Swimming (card game)
Swimming or Thirty-one (regionally also Knack , Schnauz , Wutz , Bull and Hosn obi ) is a card game of chance for two to nine people. The name thirty-one ( French Trente-et-un ) also describes a forerunner of seventeen and four , for which 31 points instead of 21 are the best result.
Variants or similar games are known in the United States and Great Britain under the names Thirty-One , Blitz and Scat ; Swimming can also be played as a tournament .
This game is listed under the names Trente-un and Feuer on the list of forbidden games of the Austro-Hungarian Ministry of Justice - while the former name can also refer to the seventeen and four predecessors mentioned above , the name Feuer clearly refers to this game, as In the most common variation, a hand of three aces ( fire ) is of particular importance (see below).
The rules
General
Swimming is played clockwise with a pack of 32-sheet French or double-German cards ( Skat sheet ). When it is his turn to swap cards, each player tries to form a combination in his hand. The object of the game is not to end up with the combination with the lowest score.
| Examples of scoring |
|---|
 Heart lady
 Heart 10
 Jack of Diamonds
This combination counts as
10 + 10 = 20 points, since only the queen of hearts and the ten of hearts are of the same color. |
 Cross ace
 Cross king
 Cross 9
This combination is worth
11 + 10 + 9 = 30 points. |
 Diamond 7
 Heart 7
 7 of spades
This combination is worth
30 ½ points (if there is a tie, the higher card hand counts). |
 Diamond ace
 King of Diamonds
 Diamond 10
This combination is
worth 31 points |
Goal of the game
There are two different ways to create combinations. Either you collect cards of the same color and add their point values (see the card game forty-one ), where:
- An ace is worth eleven points
- the king, queen and jack face cards are each worth ten points and
- the number cards 10, 9, 8 and 7 count according to their eyes.
The highest possible number of points is thirty-one : a hand consisting of an ace and two pictures or an ace, a picture and a ten of the same suit.
Or you collect cards of the same rank, i.e. three sevens, three queens, etc. (which of course are of different colors). This combination always counts for 30 ½ points.
procedure
In an open game , the dealer distributes three face-down cards individually to all players, but two packs of three cards each to himself. He looks at the cards in one of the two piles in his stacks and decides whether he wants to play with these cards or not. If he wants to play with the cards from the first pile, he must place the second pile face up in the middle of the table. If he does not want to keep the cards from the first pile, he puts these three cards face up in the middle of the table and must pick up the cards from the second pile. The remaining cards are set aside.
The player to the left of the dealer starts the game. He can either swap one card or all three cards from his hand with cards in the middle - but not two. If he does not want to swap, he can either swap a card with the statement “I'm not pushing”, or close the game by knocking (usually with his knuckles on the table). Regionally it is also customary to say “I'm closing” instead of knocking.
Playing
A game can be ended in two different ways:
- If a player knocks or says: “I'll close .”, All other players are allowed to swap (or shove) again and the game is over.
- If a player has 31 points (“Thirty-one”, “Schnauz”, “Knack”, “Hosn obi” etc.) or, if the fire variant (see below) is being played, three aces in hand, he places them Cards face up on the table and the game ends immediately - which of course can happen immediately after the cards are dealt.
If the game is played over several rounds as usual, the losers are now determined. The loser is the player or players who can show the card combinations with the fewest points at the end of the game.
Swimming
If you want to play several rounds, each player symbolically has three lives . This can be any item, such as matches or coins. The loser or losers must each give up a life, which is placed in the middle of the game table.
If a player has lost all three lives, he can continue to play, but he now swims . If he loses one more time, he goes under and is eliminated. Swimming is therefore synonymous with a fourth life.
In this way there is an elimination tournament, as the individual players are gradually eliminated and ultimately only one player, the overall winner, remains. If stakes are played, the winner wins the stake of the losers (or their lives).
Variants and special rules
Swimming or thirty-one is played in a number of variations that differ from the basic rule given above. The rules given here are therefore by no means binding in the same way as the rules of chess - you should therefore definitely agree on the rules used before starting a game. The most important deviations concern:
- Cards: With a larger number of participants, you can play 52 hands with a pack of Whist cards; In Switzerland you also use 36-sheet Jass cards and play counter-clockwise.
- Fire or Lightning: A hand consisting of three cards of the same rank is generally worth 30½ points. In many cases, however, a hand of three aces is considered the highest combination and is called fire or lightning . If a player has three aces, he reveals his cards and the game ends immediately. In this case all other players lose a life.
- Loser of a game: For many players the rule applies that at the end of a round all players with 20 points or less must pay, as well as those with the lowest number of points over 20 points. However, the winner of a round never pays, even if he is the only player with a score over 20. This rule not only speeds up the game, it also offers additional finesse: If a player has 21 points and cannot improve significantly by a possible exchange, he must pay in any case. It is therefore advantageous for him to worsen his hand by swapping so that at least one other player loses a life - this tactic is called tearing .
- If all players move one after the other, the three cards from the middle are set aside and three new cards are revealed from the pile. Now it is the turn of the player who started to push.
- Pushing is not always allowed, which reduces the players' options to swapping and knocking .
- When trading , you can either add up the point values of cards of the same suit or of cards of the same rank (see for example the card game forty-one ).
- In the face-down game , the player to the left of the dealer receives five cards: first three and then two . He keeps three cards for himself and passes the two remaining cards face down to the player on the left. Each additional player proceeds in the same way as soon as it is their turn.
literature
- Claus D. Grupp: Games of chance with balls, dice and cards , Falken Verlag, Wiesbaden 1976 (contains the game of trading )
- Sven Pieper, Bärbel Schmidt card games , Reclams Universal Library Volume 4216, Stuttgart 1994
- Peter Arnold, Editor: The Complete Book of Card Games , Chancellor Press, London 2002
- Lawrence H. Dawson, Editor: The Complete Hoyle's Games , Wordsworth reference, London 1950, reprinted 1994
- Albert H. Morehead, Geoffrey Mott-Smith: Hoyle's Rules of Games , 2nd revised edition. A Signet Book, 1983
- The United States Playing Card Company, Joli Quentin Kansil, Editor: Official Rules of Card Games , 90th Edition, 2004