Badam Sattiबदाम सत्ती

Players and cards

Badam Satti is for three to six players, each playing alone, with one standard 52-card pack and no jokers. The ace is low in this game: it sits below the two, and the king is the top card of every suit.

The dealer deals out the whole pack one card at a time, starting with the player on their right. With four players everyone gets 13 cards. With three, five or six, some players get one card more than the others. The deal moves one seat to the right each round.

Opening with the seven of hearts

Whoever holds the seven of hearts, the badam satti that gives the game its name, lays it in the middle of the table to begin the round. Nothing else can be played until it is down.

Play then goes to the right, one card per turn.

Building the rows

Each suit has its own row on the table, built outwards from its seven. On your turn you lay one card, and it must be one of these:

• Any seven. It starts the row for its suit.
• The card just below the low end of a row: the six on a seven, then the five, and so on down to the ace.
• The card just above the high end of a row: the eight on a seven, then the nine, and so on up to the king.

A row never skips a card. The five of spades has to wait until the six of spades is down, and no spade at all can be laid before the seven of spades. A row is complete when it runs from the ace to the king.

On this table the cards that fit are lifted in your hand, and each one also waits, ringed in gold, at the spot where it would go. Tap the card, or its spot on the table, to lay it.

You must lay a card if you can

If any card in your hand fits, you have to lay one, though you choose which. You may not pass just to hold a card back.

If nothing fits, you pass and play moves on to the next player. The table makes the pass for you, with a knock so everyone hears it.

Ending a round

The first player to lay their last card ends the round at once. Everyone else counts the cards still in their hand, and those points count against them. The player who went out scores nothing.

A full game is five rounds, and you can choose one or three instead. After the last round the player with the fewest points wins. Players level on the fewest share the win.

In a one-round game there is no adding up: the first player out of cards wins.

Take a card

Some tables make passing cost something. With Take a card, whenever you have to pass, the player before you hands you one card of their choice, as long as they still have two or more. You keep it, and play moves on to the next player. The giver usually hands over the card that will be hardest to lay, so passing hurts twice.

Jack, queen and king count 10 each

Many groups count the picture cards at 10 each, so a king costs no more than a ten. Choose 10 each when you set up the table.

Length of the game

Choose one, three or five rounds. One round is a quick race to empty your hand; five rounds is the standard game.

House rules this table does not use

Some groups play for chips: everyone pays into a pot at the start and each time they pass, and the winner takes the pot plus a chip for every card left in the other hands. Others let any seven open the game, or count aces as 10. This table keeps to the rules above, so everyone knows where they stand.