The 60-Second Beginner Guide
Hearts is the opposite of most card games: you do NOT want to win! Well, you don't want to win rounds that have penalty cards in them. Every Heart card is worth 1 bad point, and the dreaded Queen of Spades is worth 13 terrible points! If someone starts a round with a Club, and you play your highest Club, you might win the round and be forced to take all the cards. If someone threw a Heart in there, you just took a penalty point! Your goal is to get rid of your high cards safely so you don't get stuck winning the bad cards. The lowest score wins!
1. Setup
- 1All 52 cards are dealt out equally to 4 players (13 cards each).
- 2Before the round starts, players select 3 cards from their hand and pass them face-down to an opponent (the direction changes each round: left, right, across, hold).
2. How to Play
The player holding the 2 of Clubs MUST lead it to start the very first trick.
Everyone must follow suit if they can. The highest card of the led suit wins the trick and takes the cards.
There is no Trump suit in Hearts!
You CANNOT play a Heart or the Queen of Spades on the very first trick.
You CANNOT lead with a Heart to start a trick until Hearts have been "broken" (meaning someone was forced to play a Heart on a previous trick because they were out of the led suit).
Scoring
- •Unlike most games, points in Hearts are incredibly BAD. You want a score of ZERO.
- •Every single Heart card you take in a trick gives you +1 point.
- •The dreaded Queen of Spades gives you +13 points!
- •Shooting the Moon: If you manage to win a round while taking ALL 13 Hearts AND the Queen of Spades (all 26 points), a miracle happens! You get 0 points, and every other player at the table gets smashed with 26 penalty points!
Winning Conditions
- ✓The game continues for multiple rounds until one player reaches or exceeds 100 points.
- ✓At that moment, the game ends, and the player with the LOWEST score is declared the winner.