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THE CARD GAME RAMS AND HOW TO PLAY

This game is very similar to Loo. Number of Players: 3 to 5.

Cards: A deck of 32. Discard all 2's to 6's from a regular deck of 52. The cards in each suit rank:

(Highest) A K Q J 10 9 8 7 (Lowest)

Each player receives 5 cards in batches of 3 and 2. An extra hand or widow is dealt, as in Loo. The last card, belonging to the dealer, is exposed to determine the trump suit. Undealt cards are put aside until the next deal.

Declaring: Beginning with the player at left of the dealer, each in turn must declare whether he will play or will drop out. If he plays, he undertakes to win at least one trick. Any player in his turn may discard his hand and take the widow instead (if it has not been taken before him).

Any player may declare rams. This means that he will undertake to win all the tricks. He may make this declaration either before or after taking the widow, but must make it before the next player in turn has declared. In a rams, everybody must play; any who have dropped out must pick up their hands again. If the rams player has not taken the widow, each player who has not refused it or has not dropped out gets a chance to take it.

The Play: A player who declares rams makes the opening lead. Otherwise, it is made by the player nearest dealer's left, among those who have decided to play.

A player must follow suit when he can, and must play higher than any previous card on the trick, when he can. If a plain suit is led, he must trump if able, even if the trick has already been trumped. A trick is won by the highest trump in it, or, if it contains no trump, by the highest card played of the suit led.

Scoring: Equal numbers of counters are distributed to all players at the beginning of a game. The dealer antes 5 counters into a pool. After the game gets under way, the pool also contains payments from the previous deal.

Each player who has stayed in takes 1 counter (or one-fifth of the counters) from the pool for each trick he wins. Each who wins no trick must pay 5 counters into the next pool.

In a rams, however, the settlement is different. If the rams player wins all the tricks, he wins the whole pool plus 5 counters from every other player. If he loses a single trick, the cards are at once thrown in; he must pay counters to double the pool and 5 counters to every other player.

If everybody ahead of the player at right of the dealer passes, this player must pay the dealer 5 counters if he wishes to drop. In this case, the pool remains undivided. If only one player other than the dealer decides to play, the dealer must play to defend the pool. In this case he is allowed to take the trump card and discard another face down.

Related terms include set card game and game card generator.