Thousand

Thousand is played by three players with a 24-card pack: A, 10, K, Q, J and 9 in each suit, ranking in that order. The cards are worth 11, 10, 4, 3, 2 and 0 points, 120 in all. Play is clockwise. Each player gets seven cards and three more go face down to the prikup (the talon).

Players bid for the right to take the prikup, in multiples of 5. The player to the dealer's left must open with at least 100, and the bidding goes round until two players have passed. Nobody may bid more than 120 without holding a marriage: the King and Queen of one suit.

The winning bidder, the declarer, shows the prikup, adds it to their hand, then gives one card face down to each opponent, so everyone has eight. The declarer may now raise the bid, or concede the hand (in Russian, rospisat'), in which case each opponent scores 60.

The declarer leads to the first trick. You must follow suit if you can; if you can't, you must play a trump if there is one. At first there are no trumps. A player who has just won a trick may announce a marriage by leading its King or Queen. The marriage scores ♥100, ♦80, ♣60 or ♠40, and its suit becomes trumps until another marriage is announced.

• The declarer scores the bid if their card points and marriages reach it, and loses the bid if not. Each opponent scores their own points, rounded to the nearest 5.
• The barrel: a score between 880 and 999 is held at 880. On the barrel you have three hands to win as declarer; after that you drop to 760.
• Taking no points three times, or conceding three times, costs 120 each third time.
• If anyone holds all four Nines after the prikup is passed, the hand is dealt again.
• The first player to reach 1000 wins.

• Bid with the − and + buttons in the middle of the table, then Bid or Pass. Your limit is shown: over 120 needs a marriage in your hand.
• As declarer, tap one card to give West and one to give East, set your final bid, then Confirm, or Concede.
• On your turn, tap a highlighted card. When you lead, a King or Queen outlined in gold announces its marriage.
• The scores at the top show who is on the barrel and how many hands they have left there.

• Daily: everyone gets the same deals each day.
• New Game: a fresh game with new deals.

• Marriages win bids. Without one you can't bid over 120, and 120 is every card point in the pack, so a big bid needs a marriage.
• Count on the prikup a little, not a lot. Three unknown cards can complete a marriage, but often they don't.
• When you give cards away as declarer, don't hand an opponent a Nine if they might already hold three: four Nines means a redeal.
• As an opponent, keep the declarer from winning a trick when they hold a marriage: they can only announce it straight after winning one.
• Conceding is sometimes right. A forced bid of 100 on a weak hand loses 100; conceding costs nothing the first two times.

Thousand (Russian Тысяча, Tysiacha; Polish Tysiąc) takes its name from the target score. Pagat.com describes it as well known in Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Poland and Lithuania, with many small differences in the rules between and within these countries.

It belongs to the ace–ten family of card games, in which Aces and Tens are the most valuable cards. Wikipedia gives it the alternative names Russian Schnapsen and Thousand Schnapsen and describes it as a variant of the Austrian game Schnapsen, with which it shares the King–Queen marriages that score extra points.

The rules here follow pagat's main description, the version played in Russia, Belarus and Ukraine, including the barrel, the penalties for zero scores and the right to concede.

Thousand is a free browser version of the Eastern European card game, played against two computer opponents, with a daily game and online leaderboards. There's nothing to download and no sign-up.

A free, original browser game on PlayPendium. No download, no install.