Scopone

Players and equipment

Scopone is played by four, two against two. Sit opposite your partner — you never sit beside them. The traditional deck is an Italian 40-card pack with the Latin suits: swords, clubs, cups and coins. No tens, nines or eights in that pack, so a standard 52-card deck works too, once you pull the 8s, 9s and 10s out of it; swords and clubs stand in for spades and clubs, cups for hearts, coins for diamonds.

Each suit runs King, Queen (or Horse, in the Italian pack), Jack, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, Ace. Every card has a capture value, used while playing, and a separate prime value, used only in one part of the scoring:

Ace

16

Capture value 1, prime value

Two to six

-

Capture value equal to the number, prime values 12, 13, 14, 15, 18 in order

Seven

21

Capture value 7, the highest prime value

Jack

10

Capture value 8, prime value

Queen or Horse

10

Capture value 9, prime value

King

10

Capture value 10, prime value

The seven of coins is the single most important card in the pack, and it is worth remembering on sight.

The deal

Deal passes to the right after every hand, so sit in a fixed ring for the sitting. Shuffle and let the player to your left cut. Deal three cards face down to each player, starting with the player on the dealer's right and moving round that way, then two face down to the middle of the table, then three more to each player, two more to the table, and three more to each player — nine cards to a hand, four to the table, and the whole 40-card pack is out.

Once the deal is done, turn the four table cards face up. If three or all four of them are kings, the hand is dead: throw the cards in and the same dealer deals again.

Play

The player to the dealer's right leads, and the turn passes anticlockwise, to the right — the same way the deal went. Play one card from your hand face up to the table. A card that matches the capture value of a single table card takes that card. A card that equals the sum of two or more table cards takes that whole group — your choice of which group, if more than one adds up to it. If a single card matches AND a different sum also matches, the single card always wins: you must take it, not the group. A card that matches nothing stays on the table, face up, for the next play.

You never have to capture. Laying a card down with no capture is legal, and sometimes the better move. But if the card you play DOES capture, you must take what it captures — you cannot leave a capture on the table because you would rather keep the cards covered.

Captured cards go face down in front of one player on the capturing side, kept like a trick won. Play on until every hand is empty — nine turns each, thirty-six cards played in all. Whoever made the last capture also sweeps up whatever is left on the table, but that final pickup is never itself worth a sweep point.

Scoring

Every hand is worth four points, shared out between the two sides, plus one more for each sweep either side made:

Cards

1 point

The side that captured more than half the 40 cards

Coins

1 point

The side that captured more than half the coin suit

Sette bello

1 point

Whoever captured the seven of coins

Prime

1 point

The side holding the stronger prime — see below

Sweep

1 point each

One per sweep, either side, during the hand

A prime is one card per suit, picked for its prime value from the table above, not its capture value — so the strongest prime is usually built from sevens, sixes and aces. Add up the four cards' prime values and the higher total wins the point. A prime built across all four suits always beats one missing a suit, whatever the numbers say, and if both sides are missing a suit, or the totals tie exactly, nobody scores the point. Cards and coins split evenly (20–20, or 5–5 on coins) also score nobody.

Enter your side's total for the hand — cards, coins, sette bello, prime and every sweep, added together — into your own column; the host may enter or correct either side's. The running line is what the sheet is counting toward: the first side to 11 points at the end of a hand wins the match, and if both sides reach 11 or more in the same hand, the higher score wins. If a hand leaves them level, deal again. SquareScores never sees a card or a capture — it only holds the number each hand is worth.

A hand worked through

North-South and East-West have just finished a hand. North-South captured 23 of the 40 cards to East-West's 17, and 6 of the 10 coins to East-West's 4. East-West came away with the seven of coins, and their prime — two sevens, a six and a jack — beat North-South's for the point. North-South made one sweep along the way; East-West made none.

Cards

1

North-South, 23 to 17

Coins

1

North-South, 6 to 4

Sette bello

1

East-West held it

Prime

1

East-West's prime was stronger

Sweep

1

North-South's one sweep

North-South's hand comes to 3 (cards, coins, their sweep); East-West's comes to 2 (sette bello, prime). Enter 3 for North-South and 2 for East-West against this hand. If North-South were already sitting on 9, this hand takes them to 12 and the match is theirs.

Ending

A match plays out over as many hands as it takes to reach the target — 11 points as standard, though a table that wants a longer match can raise it before the first card is dealt, and the line can move again between matches. There is no "next match" button to press: once a side crosses the target the match banks itself, and a fresh hand opens straight away. End match is there for a table that wants to call a match short — any player may use it, not only the dealer or whoever is ahead.

Guard the seven of coins

The sette bello is worth a point outright, and it feeds the coins point and often the prime too. If it is still loose on the table, think hard before leaving a combination that hands it to the other side — a single point can decide a tight match.

Build an anchor

A sweep leaves the next player nothing to capture, and that's bad for them, not you: as soon as the table is empty, whoever plays next has to hand over a free card for somebody else to pick up later. Leaving a total of 11 or more on the table means no single card can sweep it. Better still, if two threes have gone, you hold the third and the fourth is on the table, capture everything else and leave that three as an anchor: the next opponent must play a card, and your partner, trusting you to hold the last three, can capture it and leave the three again.

Chase the prime, not just the cards

Bulk — the most cards or the most coins — is worth a point each, but a prime is often decided long before the hand ends: sevens first, then sixes, then aces. If the sevens are split two apiece, the next rank to fight over is sixes, and after that aces. Counting who has shown which sevens tells you how much that fight is worth chasing.

Track which cards are still paired

While every capture takes exactly one card for one card, the pack behaves predictably: the dealer's very last card will always match whatever is left on the table. The moment somebody captures two or more cards at once, that pattern breaks, and keeping track of which ranks are now "unpaired" tells the dealer's side whether their last card is safe or a gift to the other team.

Talk to your partner with your plays

You cannot speak across the table about your hand, but your partner is watching every card you lay down. Playing a card you hold two of, rather than a lone card, tells your partner where your strength sits; and if your partner plays a card that the next opponent captures, play the same rank if you have it — your partner most likely holds the last one and can take yours.

10-card Scopone (Scopone Scientifico)

Nothing goes to the table at the deal — ten cards straight to each player instead of nine, with none held back. The first card of the whole hand has nothing to capture, so the running start is slower and tighter. Some tables score a sweep for the dealer's side if their very last card captures everything remaining, which the standard deal never allows.

Re bello

The king of coins gets its own bonus point, on top of the usual four, the same way the seven of coins already does. A table playing this way is scoring five points a hand rather than four, before sweeps.

Napola

Capturing the ace, two and three of coins in an unbroken run — and however much further up the suit that run continues — is worth a point for every card in it: taking the ace through the six of coins scores six points on top of the ordinary coins point. Capturing the entire coin suit, ten cards, wins the match outright on the spot. Tables that play Napola often raise the target in step, since there is more to score each hand.

A longer target

Raising the target past 11 — 21 is the common second choice — makes for a longer game and suits a table also playing Re bello or Napola, where hands are worth more than the standard four points.

How many cards does each player get in Scopone?

Nine. The deal goes round three times, three cards to each of the four players each time, with the table getting two cards after the first round and two more after the second — four cards to the table in all, and the full 40-card pack dealt out with nothing left over.

Can you play Scopone without an Italian deck?

Yes. Take a standard 52-card pack and remove every 8, 9 and 10, leaving 40 cards that run Ace to 7 and then Jack, Queen, King in each suit. Spades and clubs play the part of swords and clubs, hearts stands in for cups, and diamonds for coins — so the seven of diamonds is your sette bello.

What is a sweep in Scopone?

Playing a card that captures every card on the table at once, leaving it bare. It is worth a point on top of the hand's usual four, and it matters beyond the point too: the next player has nothing to capture, so a side that keeps sweeping can string several captures together in a row — what players call a whirlwind.

Do you have to capture if you can?

No. You may always choose to lay a card down with no capture, even when a different card in your hand would have taken something. But once you have played a card that DOES capture, you must take everything it is entitled to — you cannot play a capturing card and leave the cards on the table.

What happens if your card matches two things at once?

If it matches a single table card AND also adds up to a different combination of table cards, the single card wins — you are not allowed to take the bigger group instead. If it matches more than one single card, or more than one possible combination that adds to its value, you choose which to take.

How do you win a hand of Scopone, and how do you win the match?

You win a hand by out-scoring the other side on its four points — the majority of cards, the majority of coins, the seven of coins and the stronger prime — plus a point for every sweep, and you win the match by being the first side whose running total reaches the target, 11 as standard, at the end of a hand. Add each hand's score to your running total as you go.