Pinochle

Bicycle Pinochle Games

Price: $5.98*
(Are You Game)

Think fast! You'll have to when you engage in this game of mental combat. Players scramble to be the first to reach 1000 points. Often compared to bridge and chess, Pinochle rewards the player who can leap on opportunities and is unafraid of risk.

Merchant: Are You Game

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Deluxe Rook Player's Edition Card Game

Price: $13.99*
(Candy Crate)

Since 1906 ROOK has entertained millions and millions of card game lovers. It's much easeier (yet more exciting) than Bridge, more fun that Pinochle, more varied than Hearts. Includes:48 - Page player's guide bookletPremium quality ROOK cardsScore Pad & Card tray.

Merchant: Candy Crate

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Best of Card Games ( Windows )

Price: $8.99*
(J&R Music & Computer World)

Over 150 Different Card Games - Solitaire, Poker, Blackjack, Rummy, Pinochle, Hearts, Spades, Euchre, Cribbage, Oh Hell, Fan Tan, Spite and Malice, more...

Merchant: J&R Music & Computer World

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Automatic Card Shuffler - 4 Deck Capacity by Jobar

Price: $20.49*
(Organize Everything)

This amazing Automatic Card Shuffler by Jobar takes the stress and aggravation out of shuffling multiple decks of cards. Easily shuffle 1 to 4 full decks into 1 large deck with a simple touch of the fingertip control.

Merchant: Organize Everything

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Pinochle Playing Cards

Price: $2.48*
(S&S Worldwide)

Pinochle Playing Cards, rugged, plastic-coated, 48 card decks can be used to play a variety of classic card games.

Merchant: S&S Worldwide

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Deluxe Rook Card Game by Winning Moves

Price: $10.98*
(Toys 2 Wish 4)

Since 1906, ROOK has entertained millions and millions of card game lovers. It's much easier (yet more exciting) than Bridge, more fun than Pinochle, more varied than Hearts.

Merchant: Toys 2 Wish 4

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History

The word Pinochle is derived from French Binocle and German Binokel.

The basic form of Pinochle retains from its predecessor games, all the way back to whist, with four players competing, two against two, until one team has scored 1000 or 1500 points.

Pinochle (sometimes Pinocle or Penuchle), is a trick-taking game typically for two or four players and played with a 48 card deck. Derived from the card game Bezique, players score points by trick-taking and also by forming combinations of cards into melds. Each hand is played in three phases: bidding, melds, and tricks.

A Pinochle deck consists of two copies of each of the 9, 10, jack, queen, king, and ace cards of all four suits (spades, hearts, diamonds and clubs).

Aces are always considered high. The complete ordering of rank from highest to lowest is A, 10, K, Q, J, 9.

Variants of pinochle can be played by two, three, four, five or six players. These variations can combine two Pinochle decks called "double deck".

Dealing

The game is played with one Pinochle decks of 48 cards; one player is the dealer.

In Pinochle, after the shuffle, the dealer hands out all the cards clockwise one at a time, starting with his left-hand opponent and ending with himself. The deal rotates clockwise, so the dealer's left-hand opponent will deal next.

The Auction

The dealer is obligated to open with a first bid of 150, and the bidding continues clockwise until three players in rotation have passed after any bid.

When a player has the turn to bid, he may do any one of the following:

# Make a new bid

# Pass

Each bid must supersede the last preceding bid by naming a greater number of points in any denomination.

The auction ends when there have been three passes following a bid. The last bid becomes the contract. The player in the partnership that made this final bid will then declare trump in the suit that is desired.

In order to win the hand, the combined total of "melding" and "trick" points must be equal to or greater than the winning bid. Thus bidding involves anticipating the points that will be accumulated from "Melds" and from the points acumulated from winning tricks. If the bid is higher than this combined score the bidding team is "set", this means that the total bid amount is subtracted from the total game score.

Passing Cards

After the bid has been taken and trump declared, the bid winning team exchanges cards. It is typically four cards, but some people allow only three. The teammate of the bid winner passes first. The objective of the teammate is either to add to the total points in meld or to pass trick winning cards. After receiving the cards, the bid winner examines what will create the strongest hand and then discards 4 to the teammate.

Melding

Melding consists of displaying specific combinations of cards to all players. Typically this is done by placing the combination of cards face up on the playing surface until all players have had the opportunity to examine them. All players meld after the bid winner shows meld. The types of melds include arounds, marriages, flushes and pinochles.

The rank melds of four of the same cards must include one card from each of the different suits and are only of face cards -- ace, king, queen and jack. They are scored as follows:

• "100 Aces" or "Aces around" - 4 aces of different suits - 100 points
• "80 Kings" or "Kings around" - 4 kings of different suits - 80 points
• "60 Queens" or "Queens around" - 4 queens of different suits - 60 points
• "40 Jacks" or "Jacks around" - 4 jacks of different suits - 40 points

A player holding all eight aces, kings, queens or jacks is called a double around. This hand is worth 10 times the value of a single around, for instance, a kings double around is worth 800 points.

The marriages, flush and dix are the suit melds.

• "Trump Marriage" - king and queen of trump suit - 40 points
• "Marriage" - king and queen of a suit other than trump - 20 points
• "Flush", "Family" or "Run" - A 10 K Q J of trump suit - 150 points
• "Dix" - nine of trump - 10 points

A marriage in each suit is worth 240 total points. As a shortcut, this is called a "roundtable" or a "Round House".

The pinochle is the unique combination that shares the name of the game.

• "Pinochle" - jack of diamonds and queen of spades - 40 points.
• "Double Pinochle" - both jacks of diamonds and both queens of spades - 300 points.

Each card may be used in at most one meld of each type. Thus, a queen card can be used in one marriage with one king, regardless if the player has more than one king. However, a queen can be used to score a marriage and a pinochle if the player also has the jack.

After the melds are displayed, the points are counted and the teams total their individual meld scores to form a team score.

Playing tricks

As with other trick-taking games, the winner of each trick leads to the next. The high bidder makes the first lead, which must be a trump. Each player must follow suit if possible. Otherwise, each player must trump if possible. When trump is led or played, you must beat the previous card played. So, if the trump king is led, you must play the ten or ace if you are next to play. If you have neither of these cards, you may play any trump you wish, and if out of trump you may play any card you wish. Further, when a previous player has ruffed (played a trump because it was not possible to follow suit) and you also must ruff, you must overruff if possible. When duplicate cards result in a tie, the card played first wins the trick.

Scoring tricks

Points are scored based on the tricks won in the hand. There are several ways to count up the points for play, but they always add up to 250 points. The last trick is always worth 10 points. The classic counting is where aces are worth 11, tens are worth 10, kings are worth 4, queens are worth 3, jacks are worth 2, and nines are worth zero. The disadvantage of this method is that it takes much longer to count the score at the end of each hand. A simpler method is to count aces and tens for 10 points, kings and queens are worth 5 points, and jacks and nines are worth zero. A streamlined method that avoids any strategy in trick-taking has aces, tens, and kings worth 10, and everything else zero. This method is useful in double-deck games where 96 cards are used.

Since all scores are multiples of ten in this last method, it is often further simplified by dropping the redundant zero in the units place. Aces, tens, and kings won in tricks are worth one point, while melds like 100 aces is worth 10. Note the terms "100 aces", "80 kings" and so on are still used, even though the point values are one-tenth. This regime is popularly known, including by the Grange card parties in Upstate New York, where Pinochle and Euchre are also popular.

Two-handed Pinochle

Two-handed pinochle is unique among the game's various versions for its method of amassing a hand. In some versions, no cards are initially dealt. Instead, the entire deck is placed face-down on the playing surface between the two players to form the stock. One player begins the hand-building process by drawing the top card of the stock. The player now has two choices: 1) either keep that card to build his hand, or 2) reject that card. If the player chooses to hold the initial card, the player then draws a second card from the stock, then places it face-down, without looking at it, creating a discard pile. If the player rejects the first card, he creates his discard pile with the first card. He then must keep the second card he draws from the stock, regardless of whether he liked the first card better. Players alternate turns in this hand-building process until all cards are chosen.

With bidding, the player winning the bid calls trumps, then lays all meld face-up on the table. The other player shows their melds as well. Meld points are tallied, and players return meld cards to their hands.

Trick-taking commences and continues until all held cards have been played. When adding counters, cards from each player's discard pile are included in totals for a total of 24 counters per round, plus one counter for winning the final trick.