Welcome to Kwajongen!

I’m here to introduce you to an exciting card game called Kwajongen. It’s a game that requires 4 players split into two teams. The teams are made up of partners who sit opposite each other. You can either choose your partner or leave it up to chance – it’s your call. The main objective of the game is to be the first team to decrease your score to zero. And guess what? You achieve this by winning rounds! The trick is to score more points than your opponents in each round.

Now, let’s talk about the deck used in Kwajongen. Although the original game uses a French-suited deck, we’re going to simplify things by using a standard 52-card deck. This way, you don’t have to worry about accessing specialty cards.

Getting Set Up

The first order of business is choosing the first dealer. It’s as simple as picking someone at random! And here’s an interesting twist – for each new round, the dealer passes the responsibility clockwise.

Now, let’s modify our regular 52-card deck for this game. We’ll remove all cards that have a value of 8 or lower. This adjustment ensures that the game runs smoothly and according to the rules.

Hey there! So, this is how the game goes: First, the dealer shuffles the deck and has the player on their right cut it. Then, every player gets a 4-card hand, with 2 cards being dealt at a time. The rest of the cards are placed face down in the center of the table.

Now, here comes the deal: The dealer gives each player 2 cards and themselves 1 card face up. After that, each player gets 2 more cards, while the dealer gets 3. The face-up card the dealer gets will determine the suggested trump suit.

Alright, it’s time to get into the game! Starting from the player to the left of the dealer, each player can choose to play or pass. If a player decides to play, it means they accept the trump suit and are committed to scoring more points than the opposing team. Once a player says play, the game begins immediately. But hey, if all players pass, the cards go back to the dealer for a fresh deal.

Here’s How the Cards Rank and Their Values

The way we rank cards is quite traditional. We start with the Ace, then go to the King, Queen, Jack, 10, and end with the 9, which is the lowest. However, if we use French cards, the order changes slightly. The 1 becomes the highest, followed by the Roi, Dame, Valet, 10, and finally the 9, which is still the lowest.

Now, let’s talk about the values assigned to each card for scoring purposes. Following the order I mentioned earlier, the cards are valued as 4 points, 3 points, 2 points, and 1 point, respectively. This means that in each round, there’s a potential for a total of 40 points.

Moving on to gameplay, it all starts with the player to the left of the dealer. They kick off the round, and then play continues clockwise. The first player has the freedom to play any card they want, and the other players must follow suit if they have a card of the same suit. However, if they don’t have a matching card, they have two options: they can play a trump card if they have one, or if they don’t have a trump card either, they can play any card they choose.

So, now you know how the cards are ranked and valued, as well as the basic rules of gameplay. With this knowledge, you’re ready to delve into the world of card games and have a blast!

In a game of tricks, the winner is determined by the highest-ranked trump card, if there is one. If there is no trump card, then the highest-ranked card of the suit that was led wins the trick. When I win a trick, I take the cards and place them face-down in a pile. These cards will be scored later. The winner of the trick also gets to lead the next trick.

SCORING

Once all the tricks have been won, it’s time to start scoring.

Each team starts with a score of 10 points. After each round is finished, we tally up the scores. The team that scores the most points gets to decrease their score by 1 point. If they have won all 4 tricks, they can decrease their score by 2 points instead. If my team, the play caller’s team, doesn’t score the most points, we have to increase our score by 1 point. If there’s a tie, my team adds 1 point to our score, but the other team doesn’t decrease their score at all.

If at the start of this round all players passed and we had to have another round, we add up the point values for scoring the most points. Instead of increasing our score, we actually decrease it by 2. However, if someone wins all 4 tricks, we decrease our score even more, by 3.

END OF GAME

The game comes to an end when our team’s score reaches 0 or goes below 0. And guess what? We win! We’re the champions!

The game comes to an end when our team’s score reaches 0 or goes below 0. And guess what? We win! We’re the champions!