In my ongoing effort to remember stuff, the rules our house used to play the game ’31’. There are lots of variations of this game including versions in which you have to go home and tell your wife you lost the house in a card game.  As this game was typically played with the family (or things like Scout camp) the gambling aspect was downplayed… but not entirely.

Overview

Objective: To be the last person with one or more of their three chips plus one ‘donkey’.

Cards: a single deck played with cards 7 (lowest card) to Ace (high); 2 to 6 are not used in the game.

Chips: three counters (we have traditionally used M and M’s or chocolates); one each to each player.

The Play:

• Deal: The dealer rotates to the left of the players after each hand.
• Number of Hands: The first dealer deals 3 cards to each player plus one extra hand (the old maid).
• 1st Hand or the Old Maid: The dealer has the option of taking the first dealt hand OR, without looking at the second, the old maid.
• The Middle: depending on which hand is chosen by the dealer, they then lay out the NON-selected hand face up in the middle of the table.
• Normal Play: the first person to the left of the dealer has the option of taking ONE of the cards from the middle to replace ONE of his card.
• The Knock:
  • Any player can ‘Knock’ if she things that she will not get a better card from the middle.
  • Once a Knock is done, the play continues around the table but ends with the person who has FIRST knocked; e.g. she gets a last chance hand.
• Counting and Loss of a Counter:
  • The cards are counted (see scoring below) by each person.
  • The person with the highest score wins the hand and becomes the next dealer.
  • The person with the lowest score losses one counter to the highest scoring player.
  • Players have three counters plus one ‘Donkey’; once they have lost their donkey they are out of future hands.
• ‘Thirty-One’:
  • Thirty one is the result of having two or more face cards of the same suit plus the ACE of the suit
    • E.g. 2 of the  [Ten, Jack, Queen, King of Clubs]
    • PLUS the Ace of Clubs
  • As soon as a player has Thirty One, the lays it down saying ‘Thirty-One’ and the play stops.
  • This player is the high scoring player (see counting above).
• Swap – Play:
  • All Three: A player can choose to swap her cards for all THREE of the cards in the middle.
  • Rationale: This may be done because inadvertently a high scoring hand has been created in the middle (e.g. a Thirty-One hand).
  •  A SWAP is equivalent to a ‘Knock’ except the player does not get his last chance ‘swap’.

Counting

• Thirty-One:
  • Same suit with two of (Ten, Jack, Queen, King) and the Ace, or
  • Three Aces.
• Thirty+Half: three of a kind (e.g. three Sevens) except for three access (see Thirty-One above).
• Thirty: three face cards or a ten of the same suit.
• Twenty-One to Twenty-Nine: two or fewer face cards and one or more non-face cards of the SAME suit.
  • Each face card and the Ten is worth 10 points.
  • Less than 10 is the value of the card (e.g. 7 = 7 points).
• Eight to Twenty:
  • The addition of the two top scoring cards of the SAME suit excluding the card of a different suit.
  • The highest card of a single suit if the three cards are from different suits.
• Comparative Scoring:
  • The winner of two hands with an equal score will be determined by the highest score whether comparing one, two or three cards (e.g. Ten/Jack/Queen will lose to Ten/Jack/King).
  • The higher card value is the winner of two Thirty+Half hands (e.g. Ten/Ten/Ten loses to Jack/Jack/Jack).

Thirty-One Zombies

The one aspect of the game of Thirty-One that I never liked was that eventually players were ‘out’.  This meant they had to wait around until eventually two players were left and all of the counters have been won or loss.

The Thirty-One Zombie variation allows the players to stay in the game although they are then ineligible of ‘winning’ the game.

•  When a player has lost her ‘Donkey’ she becomes a Zombie.
• Zombies are dealt into the game but cannot win the game, the honour goes to the player with the last ‘counter’.
• If a Zombie wins a hand they then get TWO counters:
  • One is from the lowest hand (see the normal play above for the rules) and,
  • One is based on a Zombie attack which is based on the lowest card in her winning hand.
  • Starting on her left, she counts out the number of players until gets to that number.
  • For example, a win with three Sevens will see her counting left ‘7’ and taking the counter of that 7th person; she will continue to count around the table until she gets to this number including herself in the count.
  • If the person the count lands on is also a Zombie, then the count is moved one person to the left until a counter is reached.
  • A Zombie win with three ACES results in the THREE players to her left losing on counter moving to left until three counters have been taken by the Zombie.

What do you think those who have played thirty-one at my house, an improvement or changes you would make?