Écarté

Full rules

1. Overview
2. The cards
3. Setup
4. Proposing an exchange
5. The King of trumps
6. Playing the tricks
7. Scoring
8. Winning the game
9. Tips for beginners
10. Variants

Overview

Écarté is a fast French game for two players. Each hand is played with only five cards, and you need to win three of the five tricks. Before playing, you may try to improve your hand by exchanging cards – but only if your opponent agrees. Holding or turning up the King of trumps scores a bonus point. The first player to reach 5 points wins.

• Players: exactly 2.
• You need: one standard 52-card deck, and paper and pen (or counters) to keep score.

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.

The order is unusual: in every suit the King is highest and the Ace comes below the Jack:

K – Q – J – A – 10 – 9 – 8 – 7

The trump suit is the strongest suit in a hand: any trump beats any card of another suit. Cards have no point values – only the number of tricks counts.

Setup

1. Dealer: both players cut; the one with the higher card chooses who deals first. After that the deal alternates.
2. Deal: the dealer shuffles, the opponent cuts, and the dealer gives each player 5 cards, face down: first 2 to the opponent and 2 to themselves, then 3 each (or 3 first, then 2).
3. Trump: the dealer turns the next card (the 11th) face up and places it on the table. Its suit is trumps for this hand.
4. Stock: the remaining 21 cards are put face down next to it as the stock.

The dealer's opponent is called the non-dealer.

King turned up: if the turned-up card is a King, the dealer scores 1 point at once.

Proposing an exchange

Five cards can be a poor hand. Before play, the players may exchange cards – the French word écarté means "discarded".

1. The non-dealer either plays (keeps the hand as it is) or proposes ("I propose").
2. If the non-dealer proposes, the dealer either accepts or refuses. - Refuses: play starts at once with the cards as dealt. - Accepts: the non-dealer puts 1 to 5 cards face down aside and the dealer gives the same number of new cards from the top of the stock. Then the dealer also discards at least one card and takes the same number from the stock.
3. After an exchange the non-dealer may propose again, and the dealer may again accept or refuse. This goes on until one of them wants to play.
4. If the stock runs short, the non-dealer still gets as many cards as asked for (or as many as are left), and the dealer must play with the hand they have.

Discarded cards stay out of play. The turned-up trump card stays on the table and is never taken into a hand.

The risk: refusing or not proposing shows confidence – and is punished if it goes wrong (see Scoring).

The King of trumps

A player who holds the King of trumps may show it and say "I have the King" – this scores 1 point. You must do this before playing your first card of the hand; if you forget, the point is lost.

Playing the tricks

A trick is one round in which each player plays one card face up; the better card wins both. The non-dealer leads (plays the first card) to the first trick; the winner of each trick leads to the next.

1. The player who leads may play any card.
2. The second player must follow suit – play a card of the suit led – if possible, and must win the trick with a higher card of that suit if possible.
3. If the second player has no card of the suit led, they must play a trump if they have one (which wins the trick).
4. Only with neither the suit led nor a trump may they play any card.

Who wins: a trump beats any other suit; otherwise the higher card of the suit led wins.

Example: Hearts are trump. You lead Q♠. Your opponent has J♠ and K♠: they must play K♠, because it wins. With no spade but 7♥ in hand, they would have to trump with 7♥.

Scoring

After all five tricks:

Penalty for confidence: the higher score of 2 also goes to the winner when the loser was the one who insisted on the first hand:

• the non-dealer played without proposing and failed to win 3 tricks – the dealer scores 2;
• the dealer refused the first proposal and failed to win 3 tricks – the non-dealer scores 2.

This applies only to the first proposal of a hand, and a vole still scores 2 (no more).

Example: Spades are trump. Anna (non-dealer) holds K♠ and says "I have the King" – 1 point. She plays without proposing, but wins only 2 tricks. Ben scores 2 for the point, because Anna didn't propose. Score: Anna 1, Ben 2.

Winning the game

The first player to reach 5 points wins. A bonus point for the King counts right away – it can end the game before the tricks are played.

Tips for beginners

• Three tricks are enough. Two trumps and a King usually make a hand worth playing.
• Propose with weak hands, but think about what the dealer will do: an accepting dealer gets to exchange too.
• As dealer, refuse when your hand is strong – the non-dealer must then win 3 tricks with a hand they wanted to change.
• Lead your strongest suit. The opponent must beat your card if they can, which pulls out their high cards.
• Count trumps: there are 8, one of them on the table.

Variants

• Ace high: some modern players rank the Ace above the King (A K Q J 10 9 8 7).
• Pool écarté: with three players, two play and the third waits; the loser of each game is replaced by the waiting player.
• Rubbers: play best of three games (or more).
• Bystanders: in 19th-century Paris, onlookers bet on the players and could advise them.