Pedro

Players and equipment

Four players, in two fixed partnerships sitting opposite each other — you and the player across the table are partners for the whole game. A standard 52-card deck, no jokers.

The deal

Deal and play go clockwise. The dealer gives out the cards three at a time until everyone holds nine, and the turn to deal moves one place left after every hand.

Starting on the dealer's left, each player bids once, in turn: a bid is a claim that your side will win at least that many points once you name trumps. The lowest bid allowed is 7 and the highest is 14, and every bid after the first must beat the one before it or pass. If the first three players all pass, the dealer must bid 7.

Whoever bids highest names a suit as trumps. The trump five is worth five points and is called pedro; the other five of the same colour — the red five if you named a red suit, the black five if you named a black one — becomes a trump too, ranking just below pedro, and is worth five points of its own as the low pedro. Everybody throws away every card that is not a trump, face down, and the dealer tops the other three players' hands back up to six cards from what is left in the pack — anyone already holding six trumps or more keeps them all and gets nothing more. The dealer then goes through whatever is left, must take every remaining trump into hand, and makes their own hand up to six with ordinary cards on top of that — so the dealer can end up holding more than six cards.

Play

The high bidder leads to the first trick, with any card — a trump is not compulsory. If the card led is a trump, everybody who holds one must play one; if it is not, a player holding the led suit may follow it or trump, and a player with neither may throw anything. The highest trump played wins the trick; with no trump played, the highest card of the suit led wins it instead. Whoever wins a trick leads the next one.

A player starting the hand with more than six cards — the dealer, or anyone dealt more than six trumps, and only ever in trumps — plays enough cards to the first trick to be left with five, stacked face up with the top card counting as the one played and the rest "buried" underneath. You may never bury a scoring trump this way.

Scoring

Six of the fourteen cards in a trump suit are worth something: the ace, jack and ten one point each, pedro and low pedro five points each, and the two one point — fourteen points in the pack every hand. The ace, jack, ten and both fives score for whichever side wins them in a trick; the two is different and scores for whichever side was simply dealt it, whoever wins the trick it falls in.

SquareScores deals no cards and sees none of this — a deal is one row on the sheet, and either partner on a side may enter that side's points for it once the tricks are counted; the host may correct any side's cell, and nobody else can. The non-bidding side always keeps what it won. The bidding side keeps its points too, but only when it reaches its bid — fourteen points split two ways means a bid of 8 or more is already more than half the pack, so a bid that misses by even one point is a real swing. Where the bidding side falls short, the sheet cannot carry a minus into a side's running line, so enter 0 for them that deal and keep a note on paper of the shortfall — the amount they bid — to come off the next deal they would otherwise score; if that deal too is smaller than the shortfall, enter 0 again and carry the rest until it is paid off. First side to a running 62 wins the game, and End match banks the table's score whenever you stop short of that line; see Variations for a scoring method with no shortfall to carry at all.

A worked hand

Hearts are trumps. Alice (bidding at 8, partnered with Carol) and Bob (partnered with Dave) play the hand out. The trump two was dealt to Dave.

Trump ace, won by Alice's side

1

in a trick

Trump ten, won by Alice's side

1

in a trick

Pedro (five of hearts), won by Alice's side

5

in a trick

Trump jack, won by Bob's side

1

in a trick

Low pedro (five of diamonds), won by Bob's side

5

in a trick

Trump two, dealt to Dave

1

scores Bob's side regardless of the trick

Alice's side took 7 of the 14 points — short of their bid of 8 — so they enter 0 and carry an 8-point shortfall against their next scoring deal. Bob's side took 6 in tricks plus the dealt two, 7 points, and enters 7 as the non-bidding side.

Ending

Play hand after hand, each dealt the same way, until one side's running score reaches 62 or more. If both sides are within 7 points of winning before a hand is dealt — "bidder goes out" — only the bidding side can win that hand, by making its bid; if it is set, the hand is scored as usual and the other side may end up ahead instead. Judge both the 62 line and "bidder goes out" on each side's sheet total less any shortfall still on paper. If both sides reach 62 on a hand that was not already "bidder goes out", one more such hand decides it. The sheet shows only each side's running total, so if its leader is not the side the rule makes the winner, or both sides pass 62 together and another hand is due, play that hand out and use End match to bank the right result. End match is any player's, for a table that stops partway through a game.

Counting the fives before you bid

Fourteen points are in the pack and ten of them are the two fives — so a hand with one pedro and three or four other trumps is worth a bid, where a long suit of ordinary trumps with neither five is not. Count the points you can see in your own hand before naming a number; your partner's hand is the unknown half of the bid.

Cinching

When a plain suit is led and you hold a trump higher than the five, playing it rather than a low trump is called cinching — it stops whoever is fourth to the trick coming in over everybody and rescuing a pedro that would otherwise go to the other side. Keeping a trump higher than the five back for exactly this moment, rather than spending it early, wins more pedros than any other single habit.

Watch how many cards each player took back

Every player discards every card that is not a trump the moment trumps are named, and the dealer tops each hand back up to six — so the fewer cards a player takes back, the more trumps they were already holding: six minus the cards they took back is roughly how many trumps are still live against you. A side that is clearly trump-light early should play to protect its own fives rather than chase the other side's.

Lead your partner's strength, not your own

Your partner bid or passed knowing their own hand, not yours — if they named trumps, trust that they hold the pedros or the top end of the suit and lead to let them win tricks rather than spending your own best card first. The hand is won as a partnership, and a side that plays two separate games usually loses both fives to the other one.

Know when a hand is not worth saving

If you can see early that your side has no realistic path to its bid, stop trying to win cheap tricks and start trying to deny the other side the two remaining fives instead — the loss is the same size whether you fall short by one point or by eight, so the only thing left to fight for is keeping pedro and low pedro out of their pile.

Minimum bid of six

Some tables set the lowest bid at 6 rather than 7, with the dealer forced to 6 (or, in a mixed version, 7) when everybody else passes. It makes a weak hand easier to open with, and a touch more hands get played out before bidding closes.

Slams and the 28-56 bid

A bid of 14 — taking every point in the pack — is sometimes called a slam or "shooting the moon," and some tables score it at double, 28 points, if it comes off, while a failed slam still only costs the ordinary 14. A further "28-56" bid is open to the dealer alone, and only when they hold the trump ace, king and two before naming trumps: successful, it scores 56; set, it costs only 28.

No negative scores

Many tables avoid a minus altogether: if the bid is made, the bidding side scores the difference between what the two sides won rather than the whole amount (bid 7, win 9 against the other side's 5, and you score 4); if the bid fails, the other side scores the bid plus whatever they themselves took (bid 7, win 6 against 8, and the other side scores 15). Several of the targets below go with this method, and it is the cleaner fit for a sheet that will not take a minus — ask whoever runs the table which they would rather play.

A different target

62 is usual, but some tables play to 51, 52, 56 or 61 instead, and a few play that reaching the target on the same hand the other side also reaches it hands the win to the bidding side. Agree the number before the first bid goes in.

Must follow suit

Some tables require a trump to follow a trump and a plain card to follow a plain card, even when a player holds a higher trump free to play instead. It takes cinching largely out of the game — the technique above stops working once a player with the led suit cannot choose to trump over it — and makes the fall of each trick far more a matter of what people were dealt than what they chose to do with it.

How many cards do you deal in Pedro?

Nine each, given out three at a time. After bidding and naming trumps, everyone discards every card that is not a trump and the other three are topped back up to six; the dealer, and anyone dealt more than six trumps, can end up with more.

What is a pedro?

The trump five. It is worth five points on its own — more than the trump ace, jack, ten and two put together, which make four — and that is what makes it the card every hand is fought over. The other five of the same colour as trumps — the low pedro — is also a trump and is also worth five points.

Why does the two of trumps score differently from the other cards?

The two is the exception: it scores for whichever side was simply dealt it, not whoever wins the trick it falls in. Every other scoring trump — the ace, jack, ten and both fives — is won instead by whichever side takes it in a trick, so a side can lose the trick with the two in it and still keep the point.

What happens if a side fails its bid in Pedro?

They lose the amount they bid rather than keeping anything they won that hand — call it 8 and take only 6, and 8 comes off your running score, not 6 gets added. On the sheet, enter 0 and carry it — see Scoring. Some tables score it the other way round instead, with no minus at all; see Variations.

Can you play Pedro with fewer than four players?

Not really — the game is built around two fixed partnerships of two, and the deal, the discarding and the trump count all assume exactly four hands round the table. Related games such as Pedro Sancho can be played by more players, or individually, but they add scoring cards and are different games.

Who leads the first trick in Pedro?

Whoever won the bidding and named trumps. They may lead any card, not necessarily a trump, and after that trick the lead simply passes to whoever won the one before.