Monte Carlo

Full rules

1. Overview
2. The parts of the layout
3. Setup
4. Playing
5. Winning
6. Tips for beginners
7. Variants

Overview

Monte Carlo is a simple patience (a card game for one player, also called solitaire). You lay out 25 cards in a square and remove pairs – two cards of the same rank, such as two Kings or two 7s – that lie next to each other. Then you close up the gaps and fill the square again from the deck. You win if you can pair off the whole deck. There is a little skill in choosing which pairs to take, but it is mostly luck – ideal for a quick game or for children.

• Players: 1
• You need: one standard 52-card deck, no jokers.
• Time: about 10 minutes per game.

The parts of the layout

• Tableau: the square of five rows of five cards in which you look for pairs.
• Stock: the face-down rest of the deck, from which you refill the square.
• Discard pile: where the removed pairs go. They take no further part in the game.

Setup

Shuffle and deal 25 cards face up in five rows of five, left to right, row by row, not overlapping. Put the other 27 cards face down next to it as the stock.

Example:

Playing

1. Remove pairs: take away two cards of the same rank (suit and colour don't matter) that are next to each other – side by side in a row, one above the other in a column, or touching corner to corner diagonally. Put them on the discard pile. The gap left by a removed card does not make the cards on either side of it neighbours.
2. When you can't find any more pairs, close up the gaps: keep the cards in the order in which they lie – reading each row from left to right, from the top row down – and slide them forward so the rows are full again from the top. In practice: push the cards of the first incomplete row to the left, then fill up that row with cards taken one by one from the left end of the row below, and so on.
3. Refill: deal cards from the stock into the empty places at the end (bottom right) until the square has 25 cards again.
4. Look for new pairs and carry on.

When the stock is empty, keep closing up the gaps after each round of pairing – closing up often brings new cards side by side.

Example: In the layout above there are three pairs: 4♥ and 4♣ (diagonal), J♦ and J♠ (diagonal), 2♣ and 2♦ (one above the other). The Q♦ and Q♣ are not neighbours. After removing the three pairs and closing up, row 3 reads K♦ K♠ 3♠ 7♦ 7♣ – now the two Kings and the two 7s lie side by side, and six new cards from the stock fill the end of the square.

Winning

You win when all 52 cards are on the discard pile in pairs. If no pair is left anywhere in the square (even after closing up and refilling) the game is lost. Morehead and Mott-Smith estimated a chance of about one game in eight.

Tips for beginners

• If one card could pair with either of two others, pick the pair that will bring more pairs together after closing up.
• Closing up moves cards by varying amounts. Before you remove a pair, picture where the cards behind it will land.
• Sometimes it pays to leave a pair lying for a round, so that it can later help to unlock another pair.

Variants

All of these are optional – choose one before you start.

• Monte Carlo Thirteens: instead of equal ranks, remove neighbouring pairs that add up to 13 (Ace = 1, Jack = 11, Queen = 12), and Kings singly.
• Monte Carlo Fourteens: remove neighbouring pairs that add up to 14 (Ace = 1, Jack = 11, Queen = 12, King = 13).
• Smaller square: deal only 20 cards in four rows of five and refill to 20.