Hearts

Goal

Finish with the lowest score by avoiding hearts and the Queen of Spades.

How do points and winning work?

Four players each receive 13 cards. Hearts are penalty cards: each Heart costs 1 point and the Queen of Spades costs 13. Aim for the lowest total when someone reaches 100. All 13 tricks were scored. You took 6 penalty points, West 13, North 6 and East 1. Only captured Hearts and the Queen count, not the number of tricks. West reached 100. You and North tied at 16, the lowest total, so the shipped game recognized both as match winners. Your Ace completed the deal. West reached 100; your total of 16 was below North’s 46 and East’s 81, so you won the match.

How do I select, pass and play?

Click or tap cards, or use Tab and Enter. During passing, select exactly three cards and press Pass selected. Select a card again to deselect it. During play, only legal cards are enabled; selecting one plays it immediately. All three selected cards moved to West. Three cards arrived from East, leaving every player with 13 cards.

How does a trick work?

Players take turns around the table. Follow the suit of the first card if you can. The highest card of that suit wins all four cards and leads next. Ace is high, then King, Queen, Jack and 10 down to 2. Hearts has no trump suit. You followed the led suit. Ace outranks the King, so the engine awarded the trick to you. The off-suit Heart could not be played while you held Diamonds. The Two followed suit without beating the King. East took the trick; winning every trick is usually not the aim in Hearts.

What is special about the first trick?

The player holding the Two of Clubs must lead it, even if someone else dealt the cards. Being void allowed a discard, but first-trick rules blocked Hearts and the Queen of Spades while a non-penalty card was available. The shipped engine allows a penalty card when you cannot follow suit and have no non-penalty card. That Heart also broke Hearts.

When can I play or lead Hearts?

An off-suit Heart could not win this Diamond trick. It gave the winner a penalty point and made Hearts available for later leads. The Queen transferred 13 penalty points to the trick winner. In this implementation, only playing a Heart breaks Hearts; the Queen does not. The broken-Hearts flag permitted a Heart lead even though other suits remained in your hand. With no other suit available, the engine allowed a Heart lead before Hearts were broken.

Which direction do I pass?

This portal rotates passing left → across → right → hold. We now use the second hand, where your three cards go to North. Some traditional tables use a different order. The second-hand rotation sent the cards across the table and brought three cards back from North. The next rotation passes right. Your cards go to East and you receive cards from West. The third-hand rotation exchanged three cards in the rightward direction. Every fourth hand skips passing. All players keep their original 13 cards, and the Two of Clubs starts play. The next deal returns to passing left. Hold skipped the passing phase, but the normal opening-card rule still applied.

What is shooting the moon?

You captured all 13 Hearts and the Queen: 26 points. Shooting the moon gave each opponent 26 points and added zero to your score.

What carries into the next deal?

The deal ended before the match target. Scores carried forward, the dealer advanced and the hand number changed the passing direction.

What changes with difficulty?

Relaxed, Standard and Challenge keep the same card and scoring rules. They change computer pace and decisions. Challenge removes normal Hint, Undo and Redo. Normal Undo restores the last saved move snapshot; it cannot rewrite an entire match. Lesson Hint and Restart remain available.