How To: Play The Card Game "Judgment"

Definition

Judgment is a game where you have to predict the number of hands you'll make and try to make those number of hands that you predict.  It is a game usually for 3 or more players.  Even 2 players can play but then the game won't be that interesting.  5 players can play the game using one deck of 52 cards.  Jokers have no role here.

Example

Suppose in our game the game is between four players.

The dealer plays last and the one to whom he distributes the cards first or gives the 1st card first plays first.  A total of 10 cards are given to each player to begin with in the first round.  With every game the number of cards given to every player will decrease.  In the first game there are 10 cards, in the second game there will be 9 cards given to each player, 8 cards in the third game and so on until the last game will have only 1 card for each player.

There is a pre-decided trump suit in every round.  In the first game of 10 cards to every player, the trump is "Spades" followed by Diamonds, Clubs and Hearts in that order when nine, eight and seven cards are given respectively.  On the game where six cards are given, again the trump changes to Spades.  That is, the sequence of the trump is "S D C H (Soon Deeds Complete Here)" (Spades, Diamonds, Clubs and Hearts).

How to play

After the cards are dealt, the player who got the 1st card first will be the first to predict the hands that he will make after looking at the cards.  The trump is spades in the first game.  With ten cards given to each player, there is a possibility of making a maximum of 10 hands.

All the other players, at their turn (in counterclockwise direction) make their predictions on the number of hands they will make.  As an example, assume the 1st player made the prediction of 5 hands, Player 2 of three hands, Player 3 of one hand and Player 4 of four hands.  After the predictions are over, the game begins with player who was dealt the 1st card first playing first.

Suppose the first player plays the King of Hearts, and all the players have hearts with them so that the trump is not played but no one has the ace of hearts, so the King of hearts wins over other cards of hearts and he makes a hand.

Hierarchy

The Ace carries the maximum score, followed by King, then Queen, then Jack, then a ten and so on up to the two which has the least score.

The one who makes a hand gets the next turn.  In our game, the first player makes a hand in the 1st round of the first game of 10 cards.  So he gets the turn to play first again.  In the second round, he plays the ace of spades, say, and since spade is the trump, so all the players must play their spades.  In the absence of the trump with any of the players, that player can play any other card.  So now this first player makes a second hand because the denominations of all the spade cards are less in score than the ace.

In the third round, again our first player plays first as he gets the turn back.  This time he plays the ten of clubs.  The player 2 then plays 5 of clubs followed by the Jack of clubs by player 3 and the five of spades by player 4.  So in this case the 4th player has made the hand.  Player 4 used the trump to make a hand since he did not have a club card.  Trump over-rules all the other suits.

In this way, the game goes on till all the remaining seven cards in the first game are played.  If the 1st player makes 5 hands as he predicted he gets 15 points.  If Player 2 makes four hands instead of three that he predicted then he gets zero points.  If player 3 makes one hand as he predicted, he gets 11 points and if player 4 fails to make his prediction of four hands, he gets 0 points.

If a player has predicted zero hands and does not make any hand, then he gets ten points.  The points table is maintained on a score sheet or a paper.

The next game begins - this time with 9 cards given to each player. And so on.