Skat

Skat is a sophisticated trick-taking card game played with a piquet pack or an equivalent 32-card pack with German suits. It is reputedly one of the best 3-player games. Skat was invented in Altenburg, Germany in the early 19th century. By the end of World War I it had become Germany's national game.

The official standard rules for all countries including Germany are defined in the International Skat Order of 1998. Locally played rules often reflect an earlier stage in the game's development or add further features.

Modern standard rules
The game is played with a pack of 32 cards consisting of Ace, Ten, King, Queen, Jack, 9, 8 and 7 in four suits. The game is most commonly played with French-suited cards, although in some regions in Germany and Austria German-suited cards are preferred. The cards carry values as shown in the table, for a total of 120 card points. It can be observed that the 12 low cards have no point value at all, while 84 of the game's 120 card points are concentrated in the 8 high cards. Only the 12 court cards have point values close to the average.

Skat is played clockwise and for a full number of rounds. A round consists of 3 plays; it finishes after each player has dealt once. For each play, the dealer deals 10 cards to each player and deposits 2 cards face down in the middle as the skat. The dealer must follow the scheme 3–skat–4–3.

The players now bid for the privilege of choosing a contract and playing as a soloist against the party consisting of the other two. At the end of the play either the soloist or the opposition players will win, and the play will have a certain value that depends on the contract, the card points won by the respective parties, and several other factors. To keep the contract, the soloist must win the play and the value of the play must be at least as indicated by the bid. In this case the soloist scores the value of the play. A soloist who loses the play or who wins a game whose value is below the bidding value loses twice the value of the play or twice (an approximation to) the bidding value, whichever is higher.

The main purpose of the complicated bidding and scoring rules is to encourage the choice of a moderately risky contract. Among skilled skat players, all but the most extreme card distributions lead to interesting plays. Moreover, the alternation between playing alone and playing in various teams gives the game variety beyond that of most other auction games.

Suit and grand contracts
The soloist may announce a suit contract in any of the four suits. All four Jacks are trumps and full members of the trump suit. The card ranks within the trump suit are as shown in the table. Thus the highest trumps are always the Jack of clubs, Jack of spades, Jack of hearts and Jack of diamonds (in this order), followed by the Ace of trumps etc. As a result, one third of the cards (11 out of 32) are trumps, and the trump suit has considerably more cards than any of the three plain suits (11 vs. 7).

The soloist has the privilege of picking up the skat and discarding any two of the resulting 12 cards. The two discarded cards count towards the soloist's total card point score. This is a good opportunity to discard a single Ten in a suit in which the soloist does not hold any other cards. Two discarded Aces or Tens contribute one sixth of the total card points towards winning the play, a substantial contribution.

Regardless of who won the auction and announced the contract, forehand (the player to the dealer's left) leads to the first trick. Players must follow suit whenever possible. A player who cannot follow suit may play any other card. The trick is won by the party that played the highest trump. If the trick does not contain a trump, it is won by the party that played the highest card of the suit led.

Generally it is an advantage for the opposing players if the player to the soloist's right leads. In this case the first opposing player can try to lead with a plain suit which their partner does not hold. The partner can then react very flexibly after seeing the card played by the soloist. It is much more tricky if the player to the soloist's left leads. A rule of thumb at the beginning of the game is "long path – short suit". Long path" refers to the path from the leading player to the soloist, the partner being in the way. "Short suit" is the recommendation that the leading player lead with a suit of which they hold only few cards.

A grand is played in exactly the same way as a suit contract, except that no natural suit is declared trumps. As a result, the four Jacks form a tiny trump suit on their own, and along with the 4 natural suits there is a total of 5 suits. The scarcity of trumps (at most four of the ten tricks may contain a trump) gives this contract a flavour that is very different to that of a suit contract.

After the last trick the parties count their card points and check that the total is 120. The soloist must win more than half of the card points, i.e. at least 61 points, to win the play. Otherwise the opposing players win the play. If one of the two parties scored 30 card points or less, the play is called schneider. If one of the parties won all tricks and the other none, the play is called schwarz. Since the two cards discarded by the soloist at the beginning have a maximal card value of 22 points, schneider implies schwarz.

The value of the play is determined by the formula
 * value = base value &times; (tops + multiplier).

The base value (see table) depends on the chosen trump suit. The tops are the number of top trumps held or not held by the soloist. A play is said to be "with n tops" if the soloist's 12 initial cards included the highest n trumps, starting with the Jack of clubs. It is said to be "without n tops" if the soloist's 12 initial cards included none of the highest n trumps. In either case n is the number used in the formula. The multiplier is always at least "1 for the play". It is increased by 1 if the game is schneider, and it is increased once more if it is schwarz.

The base value for a grand contract is 24, i.e. twice the base value of a clubs contract and almost three times the base value of a diamonds contract. This very high base value is often considered a weak point of skat. Among skilled players grand contracts tend to dominate, and are felt to be less interesting than ordinary suit contracts.

The player who won the auction with a bid of 48 holds Ten, King, Queen, 9, 8, 7 of hearts but no Jacks, and for some reason wants to play hearts. Ignoring schneider and schwarz, the player expects the play's value to be 10 &times; (1 + 5) = 60. The player now picks up the skat and finds the Jack of clubs. What was planned as a play without 5 tops becomes a play with 1 top. Again ignoring schneider and schwarz, we can expect a value of 10 &times; (1 + 1) = 20.
 * Example

The prospective soloist cannot possibly win all tricks, and even if this were possible the value would still be only 10 &times; (3 + 1) = 40. The player will have to switch to grand for a value of 24 &times; (1 + 1) = 48. Whether this can be won depends on the other cards and the player's skills.

Null contracts
Like many solo games, Skat also offers a allows the choice of a negative contract, in this case called null The objective for the soloist is to lose all tricks. The card points are irrelevant in this case, and in fact the Tens rank in their natural position immediately above the 9. Moreover, there are no trumps, and the Jacks also rank in their natural position between the Queen and Ten.

An important rule for checking whether a hand is suitable for a null contract is that "nobody goes below 7, 9 and Jack". The contract is safe if all suits are safe.

The soloist may also choose to play without picking up the skat. This is known as a null hand. Another variant is null ouvert, in which the soloist plays with all their hand cards spread face up on the table. These two variants can be combined to obtain an even higher play value.

The values of the null contracts were chosen so that they are between the values of the clubs and spades contracts with 1, 2, 3 and 4 tops, respectively. Historically, the null ouvert is responsible for the grand's base value of 24. The grand previously had a base value of 20, as is still the case in some local variants. It was changed because it was felt inappropriate that a null ouvert (46 points) could beat a grand with or without 1 top (previously 20 &times; 2 = 40 points) in the bidding phase. In the modern standard rules a grand with or without 1 top is worth 24 &times; 2 = 48, which is slightly more than a null ouvert.

Hand contracts
A soloist who chooses a suit or grand contract may decide to play a hand contract, i.e. not to pick up the skat, to increase the game value. In this case the player has less information about total card distribution and the expected value of the play. Except for the higher play value, the skat is treated as if the soloist had picked up and discarded the two cards. In particular, any trumps contained in the skat factor into the determination of the number of tops.

A hand contract (and only a hand contract ) may be further modified by announcing schneider, schwarz or ouvert. By announcing schneider or schwarz, the soloist guarantees not only to win, but to also ensure that the play ends in schneider or schwarz, respectively. Ouvert is a stronger form of a schwarz announcement in which the soloist places all hand cards face up on the table and plays them out from there. Ouvert implies announcements of schneider and schwarz, and by announcing schwarz the soloist implicitly announces schneider as well.

To win a play in which schneider has been announced, the soloist must ensure that the opponent players win at most 30 card points worth of tricks. To win a schwarz contract, the soloist must win all tricks.

If the soloist did not announce schneider (or schwarz, ouvert), the value of a hand contract is determined in exactly the same way as an ordinary suit or grand contract, except that the multiplier is increased by "1 for hand".

If the soloist announced schneider but not schwarz, the multiplier is always increased by "1 for hand", "1 for schneider" and "1 for schneider announced". Thus the total multiplier is 4, or 5 in case either party wins all tricks. There is no "eigenschneider", i.e. "1 for schneider" is never added more than once.

If the soloist announced schwarz but not ouvert, the multiplier is always increased by "1 for hand", "1 for schneider", "1 for schneider announced", "1 for schwarz" and "1 for schwarz announced". If the soloist announced ouvert, an additional "1 for ouvert" is added.

Skat for more than 3 players
An individual game is always played by exactly 3 players. In the case of more than 3 players the dealer does not participate in the game itself; only the 3 players to the dealer's left do.