JABBERWOCKY
Hey there! Let me tell you about Jabberwocky, a cool variation of the game Oh Hell that started in Hawaii. We’re gonna have thirteen rounds, and in each round, you’ll get some cards and have to make a bid on how many tricks you think you can win. The trick is to be really accurate with your bids because you only earn points if you bid correctly. If you miss your bid, well, you don’t get any points at all. Tough break, right?
THE CARDS & THE DEAL
So, in Jabberwocky, we use a regular deck of 52 cards. The 2’s are at the bottom of the totem pole, while the Aces are the top dogs. And get this, the trump suited cards are the big shots in the ranking.
Alright, let’s talk about the card game. It’s a pretty interesting game, and I want to explain it to you.
The game goes like this: we play thirteen rounds, and in each round, we get a different number of cards. In the first round, the dealer gives each player 3 cards. The rest of the cards are placed face down on the table, and the dealer flips the top card to decide the trump suit.
Now, let’s talk about how the deals work. The order of dealing goes like this: 3-4-5-6-7-8-9-8-7-6-5-4-3. The deal moves left each round, so everyone gets a chance to be the dealer.
THE PLAY
Each round has three phases: bidding, playing, and scoring. Let’s start with the bidding phase.
In the bidding phase, each player decides how many tricks they think they can win. It starts with the player to the left of the dealer. They say out loud the number of tricks they believe they can capture. The scorekeeper keeps track of all the bids. The dealer can’t bid a number that brings the total number of tricks to be won.
Once we’ve all put in our bids, it’s time to start playing. Remember, the person who bid first will lead the first trick. They’ll choose a card from their hand and play it face up for everyone to see. But there’s a rule – you can’t play a trump suited card to lead a trick until that suit has been broken. And a suit is considered broken when a player can’t follow suit and instead plays a trump card.
If you’re not familiar with the term, a trump card is a special card that outranks all other cards in the game. So, even if you have a higher card of the lead suit, you must play a trump card if the suit has been broken.
The other players in the game must try to match the lead suit if they have cards of that suit. However, if they don’t have any cards of the lead suit, they can play any other suit they want. Just remember, once a trump card has been played to a trick, it can be used to lead the next trick.
So, here’s how it goes: the person who has the highest-ranking card (either in the same suit as the first card played or in the trump suit) wins the trick. That person gets to lead the next round. We keep playing like this until all the cards have been played.
SCORING
If you manage to meet your bid, you earn 1 point. But if you don’t meet your bid, you get zero points.
WINNING
When we finish the final round, the player with the highest score is the winner. If there’s a tie, well, we leave it at that.
MARK’S NOTES
I’m a big fan of games like Oh Hell and Wizard, so stumbling upon Jabberwocky during one of my deep dives into card games was a delightful surprise. The thing is, I only found one website that talks about this game being created in Hawaii, but there’s no source to back that up. But hey, it doesn’t really matter. What does matter is how incredibly fun this game is.
When it comes to bidding in Wizard, precision is absolutely essential. Missing your bid will cost you heavily in this game. In Oh Hell, the penalties for missing your bid aren’t as severe, but you’ll still only earn 1 point for each trick over your bid. Going under earns you no points at all. Jabberwocky takes a more friendly approach by awarding 1 point to players who correctly bid.
There’s another interesting twist in Jabberwocky that will be familiar to Hearts players. In this game, you can’t lead a trick with a card from the trump suit until someone has already played a card from that suit. This rule sets Jabberwocky apart from Oh Hell.
All things considered, I believe that Jabberwocky has a lot to offer fans of trick-taking games.