How to Play the Card Game Mate
Mate is a unique card game which is almost pure strategy. The game appears to have been invented in Germany around 1915, first appearing in a small German book titled “Zwei neue Kriegspiele!", which translates to "Two New War Games!", by author and apparent inventor of the game G. Kapellan. It later re-appeared in Sid Sackson's 1969 book "A Gamut of Games" which helped spread the popularity of the game. Special sets of Chess Cards can be found for which this game can be played, replacing the normal cards used for the game with cards representing specific Chess pieces.

The game which is named after the Chess term Checkmate is also sometimes called Chess cards and can be though of as being a type of Chess which could be played with cards. The deck used to play consists of only 20 cards from a standard deck. The cards used are the following: One card in each of the four suits of the following denominations: Ace, King, Queen, 10, 7.

Card ranking in the card game Mate Each card can be thought to represent a piece from a Chess set, and has a relative ranking. The ranking of the cards in the deck are as follows (from high to low): Ace, 10, King, Queen, 7. As between cards of the same denomination each suit also has a relative ranking. The ranking of the suits used in this game are as follows (from high to low); Clubs, Hearts, Spades, Diamonds.

The first dealer is relatively unimportant in this game, as, over the course of a full game, the dealer will have no advantage. However, if there is any dispute, both players should draw a card from the shuffled deck with the player drawing the high card (as per the game's card ranking) becomes the first dealer.

Once the first dealer is determined, he shuffles the 20 card deck to be used for the game and deals five cards to each player, one at a time, starting with his opponent. Each player will thus receive 10 total cards. Each player then picks up his hand and the game can begin.

Foreplacing: Before playing to the first hand, both players have the option to foreplace a card. The dealer has the first opportunity and his opponent the next opportunity. To foreplace a card, a player would take a card of his choice from his hand and place it face-down in front of himself and stating his intention to foreplace this card. If he elects not to foreplace a card he also states this. The dealer's opponent then has the same options, and may foreplace a card face-down in front of himself at the table. Foreplacing cards gives an opportunity to increase scoring for a player at the end of the hand (see scoring section below).

Trivia: The original booklet in which this game was first described, titled Zwei neue Kriegspiele! translated to Two new War Games from German is extremely rare, with only two copies currently documented to exist. The other game described in the original booklet is called Free Chess, which is a variant of the famous board game, Chess.
After the players have the opportunity to foreplace, the hand begins. The dealer has the first play. He may play any card of his choice face-up to the table in front of himself. His opponent then must play a card based on this first card played. He must play a card of the same suit if he has one. If he does not have such a card, he must play a card of the same denomination. If has neither a card of the same suit or denomination he is said to be Mated, and the hand ends with the player of the first card declared the winner of the hand. If both player's were able to play a card to the trick, the higher ranked card (as per the card ranking described above) wins the trick. The trick should be set aside, and the player who played the higher card plays the first card to the next trick (any card of his choice). This continues until all cards have been played or a player on his turn is unable to play a card of the same rank or suit as the first card played to that trick. If both players foreplaced a card at the beginning of the hand, 9 tricks will be played, if one player foreplaced and the other did not, the player who has fewer cards is considered to have played his last card to the two last tricks. If neither player foreplaced a card, 10 tricks can be played to during the hand. During play and scoring, the specific cards which had belonged to each hand should be kept in distinct piles, as the exact same hands will be used in the next hand.

Winning the Hand and Scoring: The concept of the game is that each move is a Chess move in which the player is in Check from the opponent. He must then make a move of his own to not be Mated. If neither player is mated after all tricks have been played during the hand, the hand is a draw with neither player winning the hand and no score occurring for that hand. However, if one player manages to Mate the other player, he wins and scores based on several factors. The first factor is the value of the card which was used to make the successful Checkmate move. The following table shows the scoring value of the cards used in the game:
CardWin Score Value
Ace11
Ten10
King4
Queen3
Seven7
            Card values in the card game Mate
The player who was able to Mate the opponent, scores a number of points equal to the value of the card used in the winning move multiplied by the number of the last turn played in the current hand (from one to ten). If a player foreplaced a card, this counts as one additional move for that player (thus increasing the move multiplier for scoring on the hand for that player). Additionally, if the winning player foreplaced and his opponent did not, and he manages to win on that tenth hand (using his ninth played card for the ninth and tenth turn), he wins double this score (including +1 for the foreplaced card), called an overmate.

After the hand has been played and scored, the original hands are reassembled and given to the alternate player. In other words, each player plays the next hand using the hand his opponent had on the previous move. In addition, the non-dealer from the first hand has the first play. The second hand is thus played in the same way, however the hands are swapped. Each set of two hands played in this way is called one round.

After one full round has been completed, the cards are gathered and shuffled and the original non-dealer deals for the next round. Two full rounds makes one match. Two matches played constitutes one game. The player with the highest accumulated score after two matches are played is the game winner.
Variations and Optional Rules

Several additions or changes have been added by some players including several suggested by Sid Sackson in his groundbreaking book. The following are some of these changed or additional rules sometimes added to this game:

Discarding: Some players replace the foreplacing a card with the concept of discarding. Thus, players do not have the option to foreplace a card at the beginning of the hand. However, they do have the opportunity to discard, at the beginning of any turn.

Thus, either player, at the beginning of his turn announces he wants to discard a card. He then exposes the card he intends to discard to his opponent and then places the card face-down in front of himself. This card will have no further part in the current hand. After discarding a card, the player must then make his normal move. A player may only discard one card during a turn and is never required to do so.

The difference between discarding and foreplacing are as follows. Foreplacing can only be done before the first move of the hand, while discarding can be done at the start of any hand. Because of this, a player may end up with much fewer than 10 cards in hand. If a player runs out of cards during the hand while his opponent still has cards, he is considered to use his last played card to each remaining trick. As an example, suppose a player were to win the win the game on the eighth turn, with a King and having discarded one card. His total score for the hand would thus be 36. Four points as the winning card (King) multiplied by the value of the turn number (eight) added to the number of discards (1), for a total of 36 poinsts for the hand.

Scoring example in the card game Mate including discarding

Scoring and Overmate Multiplier: As in the standard variant, the score for a player is based on the card value of the card used to win the hand multiplied by the sum of ordinal number of the trick on which he was able to win the hand added to the number of discarded cards that player made during the hand. In addition, a player is entitled to additional multipliers if he manages perform an overmate (winning the hand on a trick in which he had to re-use a previous card because he has no cards remaining in hand), the player is allowed to add an additional amount to the final multiplier. This bonus is based on the ordinal trick number of player's win + total discards by the player. This number is then used to determine an additional bonus that can be added to the multiple. The following chart shows the amount of the multiplier depending on this total:
OverMate Trick NumberOvermate Multiplier
12
23
34
45
56
In all other aspects this game is played identically to the standard variant.

King's Privilege: Another optional rule that is sometimes added is that of King's Privilege (also sometimes called Queens Privilege, after the most powerful piece on a Chess board). In this rule, when a player leads an Ace to a trick that player may (but is not required to) declare "King's Privilege". If he does so announce this, his opponent must play another Ace to the trick (if he has one). If he does not have one, he may play another card of the same suit as usual.

                     
Copyright © 2015 CatsAtCards.com. All rights reserved.
[Main][Site Map][Glossary][Copyright Page]