Rope Team

Full rules

1. Overview
2. Card order and steps
3. Setup
4. Playing a trick
5. Pulling the rope
6. The next deal
7. No talking
8. Winning and losing
9. Difficulty levels
10. Tips for beginners
11. Variants

Overview

Rope Team is a cooperative trick-taking game for two: you play as one team and win or lose together. You are two climbers on one rope, crossing a ridge of nine cards, most of them face down. You move along it by playing tricks: each of you plays one card, the higher card wins, and the winner pulls the rope – a coin – towards their own end of the ridge. Every face-down card the coin stops on is turned face up; uncover them all and you have made it. But high cards pull hard: if the coin is pulled beyond the end of the ridge, you fall. And you may not say a word about your cards.

• Players: exactly 2.
• You need: one standard 52-card deck without jokers, one coin and one or two matches or buttons as safety ropes.

Rope Team is a new game written for this site and not yet playtested. It was inspired by The Fox in the Forest Duet (Foxtrot Games and Renegade Game Studios, 2020), a cooperative trick-taking game for two in which the winner of each trick moves a shared token along a path towards their own side. The ridge, the steps, the uncovering and the trump rule are our own. The number of safety ropes is the first thing to tune (see "Difficulty levels").

Card order and steps

In every suit the cards rank from high to low: A K Q J 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2.

Every card also has steps – how hard it pulls the rope:

A trick has two cards, so it moves the coin 0 to 4 steps.

Setup

1. Sit opposite each other.
2. Shuffle and deal nine cards face down in a row across the table between you, parallel to the table edge. This row is the ridge.
3. Turn the middle card (the fifth) face up: this is the camp. Put the coin on it – it shows where your rope team stands on the ridge.
4. The end of the ridge on Anna's left is Anna's end (for Ben it is on his right). The other end – on Ben's left – is Ben's end. Whoever wins a trick pulls the coin towards their own end.
5. Put the safety ropes next to the ridge: one on the Normal level (see "Difficulty levels").
6. Decide who deals first. The dealer shuffles the other 43 cards and deals 13 to each player, one at a time. The 17 cards left over go face down to one side without being looked at: they are out of this deal.

Playing a trick

The player who did not deal leads the first trick – plays its first card.

1. The leader plays any card face up.
2. The other player must follow suit – play a card of the same suit – if they can. If they can't, they may play any card.

Trumps: at the start there are no trumps. As soon as a card of the ridge has been turned face up (see below), its suit is trumps: a card of that suit beats every card of the other three suits. Every newly uncovered card makes its own suit trumps instead. The camp card doesn't count.

Who wins the trick? If a trump was played, the higher trump wins. Otherwise the higher card of the suit that was led wins – a card of another suit never wins, however high it is.

The winner leads the next trick. Put the played cards aside face down; tricks are not counted.

Pulling the rope

After each trick, the winner moves the coin along the ridge towards their own end: add up the steps of both cards in the trick and move the coin that many cards. Every card of the ridge is one step, face up or face down.

• 0 steps: the coin stays where it is.
• Uncovering: if the coin stops on a face-down card, turn that card face up. Its suit is trumps from the next trick on.
• Cards the coin only passes over stay face down.

Falling: if the coin would move beyond the end of the ridge, you fall and have lost – unless you still have a safety rope. Then put one safety rope back in the box and leave the coin on the last card at that end. If that card is still face down, turn it up as usual.

Example: The start shown above. Ben has dealt, so Anna leads. There are no trumps yet.

Trick 1: From the camp nothing can go wrong – a trick has at most 4 steps, and each end is 4 steps away. Anna leads the K♠ (2 steps), and Ben follows with the 9♠ (1 step). Anna wins and pulls the coin 2 + 1 = 3 steps towards her end, onto the second card from her end. It is face down, so she turns it up: the 6♥. Hearts are trumps from now on.

Trick 2: Anna leads again. The coin is only one card away from her end now: if she wins a trick with 2 steps or more, they fall. She leads the 9♣ (1 step). Ben holds the 8♣ and the 4♣ – with the 8♣, Anna would win with 1 + 1 = 2 steps, one too many. So Ben brakes with the 4♣ (0 steps). Anna wins and pulls 1 step, onto her end card – just short of the edge. She turns it up: the Q♦. Diamonds are trumps now.

Trick 3: The coin lies on the last card at Anna's end, so any trick she wins with even one step would pull it over the edge. She leads the 3♥ (0 steps): if she wins with it, the coin simply stays. Ben has no hearts and trumps with the K♦. He wins and pulls 0 + 2 = 2 steps towards his end – past the 6♥ onto the third card from Anna's end. He turns it up: the 10♠. Now spades are trumps, three of the eight cards are uncovered, and Ben leads the next trick.

The next deal

When all 13 tricks have been played and the ridge isn't uncovered yet, the next deal begins. The ridge, the coin, the trumps and the safety ropes stay as they are. Gather the 26 played cards and the 17 cards that were out, shuffle all 43, and the other player deals 13 to each; 17 go aside again. The non-dealer leads the first trick.

There are at most three deals.

No talking

During play you may not give away anything about your cards or your plans: no "I've got the Ace", no "let me win this one", no sighing, no pointing. You may talk about the rules, whose turn it is and how many safety ropes are left. Your cards are your only language.

Winning and losing

• You win together as soon as all eight face-down cards of the ridge are face up – at once, even in the middle of a deal.
• You lose if you fall without a safety rope, or if the third deal ends before the ridge is uncovered. If you can see that you won't make it, you may give up early; that counts as a loss.

Difficulty levels

On the Expert level, uncovered cards don't make trumps: the higher card of the suit led always wins.

The arithmetic behind the levels: you have to uncover 8 cards, and you have up to 39 tricks (three deals of 13) to do it. Time is hardly ever the problem – pulling too hard is. The deck holds 40 steps (sixteen cards from 8 to J at 1 step, twelve from Q to A at 2), so the 26 cards played in a deal carry about 20 steps. But the ridge is only 8 steps from end to end, and the coin has to stop exactly on each card. Every safety rope forgives one trick that pulls too far.

In a computer simulation with a simple strategy – each player sees only their own hand, nobody talks, 4000 games per level – the team won about 54% of its games without a safety rope (Hard), 79% with one (Normal) and 88% with two (Easy, but without talking); without trumps (Expert) it won 44%. Nearly all losses were falls: the three deals ran out in fewer than 1 game in 100, and most wins came in the second deal. Players who learn to read each other's plays may well win more often. If you win easily, go up a level; if you keep falling, go down one.

Tips for beginners

• Low cards are your brakes. A 2 to 7 doesn't move the rope at all. When the coin is near an end, play them.
• Near your own end, let your partner win; near your partner's end, take the trick yourself – then the coin moves back towards the middle.
• High cards pull hard, even when they lose. The steps of both cards count, whoever wins the trick.
• Count the trumps. They change with every uncovered card, so a suit that was harmless a moment ago can suddenly win. Remember which of its high cards are gone.
• The end cards are the hardest: the coin must stop exactly on them, and one step too many is a fall. A safety rope can help here – it catches the coin on the end card and so uncovers it.

Variants

All optional – agree before you start.

• Open hands: play with your hands face up, but still without talking – good for learning.
• Two deals: a shorter game with only two deals. In the simulation this cost only a few games in 100.