Dou Di Zhu is one of the most popular card games played in China.
Dou Di Zhu is a poker game for three players. One player, the "landlord", plays alone and the others form a team. The landlord's aim is to be the first to play out all his cards in valid combinations, and the team wins if any one of them manages to play all their cards before the landlord.
Players, Cards and Deal
This game uses a 54-card pack including two jokers, red and black. The cards rank from high to low:
red joker, black joker, 2, A, K, Q, J, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3.
Suits are irrelevant.
Auction
There is an auction to determine which player will be the landlord, and play alone against the other two. The possible bids are 1, 2 and 3. Each player in turn may either pass or bid higher than the highest bid so far. If everyone passes the hand is thrown in and there is a new deal. The final and highest bidder is the landlord. This player now picks up the three face-down cards from the middle, for a total of 20 cards.
Play
The landlord plays first, and may play a single card or any legal combination. Each subsequent player in anticlockwise order must either pass (play no card) or beat the previous play by playing a higher combination of the same number of cards and same type. There are just two exceptions to this: a rocket can beat any combination, and a bomb can beat any combination except a higher bomb or rocket - see definitions below. The play continues around the table for as many circuits as necessary until two consecutive players pass. The person who played the last card(s) begins again, leading any card or legal combination.
In this game, there are thirteen types of combination that can be played:
Single card - ranking from three (low) up to red joker (high) as explained above
Pair - two cards of the same rank, from three (low) up to two (high)
Triplet - three cards of the same rank
Triplet with an attached card - a triplet with any single card added.
Triplet with an attached pair - a triplet with a pair added.
Sequence - at least five cards of consecutive rank, from 3 up to ace - for example 8-9-10-J-Q. Twos and jokers cannot be used.
Sequence of pairs - at least three pairs of consecutive ranks, from 3 up to ace. Twos and jokers cannot be used.
Sequence of triplets - at least two triplets of consecutive ranks from three up to ace.
Sequence of triplets with attached cards - an extra card is added to each triplet.
Bomb - four cards of the same rank. A bomb can beat everything except a rocket, and a higher ranked bomb can beat a lower ranked one.
Rocket - a pair of jokers. It is the highest combination and beats everything else, including bombs.
Quadplex set - there are two types: a quad with two single cards of different ranks attached.
Scoring
If the landlord runs out of cards first he has won, and each opponent pays him the amount of the bid - 1, 2 or 3 units - provided that no bomb or rocket was played. If one of the other two players runs out before the landlord, the landlord loses and must pay the amount of the bid to each opponent. For each occasion when any player played a bomb or rocket, the payment for the hand is doubled. So for example in a hand in which two bombs and a rocket were played, a player who bid 3 will win 24 points from each opponent for going out first, or pay 24 to each opponent if another player goes out first.
No deals played a.k.a. spring. If the peasants do not deal any card in a round, or the landlord only deal the card once with cards left in hand in a round, the final score will be double. In the former situation, the landlord wins score while the peasants lose, else the peasants win score.
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