Players | 2, 3 |
---|---|
Setup time | 1 minute |
Playing time | 45 minutes |
Chance | Medium |
Age range | 13+ |
Skills | Strategic thought |
Haggis is a shedding card game similar to Tichu, Zheng Fen, and other East Asian climbing games. [1] Haggis has received praise for being the first to successfully create a climbing, trick-taking game, designed from the start for two to three players, where most previous games required four players or more. [1] The evenly distributed, face card "bombs" are a notable innovation for the genre, helping even out hand strength enough to make two-person play workable, and enhancing the strategic element of the game. [2]
The game's designer, Sean Ross, developed Haggis over a period of several years, with first publication in late 2010 by Indie Boards and Cards. The game was named after haggis partly in a nod to Ross' Scottish heritage, but also because the game brought together the "guts" (scoring and play mechanisms) of several other climbing games. Haggis was a nominee for "Best Card Game" in the 2010 Golden Geek Awards by BoardGameGeek. [3]
Players attempt to accumulate points; the first to reach a predetermined score (usually 250 or 350) is the winner. The scoring of Haggis gives incentives for capturing cards and for going out first. Successful players balance these two goals to strive for the most points. Additional points may be gained by successfully betting you'll be the first to shed your hand.
A valid card combination may be a set, a sequence or a bomb:
Face cards can be used as wild cards to replace any cards in a "set" or a "sequence". Each player starts a round with a Jack, a Queen and a King. These face cards are public. The face cards can also be used individually as their actual rank, thus a single Jack can be played to beat a single 10, a Queen to beat a Jack, etc. Two face cards may not be played as a pair, such as a Jack and King played as a pair of Kings, because this combination is a bomb and must be played as such.
On their turns, players must play higher ranking combinations with exactly the same type and same number of card as the first combination played, or pass. Bombs are an exception: players can play a bomb to beat any combination, except a higher bomb.
When all but one player pass in succession, the player who played the highest combination capture all cards played. But if the highest combination is a bomb, cards are captured by the player with the next higher combination. Then, a new trick starts. The winner of the last trick leads the new trick with any combination.
Points can be gained from three sources:
When a player goes out, they immediately count the number of cards held by the opponent with the most cards remaining in hand, and gains 5 points for each card counted. Remember that unplayed face cards count as part of the hand.
All point cards captured during the game give their points to the players who captured them. Odd-numbered cards are worth one point each, and each Jack, Queen, and King are worth 2, 3 and 5 points respectively. Even-numbered cards score nothing.
If a bettor is successful in going out first, the player gains the number of points wagered (30 points for a successful "Big bet", 15 points for a successful "Little bet"). However, if a bettor fails to go out first, the points are awarded to the player who did manage to go out first, and to any third player who made no bets in that round.
Whist is a classic English trick-taking card game which was widely played in the 18th and 19th centuries. Although the rules are simple, there is scope for strategic play.
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Bezique or bésigue is a 19th-century French melding and trick-taking card game for two players that came to Britain and is still played today. The game is derived from piquet, possibly via marriage (sixty-six) and briscan, with additional scoring features, notably the peculiar liaison of the
and that is also a feature of pinochle, Binokel, and similarly named games that vary by country.Piquet is an early 16th-century plain-trick card game for two players that became France's national game. David Parlett calls it a "classic game of relatively great antiquity... still one of the most skill-rewarding card games for two" but one which is now only played by "aficionados and connoisseurs." Historically also known as Sant or Saunt from the French Cent.
Trex, pronounced Tricks or Trix, and also known as Ticks, is a four-player Middle Eastern card game mainly played in the Levant region. Similar to European games like Barbu, Herzeln, Kein Stich or Quodlibet, Trex is a compendium game in which there are four rounds with each round consisting of five games. Each cycle is called a "kingdom" in reference to the fact that in each cycle one player determines which contract to play in each of the five games.
Tarabish, also known by its slang term bish, is a Canadian trick-taking card game of complex rules derived from belote, a game of the Jass family. The name is pronounced "tar-bish", despite the spelling. It is played primarily by the people of Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, in Canada, where, according to one source, it was brought in 1901 by a Lebanese immigrant George Shebib. On the other hand, following comprehensive research Kennedy (1996) states that opinions as to its origin vary and that no "definitive roots may ever be determined."
Belote is a 32-card, trick-taking, ace–ten game played primarily in France and certain European countries, namely Armenia, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Georgia, Greece, Luxembourg, Moldova, North Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and also in Saudi Arabia and Tunisia. It is one of the most popular card games in those countries, and the national card game of France, both casually and in gambling. It appeared around 1900 in France, and is a close relative of both Klaberjass and klaverjas. Closely related games are played throughout the world. Definitive rules of the game were first published in French in 1921.
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Sheng ji is a family of point-based, trick-taking card games played in China and in Chinese immigrant communities. They have a dynamic trump, i.e., which cards are trump changes every round. As these games are played over a wide area with no standardization, rules vary widely from region to region.
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Sueca is a 4 player-partnership point trick-taking card game of the ace–ten family, and a popular variant of the Bisca card game. The game is played in Portugal, Brazil, Angola and other Portuguese communities. Its closest relative is the very similar German game Einwerfen.
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The following is a glossary of terms used in card games. Besides the terms listed here, there are thousands of common and uncommon slang terms. Terms in this glossary should not be game-specific, but apply to a wide range of card games played with non-proprietary packs. It should not include terms solely related to casino or banking games. For glossaries that relate primarily to one game or family of similar games, see Game-specific glossaries.
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