Baloot

Full rules

1. Overview
2. The cards
3. Setup
4. Bidding
5. Doubling
6. Playing the tricks
7. Projects
8. Scoring
9. Winning the game
10. Tips for beginners
11. Variants

Overview

Baloot is the most popular card game in Saudi Arabia and is also played in Kuwait. It is a close relative of the French game Belote: four players in two teams win tricks to collect valuable cards. In each hand one player becomes the declarer, either in Hokum (a game with a trump suit) or in Sun (no trumps, double value). Points also come from projects – sets of cards in your hand – and from the King and Queen of trumps, the Baloot. The first team to 152 game points wins.

• Players: exactly 4, in two teams of two. Partners sit opposite each other.
• You need: one standard 52-card deck, and paper and pen for scoring.

The cards

Take out all 2s, 3s, 4s, 5s and 6s and the jokers. You play with 32 cards: A, K, Q, J, 10, 9, 8, 7 in each suit.

A trick is one round in which each player plays one card, face up; the best card wins all four. In Hokum, the trump suit is the strongest suit: any trump beats any card of another suit, and in trumps the Jack and 9 jump to the top.

Both columns run from the highest card to the lowest. The team that wins the last trick gets 10 extra points. So every hand is worth 162 card points in Hokum and 130 in Sun.

Setup

Dealing, bidding and play go anticlockwise (to the right).

1. Dealer: choose the first dealer at random. After each hand the turn to deal passes to the right.
2. Deal: the dealer shuffles and the player to the dealer's left may cut. The dealer gives each player 3 cards, then 2 more, face down, starting with the player to the right – everyone has 5.
3. Exposed card: the dealer turns the next card face up on the table. The rest of the pack stays face down until after the bidding.

Bidding

The bidding decides who takes the exposed card, which team are the declarers (they undertake to win at least half the points), and whether the hand is Hokum or Sun. The player to the dealer's right speaks first.

First round (the dealer says "First"): each player in turn says

• Pass – no bid for now.
• Hokum – "I'll play with the suit of the exposed card as trumps."
• Sun – "I'll play without trumps." Sun beats Hokum: after a Hokum bid, any player – even one who passed – may still say Sun. If a Sun is bid, any player who spoke earlier in the round may take it over with their own Sun; priority goes to the player nearest the dealer's right.
• Ashkal – only for the third player or the dealer, and only if everyone before them passed. It is a Sun bid, but the bidder's partner takes the exposed card and becomes declarer.

Second round: if all four passed, the dealer says "Second" and each player in turn may

• Pass,
• bid Hokum in a suit other than the exposed card's (players who haven't yet spoken in this round may still overcall it with Sun), or
• bid Sun, which ends the bidding.

If all four pass again, the cards are thrown in and the next player deals.

Completing the deal: the declarer takes the exposed card (in Ashkal, the bidder's partner does). A second-round Hokum bidder now names the trump suit. The dealer then deals the rest, to the right: 2 cards to the declarer, 3 to everyone else. Everyone has 8 cards.

Doubling

Hokum: before the first card is played, either opponent of the declarer may say "Double" (score ×2). The declarer may answer "Triple" (×3), the doubler "Quadruple" (×4), and the declarer finally "Gahwa" – the winners of this hand win the whole match.

Whoever says Double or Quadruple also says whether play is open or locked. In a locked game nobody may lead a trump unless they have nothing but trumps.

Sun: a double is only allowed if one team has more than 100 points and the other less than 100. Then an opponent of the declarer may double; nothing higher is possible.

Playing the tricks

The player to the dealer's right always leads to the first trick, whoever is declarer. The winner of a trick leads to the next. The highest trump wins the trick; if there is none, the highest card of the suit led.

Sun: follow suit if you can; otherwise play any card.

Hokum – you must always follow suit if you can. Besides:

1. Trumps led: you must play a trump that beats the highest one in the trick, if you can – unless your partner is winning the trick. If you can't beat it, play any trump; with no trumps, any card.
2. Another suit led, and you have it: play any card of that suit, high or low.
3. Another suit led, and you have none: - If an opponent is winning the trick, you must win it with a trump if you can. If you can't, play any card. - If your partner is winning, you may play any card. Exception: if your partner led the card and it was neither an Ace nor announced as "Ekka", you must still trump.

Ekka: in Hokum, when you lead the highest card still out in a side suit (e.g. the 10 once the Ace has gone), you may say "Ekka". This frees your partner from trumping it.

Projects

A project is a set of cards in your hand that scores extra game points:

A sequence is a run in one suit in the order A K Q J 10 9 8 7 (A-K-Q is a sequence, A-10-K isn't). One card can't be in two projects. Four 9s, 8s or 7s are nothing.

1. Declare a project (say its name) when you play to the first trick – but only if nobody has already declared a higher one.
2. After the first trick, the best project wins: higher points first; four of a kind beats a sequence of 5; then the higher top card; then whoever declared first.
3. At the second trick, the player with the best project shows it; that player's partner may show their projects too. Only this team scores its projects – the other team's count for nothing.

Baloot: the King and Queen of trumps in one hand score 2 game points, for either team. Say "Baloot" when you play the second of them. It is never doubled. A shown Sira or Fifty that contains it scores it automatically. A player who shows a Hundred containing it, or four Kings or four Queens, can't score it as well.

Scoring

1. Count. Only one team, the counting team, counts its card points (including 10 for the last trick). Normally these are the declarer's opponents; after a Double or Quadruple it is the declarer's team, after a Triple the opponents again.

2. Convert to game points.

• Hokum: round to the nearest 10 (5 rounds down), then divide by 10. 56–65 → 6, 66–75 → 7. The other team gets the rest of 16.
• Sun: round to the nearest 10, but leave a total ending in 5 as it is; then divide by 5. 56–64 → 12, 65 → 13. The other team gets the rest of 26.

3. Add projects and Baloot to the teams that scored them.

4. Who won? The team with more game points. On a tie, look at the counting team's card points:

• Hokum: ending in 2–5 → the counting team wins; 6–0 → it loses; 1 → the declarer's team wins.
• Sun: ending in 1–4 → the counting team wins; 6–9 → it loses; 0 or 5 → the declarer's team wins.

5. Write the scores.

• Declarers won, no double: each team scores its own game points.
• Declarers lost: the opponents score everything – 16 (Hokum) or 26 (Sun), plus all shown projects and Baloot of both teams. The declarers score nothing.
• Doubled game: the winning team scores everything and the losers nothing. Card points count ×2, ×3 or ×4; projects are doubled only; Baloot stays 2. Gahwa wins the match.
• Al-kaboot (one team wins all 8 tricks): that team scores 25 (Hokum) or 44 (Sun) plus its own projects and Baloot (2) (doubled: 50 or 88 plus double projects); the other team scores nothing.

Example: Hokum, no double. East is declarer, so North–South count. They took 77 card points → rounded to 80 → 8; East–West get 16 − 8 = 8. It's a tie; 77 ends in 7, so the counting team loses and the declarers win: each team writes 8. Had North–South also shown a Fifty (5), they would have had 13 against 8 and scored 21 (16 + 5), East–West nothing.

Winning the game

Write down both teams' totals after every hand. When a team reaches 152 game points or more, the team with the higher total wins the match (sakka). If both are equal and over 152, play one more hand.

Tips for beginners

• Bid Hokum on the Jack or 9 of trumps. They are the two highest trumps and worth 34 points together.
• Bid Sun on Aces and 10s. Without trumps, Aces can't be ruffed, and Sun doubles the value of the hand.
• You bid on five cards. Three more are still to come – or the exposed card plus two if you become declarer.
• Give points to a winning partner: if your partner will take the trick, play your 10 or Ace on it.
• Count trumps. There are 8; know how many are still out.

Variants

• Kawesh (Saneen): a player whose first five cards are all 9s, 8s and 7s may cancel the hand in the first round of bidding; the next player deals.
• Trump sequences first: at some tables, of two equal sequences the one in trumps wins.
• Ashkal in the second round: in some regions, e.g. Riyadh, the third player and dealer may bid Ashkal in the second round too.
• Third round: at some tables, if all pass twice and the exposed card is an Ace, the player to the dealer's right alone may still bid.
• Baloot only for its holders: at some tables, a Baloot declared by the losing team is simply lost.
• Declarer leads: some online versions let the declarer lead to the first trick; pagat.com's informants all say the player to the dealer's right leads.