Sheepshead

About this board game

Sheepshead is a trick-taking card game for 3–7 players that typically plays in about 30 minutes. Related to the Skat family, it is the Americanized version of Schafkopf, a Central European game that originated in the late 18th century.

Each game uses a 32-card deck containing the 7 through ace in all four suits. Its unusual card hierarchy is central to play: all queens, all jacks, and every diamond are trump. The strongest cards are the queens in club, spade, heart, diamond order, followed by the jacks in that same order, then the ace, ten, king, nine, eight, and seven of diamonds.

The three remaining suits—clubs, spades, and hearts—are fail suits. Their ace, ten, king, nine, eight, and seven have no precedence over one another by suit. Players must follow the led suit when possible; otherwise, they may play any card, including trump or a fail card. Discarding a different-suited fail card is called throwing off, while throwing off a point card is known as schmearing.

• Trump: 14 cards—every queen, jack, and diamond.
• Point values: aces score 11, tens 10, kings 4, queens 3, jacks 2, and sevens through nines 0.
• Winning target: capture 60 or 61 of the deck’s 120 total points.

Sheepshead’s strongest cards are not its most valuable, creating a distinctive tactical puzzle. The game also features a hidden partner: the Jack of Diamonds can determine a random partner for the player who picks up the blind. That player may instead declare to go alone before the hand begins. In a tied result, the blind picker loses and the opponents win.

With its counterintuitive trump order, flexible discards, and concealed partnership, Sheepshead rewards careful card reading and timing from the opening trick to the final point.