Romanian whist
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Romanian whist is a variant of whist which is similar to the English or American game Oh Hell! It is currently popular in Romania, and there it is called "whist".
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[edit] Rules
Romanian whist is a game for 3 to 7 players (best for 4). Each player plays alone.
From a standard deck use 8 cards for every player (24 for 3 players, 32 for 4 players and so on, to 48 for 6 players).
For 7 players a deck of 48 (6x8) cards is used and the dealer doesn't deal cards for herself, playing the so called "dead hand". As the turn to deal advances around the table, each player plays "dead hand" several times during a game.
The cards rank as follows: A, K, Q, J, 10, 9, and so on. They have no value, because it is a game for tricks only.
[edit] Deal
The first dealer is chosen at random. Then the turn to deal rotates clockwise after each hand.
The number of cards dealt to each player varies during the game. For the first few deals each player gets only one card. This continues for as many deals as there are players.
After this the number of cards dealt to each player increases by one with every deal until eventually all the cards are dealt, that is 8 cards each. Then as many deals are played with 8 cards each as there are players.
Then the number of cards dealt decreases again until every player gets only one card. Once more there are as many deals with one card each as there are players.
Example: With 4 players the whole game would consist of 24 deals, and the number of cards dealt each time would be as follows:
1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 8, 8, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 1, 1, 1.
After the cards are dealt, the next card is put face up; the suit of this card is trump. In the games with 8 cards there is no card left to turn, and these games are played without trumps.
[edit] Bidding
Each player in order, beginning with the player to dealer's left, bids how many tricks they think they will get. All bids are final and cannot be changed afterwards.
To ensure that not everyone will succeed in their bid, the sum of all tricks bid must not be the same as the number of cards dealt to each player. (Example: game with six cards, three players: The first player bids "3", the next "1". The last player cannot bid "2", as this would make the sum of the tricks equal to 6. in this case, the last bidder must bid 0, 1, 3, 4, 5 or 6).
This rule puts the last bidder (the dealer) at a disadvantage, especially in the one-card hands. To counter this disadvantage, a series of one-card hands equal to the number of players is played at the beginning and end of each game.
[edit] Play
The player to dealer's left plays the first card. The other players must play a card of the same suit if possible. Any player who has no card of the suit led must play a trump if they can. A player who has no cards of the suit led and no trumps can discard any card. The trick is won by whoever played the highest trump, or if no trump was played, by whoever played the highest card of the suit led. The winner of the trick leads to the next.
The objective is to win exactly the number of tricks you said you would win.
[edit] Scoring
The hand ends when all cards are played.
- Players who made their contract (exactly) get 5 points plus the number of tricks they made.
- Players who took fewer tricks than their bid lose one point for each undertrick.
- Players who took more tricks than their bid lose one point for each overtrick.
Examples: Suppose you bid 3 tricks. If you take exactly 3 you will win 8 points (5+3). If you take only two tricks you lose 1 point; the same if you take 4 tricks. If you take 1 or 5 tricks (two off from your bid) you will lose 2 points; if you take no tricks or 6 tricks you will lose 3.
The table for recording the points looks like this:
Peter John Peggy
--------------------------------------
1 1 6 0 5 1 -1
1 0 11 0 10 0 -2
1 1 10 1 16 0 3
--------------------------------------
2 0 15 2 14 2 10
3 1 14 0 19 1 16
and so on.
The number of cards dealt in each hand is recorded in the first column on the left. Subsequent columns are used to record the bids and the cummulative score of each player. In the example above, the first hand was a one-card hand. Peter bid 1 trick and made it (5+1=6 points), John bid 0 tricks and succeeded (5+0=5 points), Peggy was forced to bid "1" and didn't make it (-1 point). The fifth hand was a three-card hand. Peter bid 1 trick and took 2 (-1 point), John was not allowed to bid "1", bid "0" and succeded (5+0=5 points), Peggy bid 1 trick and made it (5+1=6 points).
[edit] Variations
- In the last games with one card the players don't look at their own card, but they hold it on their forehead. So each player can see the cards of the other players, but he doesn't know which card he holds himself. So he must guess how many tricks he can take from the sayings of the other players.
- Promotions: If a player wins 10 consecutive games (this means, if the player never fails to fulfill his contract), he may add 30 points to his total or if a player wins a number of games equal to the number of players plus one games, he may be awarded 10 points. The same number of points is subtracted if he fails to fulfill his contract just as many times. Games in which one card is dealt do not count as hands won or lost for promotions. In an 8-1-8 game, the one-card games end a winning or losing streak.
- 0 Finish: If a player with the last game has exactly 0 points, he wins the game. (This variation is commonly played, but is not recommended, because it tends to destroy the game at the end - players may try to lose as many games as possible, to try to reach zero.)
- Eight to Eight Games: The 8-card hands are dealt first, then reducing to one card and increasing again to 8 cards. The number of 8 card hands at the beginning and end and one-card hands in the middle is equal to the number of players, so with four players you would have 8-8-8-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1-1-1-1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-8-8-8. These are called 8-1-8 games , as opposed to 1-8-1 games. In 8-1-8 games, you do not win if you have 0 points at the end of a game
- Progressive Scoring: Due to very low bidding among some of the players resulting in low scores for everyone when using the typical "scalar scoring", another scoring system involves winning 5 points per contract fulfilled and progressively higher points per trick won, thus earning 5 points if you bid 0, 5+1=6 points if you bid 1, 5+1+2=8 if you bid 2, and so on, encouraging players to bid higher.
