. If any player has strictly greater than 100
points and there is no tie for the lowest score, then the game is
over. The player with the lowest score wins, and all others lose.
There is no glory in coming in second in this game. If the
condition is not met, then the game isn't over and another hand is
played.
Subvariants:
These modifications on the above can
be combined:
69 for 5:
Any player who remains at exactly 69 points for 5 hands is declared
the winner, overruling any winner by any other definition.
Typically the same is declared true for staying at 5 for 69 hands.
If multiple players simultaneously satisfy this victory condition,
they are all winners. In practice, though, the first condition is
extremely difficult if the other players are on the ball, and the
second condition is all but impossible.
Warren Rules:
This variant is named after our late president, Warren G. Harding,
although it is not clear that he ever played Hearts. This was
invented mainly for spice. A 53rd card is shuffled in from the
beginning. One could use a Joker, but this was originally done with
a
Warren G. Harding (link broken -alan)
trading card.
Whoever gets the Warren card also receives the extra card. The
player may look at the extra card, but do not take it into their
hand. On any occasion that they are to play a card, and if the
extra card would be a valid play, then the Warren card may be
played. The extra card's suit is declared to the other players, but
not his value. At the end of the trick, the extra card is revealed
and play continues as if the extra card had been played all along.
Note that one can pass Warren like any other card, and that the
extra card is then transferred to the new owner of Warren.
Interesting Historical Examples:
My Hand is Forced
The most unbalanced hand of which I have ever heard was played by
Leah Warner. She had the lead, and after the pass managed to have
12 hearts, including the 2 and the Ace, and the King of Spades.
Since hearts were, of course, not broken, she was forced to play
the King of Spades. If the person with the Ace of Spades didn't
throw it, then she would take the trick. She could then lead the
Ace of Hearts, drawing the free heart, and then claim the rest of
the tricks. Then she would shoot.
If the person with the Ace of Spades had thrown it, then they
would have taken the trick. In order for her to take another trick,
someone would have to already taken a point (in this case). Since
she then couldn't shoot, she would duck or slough, keeping the 2 of
hearts so she could be sure to duck the loose heart. Then she would
take no points.
As it happenned, no one dropped the Ace of Spades on the first
trick, so she claimed and shot. Although this sounds like a
textbook example because of its excessive nature (extremely odd
distribution), it actually happenned. Hearts tends to have somewhat
skewed distributions after the pass, and I expect that a player
passed her three hearts while she voided herself of any diamonds
and clubs, but I'm not sure of that.
Let's Call the Whole Thing Off
In one game, the players were trying less to win than to play
interestingly, and over the course of several hours they each had
high scores. During one hand, two of them both managed to wrap on
the same hand. Soon after, the other two had managed to wrap while
the first pair were still at 0. This left all four players with a
score of 0. It had been come full circle to the opening state. They
declared the game null.
If anything in this page is confusing, tell me(email broken -alan) and I'll try to
clear it up. The same goes for errors or suggestions.
Alan Hoyle's Home
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