You already know how to figure out what tiles that you need and how to memorize the tiles so that you can get them, but what are the odds like as the hand progresses? The chances of picking a tile obviously increase as the hand goes on, but how you play it is what will differentiate a beginning player from an expert player.
After the deal, all the tiles are unknown to you obviously. Since you hold 14 tiles, after the first draw, the chances of the needed tile being picked from the pile are 1 in 46, regardless of the number of players. Those aren’t very great odds. This presumes that both tiles of the same number and color will fill your meld. However, if you are using one on your rack, the odds increase to 1 in 92 which is even worse for you.
On the second draw if you have not seen the tile appear as a discard or on the table, the chances improve to 1 in 45 with one opponent and 1 in 44 with four players. If everyone continues to draw only from the drawing pile, the odds on the 12th draw are 1 in 37 with one oppo9nent and 1 in 32 with two opponents, and 1 in 28 with three opponents. Of course the game is rarely played with each player only drawing from the drawing pile. Therefore it is important to keep track of the number of tiles left in the drawing pile. That is why they are stacked in piles of seven so that you can quickly look to see how many remain and therefore calculate your chances of picking the tile that you want.
Your chances are figured from the total number of tiles that are unknown to you. This includes the tiles in the pile plus all unknown tiles on opponent’s racks. The number of tiles on your opponents’ racks will be the number of players multiplied by 14, minus the number of tiles on your rack, and then minus the number of tiles on the table. It may sounds confusing, but once you get used to the equation it is very easy to figure out your odds of picking the right tile you need.
With only two players, it is possible to have a chance to pick every tile in the deck, either on your original rack, from the pile, or from each discard of your opponent. Unless one of you draws a lucky rack in the early hand, you will soon be able to develop a pretty good idea of where each tile is. If the game continues without either of you going out, the drawing pile will eventually become very small. By this time you have had the opportunity to figure out pretty accurately what tiles your opponent is holding. Again, it is extremely important to keep track of the tiles that have been played because it is these hands that separate the good player from the random player.
By now you should have figured out that melding is one of the most strategic aspects of Rummikub. Without doing it the right way, you will only win a hand by luck and not by skill. That is why it is extremely important for you to learn everything you can about melding and the best strategy to take when you are figuring out which tiles to meld, and when to do it.
Once you have your initial 25 point meld, you always have the choice of playing them on the table or leaving them on your rack. If you are just beginning you may have tendency to get your initial meld down as quickly as possible. Perhaps you feel that you have established a position in the game or maybe you want to demonstrate your ability to meld, or lastly, you could just find the fun in rearranging the melds to get as many tiles down as you can. Whatever the reasoning behind it, it may not be the best decision if you are looking at the strategy of the game versus the fun of the game.
The easiest way to meld tiles is to have as many other tiles available to meld with. That means that the more open melds that are on the table, the more tiles you have to work with. Sure, it makes sense but with this line of thinking you are not only giving away all of your secrets about what you have in your hand, but you are also allowing others to be able to meld onto your tiles and possibly going out before you do.
Since the good player attempts to gain as much information as possible while withholding as much information about your own hand as possible, it may make more sense to let everyone else meld, while holding your 14 mysterious cards in your rack so that you won’t give them any information about your own hand. The ideal game to be in is to allow the other players to meld while you hold back until you can lay down all your tiles at once and go out and win the hand. Since Rummikub is a game that involves so much luck, there are times when it is necessarily to play the open melds as early as possible as a defensive measure, but it doesn’t happen that often. Therefore, the best rule is to hold on to your melds, and meld as late as possible.
Since the object of the game is to meld all of your tiles, the more combinations that you have to work with, the better the chances are that you will be able to do this. If you have melded 9 of your tiles, and only have 5 left to work with then you will have a far worse chance of melding with combinations then if you kept all 14 tiles in your hand. Since melds on your rack can be rearranged and changed by you, it is easier to do that within your rack then on the table. That way they cannot be used by your opponent and you are not letting anyone know what is in your rack.
Open melds, the melds that you form off of other player’s melds, can be played in many different ways. The first kind of play you can follow when melding your tiles to other tiles on the table is the direct layoff. It is the easiest to do because you simply add your tiles to the existing melds. For example, if you have a black run of 1, 2, 3, you can layoff your tiles but adding a black 4, and 5. Another example is when you have a group of three 10’s. You simply meld your 10 in front of you.
The other various ways of melding are definitely more complicated and they involve visioning how you want all the melds to eventually be placed. This means using your tiles, as well as the melds already formed and moving them around to make an entirely new meld. For example, if there are two melds on the table of two groups of four tiles of 4’s and 6’s, and you are holding a yellow 5 on your rack, you can rearrange the melds to form two groups of 4’s and 6’s made of three cards each, and a separate meld of a yellow 4, 5, and 6.
With the exception of the joker, any tile on the table may be repositioned provided that all tiles on the board eventually become part of a meld. The joker may be used in place of any tile when forming melds, but once a joker is on the table it cannot be moved to another meld. It must first be replaced by the tile for which it was used. This can be done by any player in their turn, if they have the replacement tile. For example, if player 1 put down a joker in place of a 9 in a group of four 9’s, then player two if they have the 9 can put down that 9 and remove the joker to use in another meld. The joker, once replaced, cannot be put back onto a player’s rack and must be used during that turn for another meld. A joker can never be replaced and used in an initial meld either.
You have to keep in mind that if you are playing with a time that all of the melds have to be repositioned within the 3 minute time frame or the turn is lost and the next player starts off from the position in which the melds were located at the beginning of the lost player’s turn.
When a player finishes a turn and has three or less tiles left on the rack, they must announce that as well as the number of remaining tiles unless they go out in that turn in which you always announce that. You play until one person goes out the hand is over and won by that player. The total value of all the tiles remaining in the other players’ racks becomes the winners score for the hand. A complete game consists of two complete rounds which are eight hands for four players, three rounds which are nine hands for three players and four rounds which are eight hands for two players. The player with the highest total score at the end of the hands is considered to be the winner.
When it comes to offensive play, the joker is an extremely important tile. Its most obvious function is as a guaranteed initial meld tile. Since by itself, the joker counts for the full value needed to make an initial meld. However, the odds of you being dealt a rack with at least one combination is pretty high, so you may want to consider holding back the joker to use later in the game as an offensive move.
It is usually a good idea to hold the joker for as long as possible. You do not want to lock it up for use with a specific group or run though. You should also keep the joker at the end of your rack and play the rest of the rack as if you didn’t even have it. This will keep you looking for the maximum number of combinations and sets. When it is necessary to meld, the joker will then be available to use to your best advantage.
There are going to be situations in which you may wish to have an opponent reuse your joker so that you can reuse it again later. To the beginner this might sound like an unusual gamble when you use the joker in hopes that they use it to add onto a meld that you may or may not have the tile to replace it with. However, the experts know that you have to take all possibilities into consideration. It is a way of taking advantage of all the odds in his favor, no matter how small.
Another example of when to use the joker offensively is when you are near the end of the hand. For example, say that you are down to three tiles, one of which is the joker, and none of them are playable on the table and do not form any combinations. This is actually pretty common and may happen to you quite often. You may think that you should dump the joker to get rid of the points but then you will still be left with two cards. Unless another player just happens to put down a meld in which you can use your two tiles you are in some trouble. Therefore, you should keep the joker and discard the highest and safest tile on your rack. That leaves you with 1 tile and 1 joker. Chances are you can use the joker and the last tile when another play melds their hand on the table. The odds are actually 28 to 1 that you will have something that you can use the joker and the last tile with. Unless you were extremely defensive player, then keeping the joker till the last possible moment in this situation is the best decision you could make.
The joker is the most dangerous single tile and it should be played with care. In spit of its high point value, it should be retained or played as a protected tile as often as possible. The only exception is when you are absolutely certain that an opponent is prepared to go out. You want to be in charge of the jokers as much as you can, and take advantage of every opportunity to reuse an opponent’s joker and place it in a protected position.
Jokes are extremely important when it comes to the game of Rummikub. No other tile has the strategic possibilities that a joker has, so it is wise to learn how to use it. Since the jokers represent any tile in the deck, they are obviously the easiest to use, and the most versatile. However, they are also the most versatile to your opponents whether or not they have any in their rack. They can be used both offensively and defensively and it is important to be aware of which way you want to use them.
The first thing you want to look at is how many players are in your game. The more people you have on the table, the more chances it can be reused. You need to remember that anyone may replace the joker with the tile it represents and then reuse it in another meld. This includes you as well as your opponent. If you are playing against only one other player, you both have the same number of turns and therefore the same number of chances to reuse the joker. The basic strategy with the joker is to improve your chances of use and reuse and to limit the chances of your opponent.
The easiest strategy, defensively, is to attempt to play a joker so that it cannot be reused, or to play it to minimize the chances of replacing it. With three or four players, this is particularly to your advantage. The best defensive play in the early part of a hand is to play the joker as an Ace or a 13 in a run, making it replaceable by only two tiles. You are positioning it as well so that no other tiles can be laid off of it.
You don’t have to be in a hurry to play the joker, especially early on in a hand. It will give your opponents too many chances of replacing it with a tile that they have in their hand. It is not normally advantageous to meld with a joker early on in a rack just for this reason. Remember, in the beginning you are trying to get as many chances at the drawing pile as you can.
Another way to place a joker in a meld that defensively will work for you is to play it only when you have the replacement tile in your hand. That way, it can never be replaced by anyone but you. You can always replace the protected joker at any time later on in the hand. This is especially important as you get to the end of a hand when you see that someone has only a few tiles remaining. You do not want to give them a chance to go out. The same works in reverse as well, but only if you have the protected joker. By putting it down early, only if it is protected, you are lowering your rack score just in case someone goes out. Since the joker is worth 25 points, you really don’t want to be stuck with it in your rack.
As you have already realized, the tiles that are given to you at the beginning of each hand are given strictly by chance. What you make of those tiles are strictly up to you though, and with more skill and knowledge of how to play the game, you will learn to use strategy to get the tiles that you need to get the biggest score possible.
Each time an opponent discards their tile, you learn the location of just one more tile that you may need or want. The same thing happens each time you pick a tile and discard one. The tiles that have been melded on the table are obviously known tiles, which can be helpful to figure out which ones you may need later on. Since the discards are only visible for one turn on the table, it may be hard to remember them, but it is vitally important that you do.
You should make every effort to keep track of all the tiles that are discarded, whether or not they are picked up. If they are picked up then you will see them later in the melds, making it a bit easier, but if it is not picked up you need to use your memory to remember it. There is not way to teach someone how to perfect their memory. Some are just lucky and have photographic memories, but most people do not. The only thing that will help you is to practice your memorization techniques. A good way to do that is to visualize the entire deck of tiles in a specific pattern of colors and numbers and then subtract from the pattern all the tiles that are dead. For this game, this is only the discard tiles that are not used and then become covered by the next discard.
When the discard tiles are picked up you should constantly review those particular tiles. Once a tile has been melded on the table, it is important to discard it from your memory so that you are not playing defensively against it, or looking for it to come up. It is also important to forget the tiles that you have been remembering from a previous hand that could really throw off the hand you are in now. This can be extremely important in increasing the odds of getting the tiles you need because you certainly don’t want to be looking for a tile you do not need.
The other two ways of increasing the possibilities of forming melds that you need are to pick from the drawing pile as well as the discard pile, and to use the open melds on the table. Unless someone goes out, you have a minimum of 39 picks from the drawing pile if there are two people playing, 21 picks if three people are playing, and 12 picks if four people are playing. Since the discards are seen by everyone, they all know the tiles. However if you are picking from the draw pile then only you will know the tiles, giving you an advantage of getting exactly the tiles that you need to win the game.
Making decisions on melding doesn’t just start when you make your initial meld. The decisions start to appear as soon as you see your rack. This is when you can tell almost immediately how your play should be and what you need to do to win the hand.
If you start out with a relatively strong rack, such as eight or more melded tiles and the rest in combinations, you have a good chance of going out early in the hand. In this case, it may be to your advantage when it comes to points, if no one melded before you completed your rack. Part of the play of the game is to influence the other players to do exactly what you want them to do.
With such a hand you would not want to meld on the table. Once a pattern of play has been established with your opponents, there is a strong tendency to remain in that particular pattern. If you have not been melding, then your opponents will soon adopt the same strategy. An early meld will indicate that the player is in a strong position to go out soon, and the other players follow by melding to reduce their point count. This is something that you do not want because you want as many points as possible, so you want to hold back and try to complete the rack entirely before going down. This will encourage everyone else to hold back, and your score will be much higher.
The opposite end of this is the poor rack on the deal. In this case, you may need considerable time to help develop your rack and get the melds that you need. If no one melds, then you only have the discards and draws to work with. Against one opponent you will have 39 potential picks from the drawing pile plus whatever additional tiles become available through the discard piles. Remember that every time you pick a discard you give up once chance at the drawing pile.
At the same time, every time your opponent picks up one of your discards they are giving up a chance at the drawing pile. With this many picks, unless your opponent develops his rack very fast, you will have enough time to develop yours. Against two or three opponents, the number of picks available goes down dramatically. The only way to increase your chances at more tiles is to encourage open melding. Therefore, this is a situation that you want to make your initial meld as early as possible.
This doesn’t mean melding as many tiles on the table as you can. You should only meld enough to make your initial meld value of 25 points, or as close as possible using the minimum number of tiles. What you are really trying to do is to encourage other players to make open melds so that you can use their tiles for you to go out.
If you are an aggressive player by nature then chances are you will constantly be on the offense. This is the person that will try to go out as soon as possible, with no regard to the tiles in which they discard except that since they are of little use to them, they just want to get rid of them. The defensive player tries to prevent another player from forming melds as often as possible, discarding only the safest possible tiles with no regard to their value in their own rack. Any development they make will strictly be by chance. The ultimate goal of a defensive player is to force every hand to a draw, hoping to luck out from time to time with a fully meldable rack. Obviously, this type of player will win less often than the purely offensive player. However, both players lose out against the good player who knows that there is a time for offensive and a time for defensive, but never plays both all of the time.
Very few racks lend themselves exclusively to either method of play. Even a totally random rack with no reasonable combination can change rapidly with the drawing of only a few tiles. Therefore, it is necessary to constantly revaluate your position as you progress in the hand. If your rack does not develop then you may want to get your point count down as low as possible and play your discards as safely as possible. If that does develop, then you look for useful tiles and probably discard with less regard for the safe value of each tile.
Rummikub differs from Rummy in that all of the tiles that are left on your rack count against you, whether or not they can be melded. If one player goes out, the others cannot lay off on the tiles already down. Therefore, there is a considerable problem for the defensive player or the player who is forced by their rack to play defensively. In deciding whether or not to meld on the table early on in the hand to reduce your point count, or to hold your tiles to prevent them being used by others you should consider some factors in how the hand is shaping up.
You should look at the score and whether or not you are ahead or behind, and whether you want to get the count as low as possible. If you are behind then it is probably best to risk the open melds against holding high tiles. In a defensive position, you should try to hold your point count down to below the spread between you and your nearest opponent if you are ahead in the game.
Then you should look at whether your opponents are playing open melds, or if they are holding them in their racks. If they are doing both then you have to look at specifically what the opponent nearest to you in score is doing. If they play their rack, you can risk holding your tiles longer with the possibility that they will further develop. If everyone else is playing on the table, then you should also play on the table to keep the total score as low as possible for whoever wins the hand. If everyone plays on the rack, you should stay there as long as possible yourself. Either your rack will develop or they will get a high score, which they would have done anyhow. In this case you are working for whatever chances you can find.
If you are in defensive mode when looking at your rack, then playing your tiles on the rack instead of on the table is the right thing to do. It allows you control of the most tiles with the minimum amount of effort. However, there are other basic defensive tactics which must be considered. The most important of these is how you play your discards. This is especially true when playing a game with only two players, but it is also of considerable importance with three or four players.
Not only must you consider which tiles are the safest to discard, but you must consider what use you can make of the tiles discarded to you. Obviously your discards, defensively, consist of tiles that cannot be used by your opponent or that have the least chance of being used. With open melds, the tiles in the melds are still available for use in other melds by rearranging them. It is extremely difficult to find meld arrangements that prevent the eventual playing of almost any tile. The only tiles that are truly not in play are discards that have not been picked up. This is the reason as to why it is so important to remember so many of the discards that you have already seen.
Sometimes you play a discard that is picked up by the next player. The easiest defense then dictates that you do not discard another tile that combines with the first. As a result, you will be holding tiles for purely defensive reasons. It is important that you now try to match these tiles yourself so that you can get rid of them. When this situation occurs, it is bets to allow the other player to meld the tile first, if possible. This lets you have the opportunity to rearrange his meld and unload your tiles. If you combine the defensive tile and meld first, the chances are almost certain that your opponent will utilize your meld to play the tile he has picked up from you.
When you are playing with someone who is also careful in watching the discards, as most players are, you can often take advantage of the situation to force him to hold tiles that are not useful to him. You do this by picking a tile on “speculation.” Generally you do not pick discards unless they complete melds on your rack, however if you feel the player on your right is holding a better rack than you, by picking up a discard that forms a combination but isn’t necessarily a meld, is a good action to take. The more combinations it fits, the better a pick it is. This not only improves your hand, but it forces the other layer to hold tiles that are probably going to be of no use to him and will forestall his ability to go out. This technique works really well against a defensive player.
Although the Israeli Rummikub is not played very frequently, it is still important to know how to score it in case you run into a group that does play it. The first obvious difference between the American and Israeli version of scoring is that the Israeli version is scored as a minus.
A long score sheet should be set up with a column for each player A normal game consists of four rounds (16 hands) for four players, and fiver rounds (20 hands) for five players. Besides the minus points given the winner of each hand, all other players receive plus points for the unmelded tiles remaining on their racks. This applies to those players who have been playing for Open Rummy. If a player has not melded any of his tiles, he is given 100 plus points.
If only one player has been playing for Open Rummy and that player goes out winning the hand, he receives minus 200 points, instead of minus 100, since he has been able to add only to his own melds. If all the tiles in the drawing pile are used up before any player wins the hand, each player receives plus points for the tiles remaining on his rack if he is playing Open Rummy, or plus 100 if he has not melded. The trump remains on the table and cannot be drawn as the last tile unless it can be used to finish the last player’s hand for a win.
Each player’s score is entered on the score sheet at the completion of each hand. At the end of the game, each player’s scores are totaled. This is not the final total though. All of the scores are then converted to plus numbers by adding the same arbitrary number to each score. This random number must be equal to or larger than the largest minus number, to obtain all of the plus values. Other than this, the value of the random number does not matter, since it does not affect the final score. The scores obtained by adding this number are called the primary scores. All the primary scores are added together and this number is written below each player’s primary score.
Each player’s primary score is then multiplied by the number of players in the game. The resulting number is written below the sum of the primary scores in each player’s column. It is then subtracted from this sum to give the final score for each of the players. It is again seen that some players have plus scores, while others have minus scores, but the winner will have the highest plus score.
Again the value of the random number is not important as long as it makes all the primary scores greater than zero. The final score is the same, and it is only used to make the calculations easier. The final scores can be used to check the calculations. If they are added together they should total zero. If they do not then you need to check your calculations to find the error.
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