Card Game Rules

Patience · Game 298 of 388 ♥

Good Thirteen

Ten cards on the table – throw out every pair that makes 13 and every King, fill the gaps and hope the deck runs out before you do.

Players
1
Duration
3 min
Age
6+
Difficulty
easy
Cards
52 cards, no jokers
Skill – Luck
SkillLuck
Everyone for themselves – Lots of interaction
Everyone for themselvesLots of interaction
Simple – Complex
SimpleComplex
Quick – Long
QuickLong

Mood relaxedlearned in 5 minutes

Collections: Solitaire games · Games for kids

Quick rules

  • Goal: throw out the whole deck in pairs adding up to 13 and single Kings.
  • Turn up 10 cards as the layout (one row, or two rows of five); the rest is the stock.
  • A = 1, J = 11, Q = 12, K = 13, others face value. Suits don't matter.
  • Throw out every pair and King you can, then fill each gap from the stock. Repeat.
  • Ten cards, no pair, no King, stock not empty: lost.
  • Stock used up: the rest always comes out – won.

Cheat sheet

Out they go

Card Pairs with
K alone
Q A
J 2
10 3
9 4
8 5
7 6
  • Only the ten layout cards count; suits don't matter.
  • Fill the gaps after throwing out everything you can.
  • Pure luck – nothing to plan. Chance of winning: just under 63%.
  • Baroness (harder): deal only 5 cards; when stuck, deal 5 more, one on each, so piles grow – only top cards count. The last 2 stock cards lie face up beside them, also free.

Full rules

  1. Overview
  2. Card values
  3. Setup
  4. Playing
  5. Winning
  6. Tips for beginners
  7. Variants

Overview

Good Thirteen is one of the simplest patiences (card games for one player, also called solitaire). Ten cards lie face up on the table. You throw out every pair of cards that adds up to 13 and every King, which counts 13 on its own, and fill the gaps from the deck. If you get through the whole deck, the patience has come out – that is, you have won. You make no real decisions: it is a game of luck, over in a few minutes, and a nice way for children to practise adding. In English books it is usually called Thirteens.

  • Players: 1
  • You need: one standard 52-card deck, no jokers.
  • Time: 2–3 minutes per game.

Card values

Card Value Pairs with
K 13 alone
Q 12 A
J 11 2
10 10 3
9 9 4
8 8 5
7 7 6

The Ace counts 1, the other number cards their face value. Suits don't matter: 8♣ + 5♥ is just as good as 8♣ + 5♣.

Setup

  1. Shuffle and put the deck face down in front of you. This is the stock.
  2. Turn the top ten cards face up and lay them out side by side – in one long row, or in two rows of five, whichever fits your table. This is the layout.
7♠7♠♠Q♦Q♦Q4♣4♣♣K♥K♥K9♦9♦♦6♥6♥♥A♣A♣♣2♠2♠♠8♣8♣♣3♦3♦♦Layout42StockRemoved
Good Thirteen – the example layout

Playing

  1. Throw out pairs: take out any two cards of the layout that add up to 13 and put them aside – they are out of play.
  2. Throw out Kings: a King goes out on its own.
  3. Fill the gaps: when you have thrown out everything you can, put a card from the stock face up in every gap, so that the layout has ten cards again.
  4. Look for new pairs and Kings, and carry on.

Example: The layout above shows 7♠ Q♦ 4♣ K♥ 9♦ / 6♥ A♣ 2♠ 8♣ 3♦. Throw out the K♥ on its own, and the pairs 4♣ + 9♦, 7♠ + 6♥ and Q♦ + A♣. Only 2♠, 8♣ and 3♦ are left – they wait for a J, a 5 and a 10. Seven gaps: fill them from the stock and look again.

Winning

The game is lost if the layout holds ten cards with no King and no pair making 13 while there are still cards in the stock. You win when the stock is used up and the last cards have been thrown out. Morehead and Mott-Smith gave the chance as about one game in two; the exact figure is just under 63%.

Tips for beginners

  • There is nothing to plan: always throw out everything you can, then fill the gaps.
  • Keep the table of pairs in view until they come by themselves: K alone, Q + A, J + 2, 10 + 3, 9 + 4, 8 + 5, 7 + 6.
  • Good news at the end: once the stock is empty, the game always comes out. Every pair you took out used one card of each partner rank, so every card still lying there has a partner beside it.

Variants

All optional – agree before you start.

  • Baroness (Five Piles): deal only five cards in a row. When you are stuck, deal five more, one on each card, so that five piles grow; only the top cards count. The last two cards of the stock are dealt face up beside the piles and are free as well. Much harder.

Background & history

  • Family: Patience (adding and pairing: remove pairs that make 13 and single Kings)
  • Origin: probably Germany; first described in English in 1892
  • Also known as: Thirteens, Simple Addition, Die gute Dreizehn
  • Related games: Baroness (Five Piles), Pyramid, Fourteen Out, Eight Cards (Acht Karten)

The oldest description we know of is in Professor Hoffmann's The Illustrated Book of Patience Games (London, 1892), under the name Thirteens. Hoffmann lays out two rows of five cards, throws out "by twos, without regard to suit or position" every pair that makes thirteen, and every King alone, then fills the gaps from the stock. The game is lost if the refilled rows hold neither a King nor a pair. The American Dick's Games of Patience, Second Series (1898) has the same game as Simple Addition, and Morehead and Mott-Smith (1949) list it as Thirteens, with two minutes per game and a chance of one in two.

In Germany the game is known as Die gute Dreizehn ("the good thirteen"). Irmgard Wolter-Rosendorf's Patiencen in Wort und Bild (1994) deals the ten cards in one row; the rules are otherwise the same. The English Wikipedia describes it as a German patience. That fits Hoffmann's book: he says in his introduction that it is translated from a German original, whose titles he rendered by "the nearest equivalents" – so the game was probably known in Germany before 1892.

Because the player has no choices, the chance of winning can be calculated exactly: according to Mark Masten's win-rate collection, Mark Conger worked it out as 62.7355…%. Close relatives are Baroness, which Mary Whitmore Jones called a "very old Patience" in 1890 and which deals five cards at a time onto five piles, and the German Acht Karten, where eight cards are laid out and the magic number is 11. Pyramid and Fourteen Out use the same idea with an open layout that rewards planning.

Sources