Phỏm (Tá lả)

Full rules

1. Overview
2. Card order and values
3. Melds
4. Setup
5. Playing a turn
6. Four rounds
7. Going out: Ù
8. Scoring
9. Tips for beginners
10. Variants

Overview

Phỏm (also Tá lả) is the rummy of northern Vietnam. You try to arrange your cards into melds – sets and runs, called phỏm – and you may grab the card your left-hand neighbour has just thrown away if it completes one. A hand lasts only four rounds. Whoever manages to meld everything goes Ù and wins outright; otherwise the player with the fewest points left in their hand wins.

• Players: 2–4, each for themselves. Best with 4.
• You need: one standard 52-card deck without jokers, and chips or paper and pencil to keep the score.

Card order and values

The cards rank from low to high A 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 J Q K. The Ace is always low: A-2-3 is a run, Q-K-A is not.

For the count at the end, each card is worth its rank:

Melds

A meld (phỏm) is either:

• Set ("across"): three or four cards of the same rank, e.g. 4♠ 4♦ 4♥.
• Run ("down"): three or more cards of the same suit in a row, e.g. 8♥ 9♥ 10♥ J♥ or A♠ 2♠ 3♠.

Each card can belong to only one meld. Two cards that need just a third to become a meld (7♣ 7♦, or 5♥ 6♥) are called a cạ.

Setup

1. First dealer: choose anyone. Deal and play go anticlockwise (to the right).
2. Deal: the dealer deals 9 cards to each player and 10 to themselves, one at a time. After the first hand, the winner of the previous hand deals and takes the 10 cards.
3. Stock: the rest go face down in the middle as the stock.
4. Discards: everybody lays their own discards face up in a row in front of them, so you can see who threw what and how far the hand has got.

Playing a turn

The player with 10 cards begins by discarding one card. After that, each player in turn (anticlockwise):

1. Takes or draws: - Take (ăn, "eat") the card the previous player has just discarded – but only if it makes a meld with two or more cards from your hand. Put the taken card face up in front of you so everyone can see it; the cards it goes with stay hidden in your hand. - Otherwise, draw the top card of the stock.
2. Discards one card face up into your row.

Taken cards are locked in: every taken card must stay in a meld, and two taken cards may never be in the same meld. You may rearrange your hand freely as long as this stays possible.

Paying for a taken card: whenever you take someone's discard, they pay you 1 point – 4 points if it happens in the last round.

Example: Ben discards the 7♦. Carla holds 7♣ 7♠, so she takes the 7♦ and puts it face up in front of her – she now secretly has the set 7♣ 7♠ 7♦. Ben pays her 1 point. Carla discards the K♥.

Four rounds

A hand lasts four rounds: each player puts four cards into their row. A taken card leaves the row of the player who threw it, so that player gets one extra turn to fill the row up again. A player whose row already holds four cards is skipped. With four players this works out so that the last turn uses up the stock exactly.

Laying down: on the turn in which you are about to put the fourth card into your row, you first lay down (hạ) all your melds face up. Then you may lay off (gửi): add loose cards from your hand to the melds of players who laid down before you – a fourth card to a set or a card that extends a run. Then make your last discard. Your remaining cards are your points.

If you have no meld at all when you lay down, your hand is móm ("toothless") – you finish last, whatever your points.

Going out: Ù

At any time, if right after taking or drawing all your cards but at most one form melds (usually three melds of three), you call "Ù!" and lay them down (the spare card, if any, is your discard). Laying off onto other players' melds also counts: if that gets rid of all your loose cards, you go Ù too. The hand ends at once and you win it.

Scoring

After an Ù: every other player pays the Ù player 5 points.

After four rounds: add up the cards left in each hand. The lowest total wins the hand. The others pay the winner according to their place:

With equal points, the player who laid down earlier takes the better place.

Penalties (the offender pays for everybody):

• If one player's discards let the next player take three cards in a hand and that player goes Ù, the discarder pays all the losers' shares.
• If a player goes Ù in the last round, the last player who took a card in that round pays all the losers' shares.

Example: Four rounds are over. Anna has 3 points left, Ben 7, Carla 7 and Dan is móm. Anna wins. Ben laid down before Carla, so Ben is 2nd and pays 1, Carla pays 2, Dan pays 4. Anna scores +7.

Write each player's net score per hand on the score pad; play as many hands as you like.

Tips for beginners

• Throw high cards first. Kings and Queens count 12 and 13 if you are stuck with them, so get rid of loose high cards early.
• Only your left-hand neighbour feeds you. Keep a cạ whose missing card is probably in their hand or in the stock – not one that others have already shown they don't hold.
• Don't feed your neighbour. Every card they take costs you 1 point (4 in the last round) – and three takes can make you pay for the whole table.
• Read the rows. If three players have thrown an 8, the fourth 8 is either in the stock or with the last player.
• Lay down late if you can. Players who lay down after you may lay off onto your melds, not the other way round.

Variants

Phỏm has many local rules – agree on them before you play.

• Higher Ù payment: at some tables everyone pays 6 for an Ù and 12 if all ten cards were in melds (Ù with no discard at all).
• No laying off: some tables (and some online versions) don't allow gửi; Ù becomes rarer.
• Ù khan: a player whose dealt hand contains no meld and no cạ at all may show it at once and win as if going Ù.
• Southern Tá lả: in southern Vietnam "Tá lả" can mean a different game; the rules on this page are the northern form.