Tarot Cards Game
Jeux

Jeux de Cartes / Card Games

Tarot Pack Zip

Historical

Tarot is the ancestor of all card games.

Introduced in Europe by the Saracens during the invasion of Italy in the 10th century, tarot cards were the first European cards (the first known game dates from 1379).

But if, until the Renaissance, they were used only to predict the future, the tarots did not long remain the prerogative of fortune-tellers, mages and fortune-tellers. They soon became a game whose success has persisted for more than five centuries now.

The word "tarot" comes from the Italian "torocco"; but there the mystery begins.

Some have argued that the word derives from "rota", the wheel, this symbol of fate. For others, it would come from "tora", the Jewish law.

We also thought of an Egyptian term designating the path of life and a Greek word that could refer to the ornamentation of the back of these cards made of compartments in grisaille.

In fact, we also designate under the name of tarot the back of the cards when it is not united.

The tarot is not Egyptian, as legend has it, but it was born in Lombardy around 1430.

This is why he first adopted the colors of the Italian games: cups, swords, staves and denarii.

This game was then called trionfi, Frenchified in “triumphs” (in the feminine!).

In the following century, it was replaced by tarocchi, a term which almost immediately became tarot in French.

In the 16th century, the tarot entered Germany, and it was there, paradoxically, that it took on more legible French colors (spades, diamonds, hearts, clubs).

This graphic mutation in no way affects the rules of the game, but opens the doors to Northern Europe as far as Denmark, and also those of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

However, in its Italian homeland, the game hardly survives except in the "reduced" area of ​​Piedmont, in Bologna and in a few Sicilian villages. France is today the country where we play tarot the most!

Number of players 4

Material: 1 tarot deck of 78 cards.

Goal of the game

The taker tries to make a contract, the defenders try to prevent him from doing so.

Card details:

The game has 78 cards called "blades".

If the tarot stands out against the landscape of card games, it is certainly not by its rules, which are the basis of all modern games, but above all by its cards.

First there is their imposing size, then their number: 78!

A beginner (especially a child) often has some trouble holding 18 cards of this size!

These 78 cards are distributed as follows:

4 families of 14 cards (spades, hearts, clubs, diamonds), i.e. by decreasing rank, king, queen, knight, valet, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, ace.

The king is the strongest suit card, the ace the weakest.

These cards consist of 21 numbered trump cards (from 1 to 21) and a special card: the EXCUSE (or fool).

In some traditional tarot cards the four suits are: sword, cup, wand and denarius. But in general we use are that of the French games (clubs, hearts, spades and diamonds).

In addition to the number, each asset represents a subject:

1

le Bateleur     

2

la Papesse

3

l'Impératrice

4

l'Empereur

5

le Pape

6

l'Amoureux

7

le Charriot

8

la Justice

9

l'Ermite

10

la Roue de Fortune

11

la Force

12

la Mort

13

le Pendu

14

la Tempérance

15

le Diable

16

la Foudre ou la Maison-Dieu

17

l'Étoile

18

la Lune

19

le Soleil

20

le Jugement

21

le Monde

 

Special tarot cards

the other 19 assets

 

the 3 « Oudlers »

Cavalier (tarot)
the 4 Knight

Details of 2 tarot trump cards In the 19th century, the so-called “profane” scenes succeeded the traditional figures of the “Marseille tarot cards”, used for divinatory purposes.

The Oudlers...

In the family of trumps, we distinguish the 1 and the 21 which, with the Excuse, are named “Oudlers” or “oudlers”.

The 21 and the Excuse are said to be "impregnable", whoever counts them in his cards at the start of the game will be certain to find them in the folds of his camp at the time of the count.

The 1 of trumps, baptized the “Petit”, is, him, “taken” by the opposite camp.

Note, among the figures, the presence of an additional card, the knight, hierarchically placed between the queen and the valet.

• 21 numbered cards, in ascending rank, from 1 to 21: the trumps.

The highest and the lowest, which are part of the 3 "ends", have special functions and play an important role in the final point count.

• The Excuse: The seventy-eighth card, adorned with a star and a mandolin player (some see it as reminiscent of the game's Italian origins), is a sort of all-purpose card. It is also the third “end”.

Card value and distribution

The tarot is a game of tricks with trumps (it is even, historically, the first), where a single attacker opposes the camp of the defenders, all having the objective of totaling a minimum number of points.

These points won or lost as the case may be will be multiplied by the coefficient specific to each auction.

It is also one of the very rare games where the value of the cards is expressed in half points (see below). The 78 cards alone represent (without bonuses) a total of 93 points.

Value of cards in points Minimum points for a contract
Kings and Oudlers 4½
Queen 3½
Knight 2½
Jacks 1½
other cards ½
36  points for the taker who has the 3 Oudlers
41 points with  2 Oudlers
51 points with  1 bout
56 points without any bout

 The goal of the game.

The Tarot is at the same time an individual and a team game.

Indeed, during a deal, one of the players (the Taker) is matched against the three other players (the Defenders) who form a team.

But this situation lasts only during each single deal. The Taker contracts during the bids that he will reach with his tricks a minimum amount of points.

This minimum amount is determined only by the number of Oudler(s) that the Taker will have among his tricks at the end of the game:

The minimum amount of points to reach does not depend on the bid taken.

The choice of the Dealer.

Before the first deal, all the cards are laid down backside and each player chooses one up. The lowest card designates the first Dealer.

A Trump is higher than any suit card.

If there is equality, the following priority order between the suits is applied: Spades - Hearts - Diamonds - Clubs.

Therefore the Ace of Clubs always designates the first Dealer.

The player who takes the Excuse must choose another card. For the next deals, the player placed on the right side of the previous Dealer becomes the new one.

The split and the deal.

The player facing the Dealer shuffles the cards. The pack face down is split in two parts by the player placed on the left side of the Dealer. The smallest part of the pack must contain at least 4 cards.

The cards are dealt counter-clockwise three by three. The Talon, or "Dog" ("le Chien" in French), is composed of 6 cards.

It is made during the dealing at the will of the Dealer one by one but without the first and the last card of the pack.

If the Ace of Trumps is the only Trump (including the Excuse) into one of the hands, this player must show his cards and that deal is not played.

The bids.

After having seen their hands, each player bids, beginning by the player placed on the right side of the Dealer.

Each player can only bid one time.

He can pass or he must bid at a higher level than the players before. The possible bids are as following:

• Pass.
If all the players are passing, the deal is not played and the player placed on the right side of the dealer makes another deal.

• Take.

• Guard.
For these two bids, only the computation of the scores differs. After the bids, the Dog is turned up and showed to the all the players.

Then its cards are included into the Taker's hand. In return, he must discard six cards, without showing them, but these cards will be included into the amount of his tricks at the end of the deal.

• Guard Without.
The Dog is not showed up but is included downside into the tricks of the Taker.

• Guard Against.
The Dog is not showed up but is included downside into the tricks of the Defenders.

The Discard.

The player who bade a Take or a Guard includes to his hand the 6 cards of the Dog.

Then he discards 6 of his 24 cards. This Discard stays secret but will be included into the tricks of the Taker.

The Taker cannot discard neither Oudlers nor Kings.

He can discard a Trump only if he has nothing else than Oudlers, Kings and Trumps. In this case, he must show to all the Defenders the discarded Trumps.

Playing the cards.

The opening is made by the player placed on the right side of the Dealer.

The order of the play is counter-clockwise.

Each trick is won by the highest Trump played, or the highest card of the suit if no Trumps were played.

The player who wins the trick opens the next one.

If a card of a suit opens a trick, each player has to follow the same suit. If a player has no cards of the requested suit, he must play a Trump.

When a player has neither cards of the requested suit, nor any Trumps, he plays any other card he wants.

If a Trump opens a trick, each player has to play a Trump, except when he has none, in which case he is free to play
any card he wants.

Whenever a Trump has to be played, either after a Trump opening or instead of a missing suit, a Trump higher than the highest played so far in the same trick is requested.

If the player cannot play a higher Trump, he has to play any other Trump. But he has to play a Trump, except if he has none, in which case he is free to play any other card he wants.

If the opening of a trick is the Excuse, then the second player of this trick determines the played suit (or Trumps).

The bonus.

•The Ace of Trumps at the end (in French: "le Petit au bout").

If the Ace of Trumps is in the 18th and last trick, the side who wins this trick gains a bonus of 10, multiplied according to the contract (see the Score section), whatever the winning side of the deal.

• The Handful (in French: "la Poignée").

A player which has 10 or more trumps into his hand can at his own choice declare a Handfull, either Simple, Double, or Triple. Before he plays his first card in the first trick, he has to show the right number of trumps as following:

Simple Handful, or 10 Trumps, for a bonus of 20.
Double Handful, or 13 Trumps for a bonus of 30.
Triple Handful, or 15 Trumps for a bonus of 40.

This bonus cannot be multiplied (see the Score section) but is added to the score of the winning side of the deal.

The Excuse shown inside a Handful indicates that the player has no other Trumps in his hand.

The Slam.

The Slam consists to win all the 18 tricks of a deal...

The Slam can be declared by the Taker in addition to the contract he bade. An extra bonus (not multiplied, see the
Score section) is added to the score of the deal:

• Slam declared and made: a bonus of 400 points.
• Slam not declared but made: a bonus of 200 points.
• Slam declared but not made: a forfeit of minus 200 points.

The Slam can be declared after the Discard. In any case, the player who declares a Slam makes the opening.

If the player who is trying to complete a Slam has the Excuse, he can play it at the last trick and he wins this trick if he has already gained all the other tricks.

In this case, the Ace of Trumps is considered to have been played "at the end" if it was played at the trick before the last one.

The Score.

To win the bid he has contracted, the Taker must reach a minimum amount of points according to the number of
Oudler(s) he has in his tricks at the end of the played deal (see the goal of the game section).

If the amount of the points in the tricks of the Taker is less than the required one, the Taker loses his bid.

A bid is worth 25 points to which are added to (or subtracted from) the points of the tricks that are above (or
under) the required amount of the points.

This number is multiplied by 2 with a Guard, by 4 with a Guard Without or by 6 with a Guard Against.

The same figure is subtracted from (or added to in the case of a lost bid) the score of the three Defenders, and added 3 times to (or subtracted 3 times from in the case of a lost bid) the score of the Taker.

Therefore, before each new deal, the sum of all the scores is always 0.

An example of scoring:

the Taker wins a Guard with 43 points, 2 Oudlers and the Ace of Trumps at the end.
 
Because he has two Oudlers, he had to make 41 points to win his bid.

Therefore, his gain is 43 - 41 = 2 pts.

The computation for an successful Guard is then
(25 + 2 + 10 (for the Ace of Trumps at the end)) x 2 (for the Guard) = + 74 pts.

The result gives - 74 pts for each of the three Defenders and + 74 x 3 = + 222 pts for the Taker.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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