Basic Euchre Information
Euchre is a trick-taking card game played with 24 cards from a 52-card deck. The 24 cards used are all four of each of the following denomination: 9, 10, Jack, Queen, King, and Ace. Euchre is played with four people. Players sitting across from each other are partners.
Dealing
Five cards are dealt to each player to make up their hands. Partners may not share information about their hands with one another in any way. These five cards can be dealt in any way the dealer sees fit, but common practice is to deal two or three cards to each player at a time.
Game Play
The cards remaining in the deck after the deal are considered the “kitty” and may not be revealed at any time. Once the dealer has dealt, he flips the top card of the kitty up, and play shifts to his left.
The person to the dealer’s left may either call the face-up card into the dealer’s hand or pass. If he calls the card into the dealer’s hand, the suit of that card becomes “trump” for that round, and the dealer discards a different card from his hand into the kitty. If he passes, the next person gets the option of calling the card up or passing. If the card gets all the way back to the dealer, he may order it into his own hand or flip it face down.
If the card is flipped face down, the player to the dealer’s left may declare any suit he desires as trump except for the suit of the card that was turned face down.
Example: If the Queen of Hearts is flipped down, the player may call diamonds, spades, or clubs trump. Hearts cannot be trump during this round.
Once trump has been declared, play begins with the player to the dealer’s left. He may lead any card he likes. The next player must then play a card of the same suit if he has it. If not, he may play an off-suit card. This continues until each player has played one card. Whoever has the best card of the suit that led wins unless a trump was played. If that’s the case, whichever player played the highest trump wins the trick.
Example: If spades is trump and the player led with the Ace of Diamonds, the next player must play a diamond. He plays the 9 of Diamonds—his only diamond. The next player plays a 10 of Diamonds, but the final player doesn’t have any diamonds, so he plays the 9 of Spades and wins the trick because he played trump.
This continues until all five cards have been played. Then a new hand is dealt, and play continues like this until a team reaches ten points.
Ranking and Bowers
Non-trump cards are ranked from highest to lowest normally: Ace, King, Queen, Jack, 10, 9.
Trump cards are ranked differently. If spades is trump, the ranking from highest to lowest would be: Jack of Spades, Jack of Clubs, Ace of Spades, King of Spades, Queen of Spades, 10 of Spades, and 9 of Spades.
If hearts was trump, it would be Jack of Hearts, Jack of Diamonds, and so on.
Jacks of trump are considered “bowers” with the Jack that is the actual trump (spades and hearts in the examples above) being called the “right bower” and the other Jack of the same color being called the “left bower.”
In both of the above instances, the Jacks that are left bowers are considered the same suit as trump in game play.
Example: If diamonds is trump and the 10 of Diamonds is led, and you have in your hand the Jack of Hearts and four spades, you must play the Jack of Hearts since it is considered, by these rules, a diamond while diamonds is trump.
This is confusing at first, but people catch on quickly.
Declaring Trump or Passing
A player should only declare trump when he knows he can win at least two tricks with the cards in his hand. One should always be able to count on his partner for at least one trick—this would theoretically give the team three tricks, and thus a point. (See Scoring, below.) If one cannot win two tricks, he should pass.
If everyone passes and the dealer turns the card on the kitty down, and everyone passes on declaring trump, it is left to the dealer to decide. There’s a rule called “screw the dealer.” If you play “screw the dealer” then the dealer must declare trump even if he would rather pass. If you do not play with this rule, then the dealer can declare a misdeal and re-deal the hand.
Euchring the Other Team
To “euchre” a team is to win three or more tricks against a team that declared trump. Euchring is worth extra points.
Reneging
To renege is to fail to play an off-suit card when one could have—and should have—played a card that followed suit. Penalties vary, but the common penalty is the rewarding of two points to the opposing team. Often reneging is difficult to catch. Players tend to be more understanding and lenient with an honest player who admits a mistake when he realizes he’s made one.
Going Alone and Defending Alone
Sometimes a player has such a good hand (at least three trump cards and two Aces or Kings) that he can win at least three tricks on his own. It is always beneficial to “go alone” when you can win at least three tricks. When a player goes alone, his partner doesn’t play that hand and discards his own into the kitty. The lone player then must defeat the other team on his own. Doing so correctly will win his team more points.
The rarer situation is defending alone. It’s the same concept, but reversed. This usually only happens when the team that declared trump makes a mistake.
Scoring
If a team declares trump and wins 3 or 4 tricks, they win 1 point.
If a team declares trump and wins 5 tricks, they win 2 points.
If a team member goes alone and wins 3 or 4 tricks, they win 1 point.
If a team member goes alone and wins 5 tricks, they win 4 points.
If a team defends (doesn’t declare trump) and wins 3 or 4 tricks, they win 2 points.
If a team defends and wins 5 tricks, they win 3 points.
If a team member defends alone and wins 3 or 4 tricks, they win 4 points.
If a team member defends alone and wins 5 tricks, they win 8 points.
Note: Scoring is subject to several regional variations. It is best to agree on how many points each of the above situations is worth before beginning to play. This will save you from arguing later.
Additional Links
The Ten Commandments of Euchre
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