Trick-taking game
A trick-taking game is a card- or tile-based game in which play of a hand centers on a series of finite rounds or units of play, called tricks, which are each evaluated to determine a winner or taker of that trick. The object of such games then may be closely tied to the number of tricks taken, as in plain-trick games such as contract bridge, whist, and spades, or to the value of the cards contained in taken tricks, as in point-trick games such as pinochle, the tarot family, briscola, and most evasion games like hearts.
Trick-and-draw games are trick-taking games in which the players can fill up their hands after each trick. In most variants, players are free to play any card into a trick in the first phase of the game, but must follow suit as soon as the stock is depleted. Trick-avoidance games like reversis or polignac are those in which the aim is to avoid taking some or all tricks.
The domino game Texas 42 is an example of a trick-taking game that is not a card game.
History
The earliest card games were trick-taking games, as evidenced by the rank-and-suit structure, originating from ancient China and spreading westwards during the early part of the second millennium. Michael Dummett noted that these games share various features. They were played without trumps, following suit was not required but only the highest card of the suit led wins, rotation was counter-clockwise, they were plain-trick games, and the pip cards of one or more suits were in reverse order so that the lower cards beat the higher ones.Two revolutions in European trick-taking games led to the development of ever more sophisticated card games: the invention of trumps, and the requirement of following suit to constrain their power, in the 15th century; and bidding in the 17th century.
According to card game researcher David Parlett, the oldest known European trick-taking game, Karnöffel, was mentioned in 1426 in the Bavarian town Nördlingen – roughly half a century after the introduction of playing cards to Europe, which were first mentioned in Spain in 1371. The oldest known game in which certain cards have additional privileges is Karnöffel, where specific ranks of one suit were named Karnöffel, Devil, Pope etc. and subject to an elaborate system of variable powers. However, these were not trumps in the sense of a suit whose cards uniformly beat all other suit cards.
Around 1440 in Italy, special cards called trionfi were introduced with such a function. These special cards are now known as tarots, and a deck augmented by tarots as a tarot deck. The trionfi/tarots formed essentially a fifth suit without the ordinary ranks but consisting of trumps in a fixed hierarchy. One can get a similar effect by declaring all cards of a fixed or randomly determined suit to be trumps. This method, originating with triomphe, is still followed by a number of modern trick-taking games that do not involve an auction.
Trumps were retroactively added to some games, such as trappola. It is much rarer for trumps to be removed. The invention of trumps became so popular that very few European trick-taking games exist without them. This did not stop the two-handed piquet from becoming the most popular card game in Europe during the 16th century. Parlett suggests the invention of trumps let players in games involving more than two a greater chance of heading a trick.
The invention of bidding for a [|trump suit] is credited to ombre, the most popular card game of the 17th century. Rather than having a randomly selected trump suit, players can now hold an auction for it. The most popular game of the 18th-century was tarot which experienced a great revival. During this time, many tarot games were borrowed bidding over the stock. In the 20th century, whist, now with bidding and the dummy hand, developed into contract bridge, the last global trick-taking game.
The practice of counting tricks, in plain-trick games, may have originated in the counting of cards won in tricks. It was therefore a logical development to accord some cards a higher counting-value, and some cards no value at all, leading to point-trick games. Point-trick games are at least as old as tarot decks and may even predate the invention of trumps. Elfern and Fünfzehnern are possible candidates, although the earliest references date to the 18th century. Nearly all point-trick games are played with tarot decks or stripped decks, which in many countries became standard before 1600. Neither point-trick games nor stripped decks have a tradition in England.
While there are a number of games with unusual card-point values, such as trappola and all fours, most point-trick games are in the huge family of ace–ten card games beginning with brusquembille. Pinochle is a representative of this family that is popular in the United States. Other examples include belote and skat.
In contrast to Europe, Chinese trick-taking games did not develop trumps or bidding. They diverged into multi-trick games where melds can only be beaten by other melds provided they have the same number of cards. During the Qing dynasty, these multi-trick games evolved into the earliest draw-and-discard games where the players' objective was to form melds and "go out" rather than capture the opponents' cards. Khanhoo is an example of a multi-trick game that became a draw-and-discard game. Multi-trick games are also probably the source for climbing games like Zheng Shangyou and dou dizhu, which first appeared during the Cultural Revolution.
Basic structure
Certain actions in trick-taking games with three or more players always proceed in the same direction. In games originating in North and West Europe, including England, Russia, and the United States and Canada, the rotation is typically clockwise, i.e., play proceeds to the left. In South and East Europe, South America, and Asia it is typically anticlockwise, so that play proceeds to the right. When games move from one region to another, they tend to initially preserve their original sense of rotation. A region with a dominant sense of rotation may adapt a migrated game to its own sensibilities. For two-player games the order of play is moot.In each hand or deal, one player is the dealer. This function moves from deal to deal in the normal direction of play. The dealer usually shuffles the deck, and after giving the player one seat from the dealer opposite the normal direction of play an opportunity to cut, hands out the same prescribed number of cards to each player, usually in an order following the normal direction of play.
Most games deal cards one at a time in rotation. A few games require dealing multiple cards at one time in a packet. The cards apportioned to each player are collectively known as that player's hand and are only known to the player. Some games involve a set of cards that are not dealt to a player's hand. These cards form the stock. It is generally good manners to leave one's cards on the table until the deal is complete.
The player sitting one seat after the declarer in normal rotation is known as the eldest hand, also called the forehand in Skat and other games of German origin. The eldest hand leads to the first trick, i.e. places the first card of the trick face up in the middle of all players. The other players each follow with a single card, in the direction of play. When every player has played a card to the trick, the trick is evaluated to determine the winner, who takes the cards, places them face down on a pile, and leads to the next trick. The winner or taker of a trick is usually the player who played the highest-value card of the suit that was led, unless the game uses one or more trump cards.
The player who leads to a trick is usually allowed to play an arbitrary card from their hand. Some games have restrictions on the first card played in the hand, or may disallow leading a card of a particular suit until that suit has been played "off-suit" in a prior trick, called "breaking" the suit, usually seen in cases of a trump or penalty suit. Other games have special restrictions on the card that must be led to the first trick. Usually this is a specific card, e.g.,. The holder of that card is the eldest hand instead of the person one seat after the dealer.
In many games, the following players must follow suit if they can, i.e., they must play a card of the same suit if possible. A player who cannot follow suit may slough a card, i.e., play a card of a different suit. A trick is won by the player who has played the highest-ranked card of the suit led, i.e., of the suit of the first card in the trick, unless the game uses a trump suit.
It can be an advantage to lead to a trick, because the player who leads controls the suit that is led and which others must follow. The leading player playing a suit of which he has many decreases the chance that anyone else would be able to follow suit. Playing a suit of which he has few allows him to rid his hand of that suit, known as voiding the suit, freeing him from the restriction to follow suit when that suit is led by another player.
On the other hand, it can be advantageous to be the final player who plays to the trick, because at that point one has full information about the other cards played to the trick. The last player to a trick can play a card just slightly higher or lower than the current winning card, guaranteeing they will win or lose it by the minimum amount necessary, saving more valuable high or low value cards for situations where they must guarantee that a card played early to a trick will win or lose.
When all cards have been played, the number or contents of the tricks won by each player is tallied and used to update the score. Scoring based on the play of tricks varies widely between games. In most games either the number of tricks a player or partnership has won, or the value of certain cards that the player has won by taking tricks is important.