SNOOZER: A Fun Trick-Taking Card Game

If you’re looking for a fun card game to play with your friends, Snoozer is a great choice! It’s a trick-taking game that can be played by 4 to 7 players. If you have exactly 4 players, you can either play as individuals or team up in partnerships of 2. In this game, teammates will sit opposite each other.

The goal of Snoozer is simple: be the first team to reach 100 points! How do you do that? By bidding on how many tricks you think you can win in each round and being smart about winning certain point cards.

Don’t let the name fool you – Snoozer is also known as Dom Pedro, so you might have heard of it by that name as well.

Getting Started: Setup

Before you can dive into the excitement of Snoozer, you need to set up the game. Here’s what you need to do:

First, randomly choose a dealer. After each round, the dealer role will pass to the left. The dealer is in charge of shuffling the deck and dealing each player a hand of 6 cards. They will deal the cards in sets of 3, so each player gets 3 cards at a time. Once everyone has their cards, it’s time to start the bidding round!

Some versions of Snoozer have a slight variation in setup. In these versions, the entire deck is dealt out as evenly as possible among the players. After the bid is made and trumps are called, players will then discard down to 6 cards to begin the game.

Understanding Card Rankings and Values

Hey there! Let me break down the rankings and values of cards in Snoozer for you.

First off, the trump suit can change with each round, so keep that in mind!

Now, let’s talk rankings. In Snoozer, the highest-ranked card in the trump suit is the Ace. After that, it goes King, Queen, Jack, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, and finally, the joker is the lowest-ranked card in the trump suit.

But what about the other suits? Don’t worry, they follow the same ranking as the trump suit, with the Ace being the highest-ranked card and the 2 being the lowest-ranked.

Now, let’s move on to the values assigned to certain cards. Only cards from the trump suit have points. Here’s the breakdown:

• The Ace of trump is worth 1 point.
• The Jack of trump is worth 1 point.
• The Ten of trump is worth 1 point.
• The 9 of trump is worth 9 points.
• The 5 of trump is worth 5 points.
• The 3 of trump is worth 3 points.
• The 2 of trump is worth 1 point.
• And finally, the joker is worth a whopping 15 points!

Let’s Talk Bidding

When we start a bidding game, it begins with the player sitting to the left of the dealer. This player has the option to either bid or pass. If they choose to bid, their bid must be higher than the previous bid. There is no minimum bid, but the maximum bid is set at 36. The purpose of bidding is to have the opportunity to call the trump suit.

However, the dealer always has the advantage of being able to call and become the winner of the bid.

Once the bidding is complete, the winner of the bid gets the privilege of calling the trump suit.

GAMEPLAY

The objective for each team is to win the tricks that contain the point cards. In addition, the team that won the bid must also win at least the number of points they bid in order to score their point cards.

When I’m playing a game where bidding is involved, the person who won the bidding round goes first, and then we continue playing in clockwise order. For the first trick, we have to lead with a trump card. But for the tricks after that, we can lead with any suit. All the other players have to follow the suit if a trump card was led, but if they don’t have that suit, they can play any card. They can also follow suit or play a trump card if a non-trump was led, but if they can’t do either, they can play any card to the trick.

The trick is won by the highest trump card played. If no trumps were played, then the highest card of the suit led wins the trick. And the winner of the trick gets to lead the next trick.

SCORING

After all the tricks have been played, it’s time to score. The players who didn’t win the bid still get points based on the cards they collected, regardless of whether the other team completed their bid or not.

If I manage to complete my bid, I get to score all the points I won during the tricks. But if I fail to complete my bid, I’ll lose points equal to the ones I won.

The point cards have a specific order when it comes to scoring and determining the winner. The order goes like this: Ace, 2, jack, 10, 3, 5, 9, joker.

END OF GAME

We keep track of our scores over several rounds, and the team that reaches 100 points first wins the game.

If both teams reach 100 points in the same round, the team that reaches it first following the scoring order becomes the winner.

I’m Amber, and I use they/them pronouns. I love writing and playing games. I’m a gaming master, and I have a soft spot for dogs, plants, and D&D.