Truco

Argentine Truco is a trick-taking game for a 40-card Spanish deck. What a hand is worth starts at one point. Either team may dare the other to play it for more, and either team may refuse.

The board uses English for every button. A few traditional names are listed once here so a written rule can be matched to the table:

Truco and Envido keep their names. They are the two calls the rest of the rules are about.

Two, four, or six. Four is two against two. Six is three against three. Partners sit alternately: the odd seats against the even seats.

Play, the deal, and the rotation of the deal all run to the right, counter-clockwise around the table. Lead is the player to the dealer's right. That player leads the first trick and wins the ties the rules give to the player nearer the lead. The dealer is pie, the last to play.

The Spanish deck: oros, copas, espadas, and bastos, ranks 1 through 7 plus sota, caballo, and rey. There are no 8s or 9s.

On these cards the shared deck prints sota, caballo, and rey as 8, 9, and 10, which is how Escoba counts them. Truco does not. For envido and flower those three faces count 0. In a trick, rey beats caballo beats sota.

Shuffle and deal three cards to each player, one at a time, face down, starting at the lead. The rest of the deck is out of play. After each hand the deal passes to the right.

On your turn you may call, and then you play one card. There is no obligation to follow suit. Any number of legal calls may come before the card, one at a time, and each must be answered before the next.

The fourteen ranks, highest first. Suit matters only for the four named cards. Every other card of a rank ties every other card of that rank.

The board prints that number under the cards still in your own hand.

The highest card wins the trick. When the highest rank was played by both teams, the trick is a tie and neither team wins it. When partners tie for the winning card, their team wins the trick, and the partner who played the tied card first leads the next trick. After a tie, the leader of that trick leads the next one.

A hand is best of three and ends as soon as one team has won it.

An unraised hand is worth 1. Points for the hand are scored when the hand ends.

Envido is a claim about the cards in your hand. It may be called only during the first trick, and only by a player who has not yet played a card. Once Truco has been accepted — including a raise, which accepts the call it raises — envido is closed for the hand.

Card values: 1 through 7 count as printed. Sota, caballo, and rey count 0.

The raises alternate, and any step may be skipped:

Match envido is worth the target minus the higher team's score, so accepting it can end the match.

Accept plays the chain for the total above. Decline scores every call except the last, or 1 when the declined call was the only one. A decline does not end the hand. The points are scored at once.

Announcing starts at the lead and goes to the right. You announce your true envido with Announce. Yours are good is legal only when you cannot beat the best value an opponent has already announced. A tie goes to the player nearer the lead.

You cannot fold during the announcement. Folding is for your own turn, or for the moment you are the one being asked.

Envido points can end the match on their own. The cards of the winning envido are shown at the end of the hand, or at once when those points end the match. An accepted envido that does not end the match leaves those cards hidden until the hand is over.

Envido may be the immediate answer to the first Truco of the hand, and only then, and only while you are still allowed to call it. The envido is settled first. The same player then answers the Truco, which has been waiting. Raising the Truco accepts it and closes envido.

Decline on a truco call declines it. The team that made the call scores what the hand was worth before this raise, and the hand ends. Worth four cannot be raised.

Before anyone has called Truco, either team may call it. After that, only the team that accepted the last call may raise it: immediately, as their answer, or later on their own turn before they play. A team cannot raise its own call. Accepting a raise returns the turn to the player who was about to play a card. That player plays one card. A player who has already played to this trick does not play another.

The player who answers is the opposing player who acts next. At this table that is the next seat to the right.

While a call is waiting, only that player acts. The answers are Accept, Decline, a legal raise, or Fold.

Fold leaves the hand. You may fold on your own turn or while you are the one being asked. You may not fold while players are announcing an accepted envido.

Play to 30, or to 15 when the table chooses that. At 30 the tally is drawn as early (points 1–15) and then late (16–30). That split is only how the score is shown. The match ends as soon as a team reaches the target, including in the middle of a hand.

Flower is optional and off unless the table turns it on. There is no counter-flower.

Three cards of one suit are a flower, worth 20 plus all three pips. Faces count 0, so the best is 38, from 7, 6, and 5 of one suit. You must declare it before you play your first card of the hand. If you play without declaring, the flower is gone.

Flower is scored as soon as every seat has either declared or lost the chance, and it can end the match. A declared flower wipes an envido that has not been scored yet, including when no envido has been called yet. An envido that has already scored stands. No envido may be called after a flower has been declared.

Your own hand is face up. Everyone else's is face down. The call bar shows only the calls you can press right now. A call you cannot press is left off the bar, and each call that is there is at least 44 pixels tall. A call lights a banner across the table. The trick strip marks each trick Us, Them, or Tie from where you sit. The score is a row of matchsticks, early then late when the target is 30. Your own hand prints its envido as Points.