The Clock (solitaire)

The Clock is a very easy game of solitaire played with 52 cards. You have 13 foundations to drop cards. Each foundation has a specific card value (the clock value). You build 4 layers of cards on each foundation that must alternate in color (you can either start with black or red).

Setup

Figure 1: The Clock - Game in Progress

Use one deck of cards. Shuffle it and you are ready to go. Imagine a clock on your game table. All ones will be placed at the 1 o'clock position, all Queens on 12 o'clock, and the kings in the center. This game has no cascades. In the figure the stock and waste are inside the clock. If playing the game with a real deck you would hold the stock in your hand and put the waste at a convenient location outside the clock.

Rules

Draw card by card from the stock. If one fits to any of the 13 foundations play it, otherwise put it on the waste. Foundations are built by alternating color and layer wise. This means that you can choose your starting suit, but the second card on the foundation must be opposite color. Layer wise by suit means that you must have the same suit on each layer of the foundations. So on all foundations you must have - for example - Spades, Diamonds, Clubs, Hearts in the same order, though you can choose the order during the first moves of the game. The game allows you to recycle the waste stack exactly two times.

Strategy

Play slow. If you miss a card that you can use, then the game will be harder to solve.

References

Rudolf Heinrich, 1976, “Die schönsten Patiencen”. Perlen-Reihe 641, 18th and 27th Edition, probably out of print, ISBN 3-85223-095-0, Perlen-Reihe Verlag, Wien

See also