How to play Estimation (card game)

BASICS:

• Estimation is a 4 players card game, each player plays on his own against others (except in Estimation Couple mode).
• Each player plays 1 card on table (Counter clockwise order)
• Each player must play a card of the same suit as the first card played on table..Example:

• In this example (Jack Heart) is the first played card on table, in this case you must play Heart as well (if available in your hand). If not, you play any other suit but it will have no value.
• The player with the highest value card on table, gets the four cards on table and eats them as trick, he later plays the next card his/her choice on the table (any value / any suit).

CARD VALUES:

• Cards value order (from highest to lowest):

• Suits value order (from highest to lowest):

BIDS:

What is bid?

• A bid consists of number of Tricks + Trump color.
• If you want to bid, your estimated tricks must be 4 or more tricks.

Trump Colors:

• Each round must have its own trump color, which the player chooses based on his 13 cards hand.
• Trumps from highest to lowest are : Sans (No color) - Spades - Heart - Diamonds - Clubs
• Trumps are different in strength, therefore if other player bids the same number of tricks with stronger trump he wins the bid.

Note:

• In case all players passed to bid, the round will be skipped, then next round starts with double score.
• Trumps in the last 5 rounds of the game are fixed as follows (Sans,Spades,Hearts,Diamonds,Clubs), but can be changed in case one of players asks for 8 or more tricks.
• In the last 5 rounds the player with highest tricks will be treated as “Caller".
  

GAME FLOW:

In each round of the game, there are 4 phases:

Distribution Phase:

• Each player gets 13 random cards.

Bidding Phase:

• In each round, all players will be asked if they want to call Dash Call before the bidding starts.

What is Dash Call:

• Dash Call is a call of ZERO tricks before knowing the trump suit, which is considered a risky call to make, that affects the round flow.
• The popup shown above will appear before each bidding phase to confirm if you really want to call Dash Call or not.
• Dash Call is very rewarding if the player manages to win. on the contary, it can be a big loss for your score points.
  
• Afterwards, the bidding starts to determine the round trump suit/color as following:

• The minimum trump bid (or as estimation players call: call) to mention is: (4 Clubs), all other players will get their turn either to say higher bid than the prior one, or pass and not take part of it (Depending on your 13 card in your hand and your strategy).
• At the end, the player with highest bid is the one who will determine the trump suit of the round.
• Then all other players will make an estimate of the tricks they want to eat based on that trump suit determined.
• By that bidding phase ends and all players will start playing to achieve this number of tricks by end of the round.

Playing Phase:

• The bid winner plays first his card, other players will play in order after him (counter clockwise).

Score Calculation Phase:

• At the end of playing phase, the score will be calculated for each player based on their call and win/loss. Score calculations rules can be found in the upcoming page.
• After score calculating, a new next round starts and all above steps will be applied again.

After 18 rounds (Full Bola), the player with the most points wins the game.

Notes:

• The total estimated tricks of all 4 players can't be = 13, in order to get at least 1 loser in each round.
• Rounds with overall 14 or more tricks are called: +Over rounds, and vice versa, rounds with overall 12 or less tricks are called: -Under rounds.
• In over rounds, each player will try to eat their tricks as fast as possible, in order to reach their desired tricks before the others, as there will be at least 1 player unable to reach the desired tricks number, vise-versa, in under rounds, players will be avoiding most of the times eating their tricks, as there will be at least one player with at least extra unwanted eaten trick.
• Players are not allowed to estimate higher amount of tricks than the bid winner, or as estimation players call: 'The Caller' after passing during trump bidding, however players can estimate the same amount as bid winner, and will be labeled as 'With', which means his score will be calculated as the bid winner/the caller.
• If all players passed during bidding phase, the next round starts instantly with doubled score in each calculation.
  
  

SCORE CALCULATION:

• After each round, the player who gets the number of tricks as estimated at the bidding phase, they will be rewarded as following:

Notes:

• Caller: is the player who won at the bidding phase.
• With: is the player who wants to eat the amount of tricks liker the (Caller) or the bid winner.
• Risk: is when the last player during the bidding phase estimates a certain amount of tricks which will cause the total tricks of all players to be over or under 13 by at least 2, and each difference by 2 adds a (Risk).
• Dash Call: when a player asks for zero tricks before the bidding phase starts, notice that win/lose score differs from (+ Over / - Under) rounds as shown in the above table.
• Any round with players overall tricks of 14 (or more) is played as +Over round, and all rounds with overall tricks of 12 (or less) is played as -Under round.
  

That's all. interesting game, isn't it? start playing now after downloading Pocket Estimation on your phone