Tablić is a very popular card game, usually played by two or four players. With four, players play in pairs and partners sit across from each other. It is played with a full deck of 52 cards.
Card values
The king (K) is worth 14, the queen (Q) 13 and the jack (J) 12. All other cards count at face value. The ace (A) is special: it can be worth 1 or 11, whichever the player whose turn it is prefers.
Goal
The goal is to take as many cards from the table as possible. A player plays a card from their hand and captures a card of the same value from the table, or several cards whose values add up to the value of the card played. Each player keeps the cards they capture to count points at the end of the hand.
Dealing
The dealer gives each player 6 cards (in two rounds of 3) and places 4 cards face up on the table. The cards on the table must be laid out separately. The rest of the deck is set aside. When all players have played out their cards, the dealer takes the deck again and deals 6 more cards to each player. When the whole deck has been dealt, the deal passes to the next player.
Play
The player to the dealer's right always starts, and play continues counter-clockwise. In each round every player plays exactly one card, which may, but does not have to, capture something from the table.
A player who captures cards turns them face down onto their own pile, so the other players cannot see which cards have already been taken. If a player cannot capture anything, the card played stays on the table. When the hand is over, any cards left on the table go to the player who made the last capture.
A player who clears the table, capturing every card on it, scores a tabla. Taking the leftover cards at the end of the hand, as the last player to capture, does not count as a tabla.
Scoring
Each player or pair scores for the cards captured. A hand is worth at most 25 points plus the number of tablas scored:
- one point for each captured 10, J, Q, K and A
- one point for the “small two” (two of clubs)
- two points for the “big ten” (ten of diamonds)
- three extra points for whoever captured the most cards. If the players captured the same number of cards, nobody gets these three points.
End of the game
The game ends when a player or pair passes 101 points. The other side may also have 101 or more; when both pass 101, whoever has more points wins. Play does not stop the moment someone passes 101 points, but continues until the deck runs out.