Briscola
Briscola is one of Italy's most popular games, together with Scopa and Tressette. A little-changed descendant of Brusquembille, the ancestor of briscan and bezique, Briscola is a Mediterranean trick-taking ace–ten card game for two to six players, played with a standard Italian 40-card deck.
The game can also be played with a modern Anglo-French deck, without the eight, nine and ten cards. With three or six players, twos are removed from the deck to ensure the number of cards in the deck is a multiple of the number of players; a single two for three players and all four twos for six players. The four and six-player versions of the game are played as a partnership game of two teams, with players seated such that every player is adjacent to two opponents.
The cards
The traditional Italian-suited pack used for briscola consists of forty cards, divided into four suits: coins, swords, cups and batons. The values on the cards range numerically from one through seven, plus three face cards in each suit: knave, knight, and king. The knaves depict a man standing. The knight is on horseback. The king wears a crown. To determine the face value of any numeric card, simply count the number of suit icons on the card. The ace card of coins is usually a type of bird with a circle in the middle.Below is a table identifying card rank and point values. Unlisted cards have no point value, and are ranked in descending ordinal value, from seven to two. Note, however, the odd ranking of the three.
| Cards, by rank | Point value |
| Ace | 11 |
| Three | 10 |
| King | 4 |
| Knight | 3 |
| Jack also called woman | 2 |
In total, a deck has 120 card points. To win a game, a player must accumulate more points than any other player. If two players have the same number of points another game is played to determine the winner.
Play
After the deck is shuffled, each player is dealt three cards. The next card is placed face up on the playing surface, and the remaining deck is placed face down, sometimes covering half of the up-turned card. This card is the briscola, and represents the trump suit for the game. Before the game begins if a player has the deuce of trumps they may retire the briscola. This move may only be done at the beginning of the game or first hand. Before the first hand is played, team players may show each other their cards. Deal and play are anti-clockwise.The player to the right of the dealer leads to the first trick by playing one card face up on the playing surface. Each player subsequently plays a card in turn, until all players have played one card. The winner of that trick is determined as follows:
- if any briscola has been played, the player who played the highest valued trump wins
- if no briscole have been played, the player who played the highest card of the lead suit wins
Once the winner of a trick is determined, that player collects the played cards, and places them face down in a pile. Each player maintains their own pile, though the four- and six-player versions may have one player collecting all tricks won by his partners. Then, each player draws a card from the remaining deck, starting with the player who won the trick, proceeding anti-clockwise. Note that the last card collected in the game should be the up-turned briscola. The player who won the trick leads to the next.
Scoring
After all cards have been played, players calculate the total point value of cards in their own piles. In partnership games, the partners combine their points. 61 card points are needed to win and 60-all is a draw. Briscola is usually played for the best of 3 or 5 games, however, Pennycook records a variant whereby 1 game point is scored for a simple win, 2 for scoring 91 or more and 3 for scoring 120, regardless of whether or not all tricks are taken. Games is then 12 points.In a three-hand game, if two players score over 40, they each score 1 game point. If only one player achieves this, that player scores 2 game points. A player taking 120 card points gets 3 game points. If there is a three-way tie for 12 points, play continues until one has a lead. If there is a two-way tie, the third player drops out and play continues as a two-hand game.
Alternatively, when four play, game may be set at 121 or 151 card points; thus played over at least 2 deals.
"Conquista" or black hand
This is a popular add on to the game, which originated in the Italian version of "briscola" but has been widely accepted in the Spanish version of brisca. La conquista is also known as mano negra or sota negra in Spanish brisca. The black hand is defined as when a player automatically gets in his hand the king card, 3 and 1 card of the chosen "briscola". When those three cards are gathered by the player, they are shown to the opponent and the game is automatically won in spite of the points that the opponent has gathered throughout the game which might or not have exceeded the player's points.Signalling
In four- and six-player variations a system of signaling is often allowed between members of the same team. In this variant, the first round is played without speaking, and on all subsequent rounds, players are permitted to signal their partners and attempt to signal without the other team noticing. A common system of signaling is as follows:- Ace – stretch the lips over the teeth or purse lips
- Three – wink or distort the mouth to one side
- King – glance upwards or raise eyebrows
- Knight – shrug one shoulder
- Knave – show the tip of the tongue or lick your lips
- Threes or aces outside of the briscola suit – quickly open and close your mouth
Variations
In some parts of Italy, the three as the second most valuable card is substituted by the seven, like in Portuguese Bisca.
Briscolone
Briscolone is a two-player variant whose rules vary slightly. Examples include:- Players are dealt 3 cards each as normal. Game is 121 or 151 points and there are no trumps. In the last 3 tricks, players must follow suit and head the trick if able.
- Players receive 5 cards instead of 3. There are no trumps. Game is 121 or 151. There is often an additional rule that players are required to follow suit.
- Players are dealt 5 cards. The first card played is a trump. Players need not follow suit.
Briscola chiamata
Briscola chiamata sometimes also called briscolone, although that is the name of a two-player variant, is the five-player version of briscola. Every player is dealt eight cards, so that no cards remain undealt. Then the bidding phase begins, the purpose of which is to decide the trump suit and to form two uneven groups that will play against each other.In one variant, each player, starting from the dealer's right and proceeding counter-clockwise, bids on progressively lower card values, according to the peculiar sorting of cards used in the game. Thus, if the first player bids on a Three, the second player can only bid on a king or lower. If a player bids on a Six, the next player can only bid on a Five, Four or Two. Bidding continues until all but one player have passed in a round. This remaining player has then "won the bid" and therefore gets to declare the Briscola, i.e. the trump suit. If they had bid on a Three, for example, they could choose "Three of Cups": the trump suit will be Cups, and the holder of the "Three of Cups" is determined to be the declarer's partner, though if the player holds that card themselves they will play with no partner.
In another variant, bidding proceeds in the same fashion, but players declare how many points they will score, if someone declare 120 points he may call two cards. A player may pass, and hence cannot bid again in that game. The bid represents the number of points that player believes they are capable of accumulating. In this variant, whoever declares the trump suit also declares a specific Briscola card and the holder of this card is then determined to be the declarer's partner, however, they can not openly declare this and their identity is only conclusively revealed when the named card is played.
The two variants can be combined. Most commonly, the bid starts as in the first system but a bid of Two can be beaten by a bid of "Two with 65 points". Alternatively, any player can "force" the bid and ask subsequent players to keep the same card but increase the score. This is useful whenever a player has low-value cards such as a Two or Four in their strongest suit.
In both systems the declarer can declare the highest Briscola card they do not already hold in the hopes of creating the strongest combined hand with their partner, but can also "bluff".
After the bidding phase, the game proceeds in the same way. First, the remaining three players are partnered with each other, without their knowledge; each player, other than the declarer's partner, acts independently, until it is clear which players are partners. Infrequently, the declarer may declare a Briscola card they already hold, in which case the other four players are partnered against the winning bidder.
Because of the unique method of declaration and blind partnering in this variation of the game, it is considered to be one of the most entertaining variations of the game. Game strategy is often devised to determine which player is partnered with the declarer, whereas the declarer's partner may devise ruses and decoy strategies to fool the other players, such as not taking a trick, or playing points on a trick that will be won by an opponent.