Ecarte
Objective:
In Ecarte the goal is to build a trick-winning hand.
Use a standard deck, all cards from two to six are removed leaving 32 cards. In Ecarte Cards rank from high to low king, queen, jack, ace, 10, 9, 8, 7. Five cards are dealt in twos and ones, and the next card is turned over to determine the trump suit. If it's a king, dealer scores one point immediately. The rest of the pack becomes the stock.
How to play Ecarte:
Players cut to determine the dealer. Player examines his hand and decides if he wants to play it. He says ’play’, then play starts right away, or ’propose’ if he doesn't like his hand. If he proposes, dealer can say either ’play’, in which case play starts anyway, which is a signal that both can change any number of cards in their hand. Starting with the non-dealer, they discard face down onto a pile and draw the same number of cards from the stock.
Process is repeats until play starts. If the stock runs out, players are stuck with the cards in their hands.
In Ecarte the king of trumps may be annouced by the person who holds it before he plays the first trick (which is started by the non-dealer), and scores a point. Whoever leads for that trick states its suit, and his opponent must follow this if he is able to, otherwise trump or discard. The winner of each trick leads to the next.
Taking all five tricks counts as 2 points, which is called a ’vole’. If the hands are played as originally dealt, whoever called ’play’ scores a point if he makes the most tricks and two for a vole. If he makes less tricks than his opponent, his opponent scores two points. However, if cards were changed at the beginning, scoring is 1 point per round and 2 for vole.
History of Ecarte:
A two player French card game that was once very popular in the 19th century. The word
Ecarte means "discarded", this game was developed from an old card game called la triomphe. Ecarte is related to Euchre and Whist.
Spades
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