There are some major differences between the American version of Rummikub and the Israeli version of Rummikub, although most people do play the American version more often. The Israeli version is much more complex both in rules, strategy and scoring. The game is specifically designed to be played by four players as opposed to just two, or three.
The same deck of tiles is sued, but the difference is that the 1 can be used either for high or low. So, it can be used for a 12, 13, 1 or a 1, 2, 3, but cannot be used as a 13, 1, and 2 because this would be both high and low. The play starts the same way, with the shuffling of the tiles. The play however goes counterclockwise instead of clockwise. The stack of 8 tiles is given to the first player on his right whereas in the American version, no one gets that stack of 8 tiles. The top tile of the last stack of the drawing pile becomes the trump for the round. There are three types of Rummikub you can play at this point – Open Rummy, Foot, or Hand. The melding is different however, because although you can add to previously made melds you cannot rearrange them as you can in the American version. The initial meld is also 50 points whereas the American version is only 25.
Open Rummy is the lowest scoring hand and is when the player places all of the tiles on the table. If the player places all of the melds on the table, either with her own melds or adding on to others, they win the game. If a player retains all of their tiles on the rack and has sets including at least one run, and totaling 50 points or more, they may finish by melding all the sets at once and laying off all extra tiles on to other melds on the table. They can then discard the last tile face down or use it in a meld. This is known as Foot and counts as a minus 200 points. A player playing Foot may not use the trump to complete the hand and they must draw from either the drawing pile or the last discard.
Hand is the first of fourth different plays made completely on the rack. In all of these, no tiles are melded during the play of the hand. No tiles are laid off on other melds on the table in order to complete the hand. In Hand, all of the tiles are formed into sets consisting of at least one run with the remaining tiles being in any combination of runs and groups. The winner must draw one tile from either the pile or discard and then discard one tile face down to announce that they have completed Hand. The hand is then exposed for verification by the other players.
Since there are forty ways in which each hand may be won, each has its own scoring value. All hands are scored as minus points for the winner. The totals are adjusted to give the final winner a plus score at the completion of the game.