Pinochle
Pinochle, also called pinocle or penuchle, is a trick-taking ace–ten card game, typically for two to four players and played with a 48-card deck. It is derived from the card game bezique. Players score points by trick-taking and by forming combinations of characters into melds.
It is considered part of a "trick-and-meld" category which includes the game belote. Each hand is played in three phases: bidding, melds, and tricks. The standard game today is called "partnership auction pinochle".
History
Pinochle is thought to have two possible origins. One is that it is a cousin of Binokel, with both games evolving from the game of bezique. A second alternative is that pinochle developed from the Swiss and, later, South German game of Binocle or Binokel, which is a descendant of bezique.The word pinochle has several different potential derivations. It may come from the French word binocle literally meaning "two eyes", or "eyeglasses" or "binoculars". This was a reference to the mythical notion that the German game of Binocle was invented with a special deck, where the Queen of Spades and Jack of Diamonds were pictured in side profile, with just one eye each. There are also suggestions that the word pinochle comes from bis and Knöchel, because originally the game ended when a player rapped their knuckles on the table. The term may also be related to the French word binage for the combination of cards called "binocle". This latter pronunciation of the game was adopted by German speakers.
German immigrants brought the game of Binokel to America in the last quarter of the 19th century, where it was mispronounced and misspelled "pinochle." Pinochle was the favorite card game of American Jewish and Irish immigrants. Skat was the preferred game of a majority of German immigrants. Auction Pinochle for three players has some similarities with the German game Skat, although the bidding is more similar to that of bid whist.
During the few months when the USA was involved in World War I, the city of Syracuse, New York, outlawed the playing of pinochle in a gesture of anti-German sentiment. It was also temporarily banned in some other US cities as a result of its German heritage, but has since regained popularity.
Deck
A pinochle deck consists of two copies of each of the 9, 10, jack, queen, king, and ace cards of all four suits, for 48 cards per deck. Aces are always considered high. Pinochle follows a nonstandard card ordering. The complete ordering from highest to lowest is A, 10, K, Q, J, 9. The game can also be played using standard ranking with a simple change to scoring.Originally, the deck had to be composed by combining two poker, piquet or euchre decks and removing unneeded cards. A piquet deck does not have the 2–6, making it easier to modify, and a euchre deck is exactly half a pinochle deck. With the game's popularity in the United States in the early 1900s, a single boxed deck with the necessary cards was marketed. These specialized pinochle decks are now widely available in similar styles to common 52-card counterparts.
Variants of pinochle can be played with five, six, eight or more players. These larger variations can combine two pinochle decks called a "double deck". The double deck can also be used when playing with four players; hand sizes, average scores and minimum bids are doubled.
Partnership auction pinochle
Dealing
The game is played with a deck of 48 cards and four players. One player is the dealer.After the shuffle, the dealer will offer a cut to the player on their right, then distribute the cards. All the cards are dealt in partnership pinochle. For odd numbers of players like three, a "widow's hand" of cards remains. Traditionally, the deal is done clockwise, dealing a packet of three or four cards at a time, starting with the player to the left and ending with the dealer. The deal rotates clockwise, so the dealer's left-hand opponent will deal next.
Some versions include a rule that a player being dealt five nines constitutes a misdeal, and the cards must be redealt. A variation of this stipulates that if someone is dealt five nines, they must also have no aces to constitute a misdeal, or if one has six nines and up to one ace.
Auction pinochle
In auction pinochle, players bid for the points they predict their hand could earn. The highest bidder earns the right to declare the trump suit. One of the players, usually the player to the left of the dealer, or the dealer themselves, is obligated to open with a first bid. The size of bids is based on the point scale and number of decks used; traditionally, points are in multiples of 10, thus a minimum opening bid might be agreed to be 100 or 250.Many alternate scoring rules drop the unnecessary trailing zero. In that case, bids of 10 and 25, respectively, have the same values. When a player has the turn to bid, the player may either bid or pass.
A popular variation for four player pinochle involves dealing a 4 card kitty, with the bid winner taking the kitty and discarding 4 cards from his hand. The point value of the discards can sometimes be added to the bid winner's total trick count or not, depending on the pre-established rules. In three player games the 6 card kitty can often lead to very competitive and extravagant bidding.
Each bid must be greater than the previous one, and be a multiple of 10 or 25. When a player passes, they can no longer bid. The auction ends when all subsequent players in rotation have passed after the last bid. The last bid becomes the "contract". The player that made this final bid will then declare trump in the suit that is desired. In some house rules, trump cannot be declared in any suit not containing a "run", "marriage" or "dix" meld.
In order for the winning bidder 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 accumulated from winning tricks. If the combined score is lower than the bid, then the bidding team or player has been "set". This means that the total bid amount is subtracted from the total game score, often accompanied by losing the points scored in meld for that hand as well. This can result in a negative score.
A related though different style of bidding is for the players to bid individually, and partners' bids are then summed. The winning bid only decides trump; both teams' bids become their contract, meaning any team can score or be set. This creates a more balanced game.
Passing cards
In some versions of pinochle, after the bid has been taken and trump declared in a partnership game, the bid winning team exchanges cards. It may be two, three, or four cards, depending on the version of the game. The partner of the bid winner passes first. The objective of the partner 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 an equal number of cards back to their partner. Variations are for the bid winner and partner to exchange the designated number of cards simultaneously, or for no passing to occur.
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 first.The types of melds include "arounds", "marriages", "flushes" and "pinochles". These melds are placed under "headings" where a card which is melded under a particular heading can be used again under another heading, but cannot be melded again under the same heading.
The group melds containing four of the same face cards – ace, king, queen or jack – must include one card from each of the different suits. They are scored as follows:
- "100 aces" or "aces around" – four aces of different suits – 100 or 10 points
- "80 kings" or "kings around" – four kings of different suits – 80 or 8 points
- "60 queens" or "queens around" – four queens of different suits – 60 or 6 points
- "40 jacks" or "jacks around" – four jacks of different suits – 40 or 4 points
- "1000 aces" or "aces abound" – all eight aces – 1,000 or 100 points
- "800 kings" or "kings abound" – all eight kings – 800 or 80 points
- "600 queens" or "queens abound" – all eight queens – 600 or 60 points
- "400 jacks" or "jacks abound" – all eight jacks – 400 or 40 points
- "Trump marriage" – king and queen of trump suit – 40 or 4 points, 80 or 8 for double. In some variations, a double marriage in trump is worth 400 or 40 points.
- "Marriage" – king and queen of a suit other than trump – 20 or 2 points, 40 or 4 for double
- "Flush", "family", "rope", "book", "straight", or "run" – A, 10, K, Q, and J of trump suit only – 150 or 15 points. Similar to the arounds, a double run – or two runs in trump in the same hand – is worth 1,500 points or 150 points.
The pinochle and dix are the "special melds".
- "Pinochle" – jack of diamonds and queen of spades – 40 or 4 points
- "Double pinochle" – both jacks of diamonds and both queens of spades – 300 or 30 points
- "Dix" – nine of trumps – 10 or 1 points each
After the melds are displayed, the points are counted and each player totals their individual meld scores.
| Meld name | Example | Point value | Simplified |
| Run in trump | 150 | 15 | |
| Double run in trump | 1500 | 150 | |
| Marriage in trump | 40 | 4 | |
| Dix in trump | 10 | 1 | |
| - | |||
| Hundred aces | 100 | 10 | |
| Thousand aces | 1000 | 100 | |
| Eighty kings | 80 | 8 | |
| Eight hundred kings | 800 | 80 | |
| Sixty queens | 60 | 6 | |
| Six hundred queens | 600 | 60 | |
| Forty jacks | 40 | 4 | |
| Four hundred jacks | 400 | 40 | |
| - | |||
| Marriage in non-trump | 20 | 2 | |
| Pinochle | 40 | 4 | |
| Double pinochle | 300 | 30 |
Because all of these values are multiples of ten, one can arrive at simplified values by removing the trailing zero from each point total. For instance, a pinochle has a simplified score of 4, a double Pinochle would score 30.