Gin rummy
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Gin rummy (or Gin for short) is a simple and popular two-player card game created by E. T. Baker in 1909. Derived from knock rummy, Gin was created with the intention of being faster than standard rummy, but not as spontaneous as knock rummy.
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The Deck
Gin is played with a standard 52-card pack of playing cards. Aces are played only as low; the ranking from low-to-high is A-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10-J-Q-K.
Dealing
Dealership alternates from round to round (the dealer to the first round shall be determined at random). The dealer deals a ten-card hand to each player. The 21st card dealt, the upcard, is placed face-up in a central location known as the discard pile. The remainder of the pack is called the stock.
The non-dealing player has the option of taking the upcard and playing first. If he or she does not, the dealer plays first.
Play
On each turn, a player:
- draws either the (face-up) top card of the discard pile, or one card from the stock,
- may "knock", ending the round, under certain conditions, and (in any case)
- discards one card from his or her hand (which may be the card drawn, but cannot be an upcard taken that turn) onto the discard pile, and
Play continues, in alternating turns, until one player chooses to knock, or only two cards remain in the stock.
All cards in the discard pile, except for the one on the top, will never be redrawn into play and are sometimes called dead. Players may not look through the discard pile to determine whether or not a given card is dead, and the discard pile should be kept "squared up" to prevent inadvertent access to that information.
Evaluation of the hand
The objective in Gin Rummy is to improve one's hand by forming melds and eliminating deadwood. Two types of melds exist:
- Sets of 3 or 4 cards sharing the same rank. For example, 8♥-8♣-8♠.
- Runs of 3 or more cards in sequence, of the same suit. For example, 3♥-4♥-5♥-6♥-7♥.
Aces rank only as low, so A-K-Q or 2-A-K "runs" are not recognized.
A player's deadwood cards are those not in any meld. Her deadwood count is the sum of the point values of the deadwood cards— aces are scored at 1 point, face cards at 10, and others at pip value. Intersecting melds are not allowed; therefore, if a player has a 3-card set and a 3-card run sharing a common card, he can only count one of them and must count two cards as deadwood.
A low deadwood count is desirable, so players usually work to lower it by forming melds and, secondarily, replacing high cards (such as face cards) with lower ones.
Knocking
In standard Gin, a player may not knock until he has 10 or fewer points of deadwood, and must knock if he has 0 points of deadwood (known as going Gin).
The knocking player lays her hand out with the melds clearly indicated, and deadwood separated. The other ("defending") player has the options of:
- forming melds from his own hand, and
- laying off cards from his hand onto the knocking player's melds, assuming they fit appropriately.
If the knocking player has gone gin, however, the defending player usually does not have the ability to lay off.
Scoring
In the United States, the most common scoring system for gin rummy is the 20/25 system of scoring, though the 10/20 system is more traditional.
10/20 system
If the knocking player has gone gin, she scores 20 points, plus the deadwood count of the defending player.
If the knocking player has not gone gin, and the defending player has an equal or lower deadwood count, he has undercut the knocker, and scores 10 points plus the margin by which his deadwood count was lower.
If the knocking player has not gone gin and is not undercut, she scores according to the margin by which her deadwood count was lower than that of the defending player.
20/25 system
This system is the same as that above, except for that the gin bonus is worth 25 points instead of 20, and the undercutting bonus is 20 points instead of 10.
Single match
When a single match is to be played, the players will continue to play rounds until one player has 100 points or more. This player wins the match.
Multi-match
In multi-match games, it is typical to keep track of both match and game scores. Match scores are reset to zero with the start of each match, but the game scores accumulate from match to match, and are ultimately used to determine the winner. A match ends when one player scores 100 match points.
At the end of the match, players' match scores are credited toward their game scores, as well as:
- 25 game points for each round won,
- 100 game points to the winner of the match, and
- 100 additional game points to the match winner if the loser won no rounds.