Golf

GOLF

Okay this week I've got something for anyone who has a deck or two of standard playing cards sitting around - Golf!

You will need a deck of cards for every 2 players, the full 52 + 2 jokers. Shuffle them and hand out 8 to each player. They don't get to look at them but place them face down in two rows of 4. Then each player flips 2 cards over and the game begins.

On your turn you either take the top card from the deck or the discard pile. If you draw from the deck you can either choose to keep it, swapping out one of your cards (face down or up) or discard it and then flipping over any 1 of your face down cards. If you draw from the discard you must swap out a card. Once you only have a single face down card left (the rest are face up) you no longer have to flip when drawing from the top of the deck, you can choose just to discard the drawn card. As soon as someone has flipped all their cards each other player gets 1 more turn and the round is over.

Your score is the total value of all your cards with some differences. Kings are zero, Jokers are -2 points. Aces are 1 but Jacks and Queens are 10. If you have a matching pair in a column they cancel out and score zero (except for Jokers). If you have 4 matching cards in 2 adjacent columns each other player scores 20 points. Just like real golf you want a low score so making pairs, getting Kings and swapping out those high cards is a must. After 9 rounds who ever has the lowest score wins.

Golf has a lot of variants, from the number of cards you start with, to how they score - it's a game that everyone has their own preferred home rules (even the above rules description is just how I personally learned to play). Mix and match to your liking. 

I really like Golf. It has lots of good decision making in it, despite the luck of the draw factor. Do I keep this card? Should I push my luck for pairs? Discarding this card is really good for the next player, what should I do? Should I flip my cards fast to put pressure on the other players? It won't burn your brain and sometimes you are the the mercy of chance but I think it is a great card game to wind down an evening with.