After the third player lays down a card, the trick ends.If they're unable to, they may play any card. When laying down subsequent cards, players must follow the suit of the previous card if they can.Play proceeds clockwise from the lead trick. Player 2 always plays the first card of the game (the 'lead trick'), regardless of who the dealer is.Players take turns laying cards in the center of the table in an effort to win each trick by placing the highest value card.Once a contract is chosen, the round of trick-taking can finally begin.Null contract values - A, K, Q, J, 10, 9, 8, 7.Jack (clubs), Jack (spades), Jack (hearts), Jack (diamonds).Card ranks for most contract types in Skat are slightly different from what players may be used to.Open - Win all of the tricks while cards in their hand are played face-up on the table.Schwarz - A declaration that the player will win all of the tricks.Schneider - Increases the winning card point value requirement to 90.When choosing either a Suit or Grand contract when playing a Hand Game, the declarer may also make any of the following announcements before the first trick:.Open Null - Same as the above, but the declarer's hand is exposed.Also, the declarer's goal in this contract is to lose all of the tricks. Null - No trumps, not even Jacks, and card value order shifts slightly (see below).Ranked from highest to lowest: clubs, spades, hearts, diamonds. The declarer must score 61 points to win. All Jacks are considered as having this suit and will beat trumps of other ranks. Suit - Declarer names a suit as trump.The following contract styles may be chosen in both Skat and Hand games: Contracts set certain rules for the proceeding round.Finally, the declarer will select a contract type, explained in the next section.A Skat Game simply means the declarer picks up the face-down Skat cards, adds them to their hand, then discards two cards, face-down. The declarer may now choose between playing a Skat Game or a Hand Game.The auction winner repeats this process and bids against the dealer.If accepting, the other player may then increase their bid or pass. One player makes a bid, then the other will accept or pass. The two non-dealer players bid against each other first.(Read the Scoring section at the bottom before bidding, as you need to fully understand how game points work before bidding.) The minimum point value for a game is 18, so set that as the lowest bid. Players will want to outbid opponents so they can become the declarer, but they won't want to bid so high that they can't achieve that many points. Bids are a wager of how many points the game will be worth at the end of the round.The declarer picks the contract and is actively trying to win, while the two defenders are trying to prevent the declarer from winning.

Next, players enter a bidding phase to determine who is named the declarer and who will be the defenders.The remaining two cards are placed face-down to form the Skat Stack. Choose a dealer any way you like and place them in the Player 1 seat.Skat must be played with three active players.You may also use a German-suited deck with the same rankings. You will need one deck of 32 cards containing four suits ranked A, K, Q, J, 10, 9, 8, and 7.

One could play dozens of hands and never use the exact same set of rules.

There are multiple contract types and game modifiers in Skat.Their opponents win if they reach a combined score of 60. The player named the declarer in each round must reach 61 card points to win.The goal of Skat is to place a bid and win the subsequent round of tricks, all while maximizing your score.

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