Game Instructions

Overview

Boat is a partnership card game played with four players in teams. It is very similar to Rook(Trademarked by Hasbro). The deck consists of the normal suits (Clubs, Diamonds, Hearts, Spades), but without the twos, threes, and fours. Each suit starts at five and goes up to Ace. In addition, there is a special Boat Card which is the highest trump.

There are 41 total cards: 10 of each suit plus the Boat Card.

Dealing

Nine cards are dealt to each player and five cards are reserved as Bonus Cards. The players then bid to decide who will get the bonus cards and have a chance to choose the trump suit.

Bidding

Each bid is a number; the minimum bid is 65, and higher bids must be multiples of 5. The player to the left of the dealer has the first chance to bid and the turn passes clockwise around the table.

At your turn, you can either bid or pass. Each bid must be higher than the last, and a player who has passed cannot bid again in that hand. The bidding continues as many times around the table as necessary until three players have passed. The remaining player is the high bidder, and the high bidder's team tries to take at least the number of points bid.

Discarding & Trump Selection

The high bidder must then choose the best 9 cards from the 14 cards that include the Bonus Cards. The Boat card counts as the high card of the trump suit. Any points discarded will be awarded to the team that catches the last trick of the hand.

After discarding, the high bidder chooses the trump suit by selecting the suit.

Playing the Hand

The high bidder then leads any card to start the first trick. The other players in turn must play a card of the same suit if they can. If they have no card of the led suit, they must play a trump if they can. If they do not have a card of the led suit or a trump, they may play any card.

When everyone has played a card, the trick is won by the player of the highest trump, or, if no trump was played, by the highest card of the suit that was led. The winner of the trick leads the next trick.

Scoring

At the end of the hand, each team is scored for the total value of the cards they have won in tricks. If the tricks won by the high bidder's team contain at least as many points as the bid, that team's score increases by the amount of card points they took. If the high bidder's team takes fewer card points than the bid, they score nothing for the cards they won; instead they subtract the amount of the bid from their previous score.

The non-bidding team always receives the total number of points taken by their team, whether the bid was successful or not.

Card Values

The total points available per hand are 120 points.

Winning the Game

The game ends when a team reaches 500 points or more. If both teams exceed 500 points, then the team which has the higher score is the winner.