Rummy

Gin rummy across the card room's table against Otto, who plays a patient game. Ten cards each. On your turn, draw from the stock or take the top of the discard pile, then discard one card. Three or four of a rank is a set; three or more in a row in one suit is a run; everything else in your hand is deadwood, an ace counting one and a court card ten.

How it plays

Tap the stock or the discard pile to draw. Your hand sorts itself and shows its best melds grouped, with the deadwood count on the slab. Tap a card to discard it. When the deadwood you would be left with is ten or less, a Knock button appears beside the discard: knock and the hand ends. With no deadwood at all you have gin.

A knock scores the difference between Otto's deadwood and yours, after Otto lays off whatever fits onto your melds. Gin scores a bonus of twenty-five plus all of Otto's deadwood, and nothing can be laid off on it. If you knock and Otto's deadwood is no higher than yours, that is an undercut, and Otto takes the difference plus twenty-five. The match runs to a hundred points, with the loser of each hand dealing the next, and your match points go to the leaderboard with a hundred more for taking the match.

Tips

Low cards are cheap deadwood; shed the court cards first unless they are close to a meld. The discard pile tells you what Otto does not want, and what you throw tells Otto the same, so do not feed the suit Otto has been taking. Knock early when you can: waiting for gin is pretty, but an undercut costs more than a small knock gains.

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