Today we will learn how to play Machiavelli. This Italian card game is well played in the Veneto region of Italy. Named after everyone’s favourite Florentine diplomat Niccolò Machiavelli this Rummy variant gets its name through its cunning and manipulation. It is similar and many even call it a card form of the board game Rummikub, both can be traced back the 1940s.
How to Set up
2x Standard 52 card Deck (104 cards)
3+ players
Play time
20 mins per round
Complexity
4*
RANK OF CARDS:
A (high), K, Q, J, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, A (low) – Cards may cycle
Objective:
First to play all cards in their hand – “go out”
How to Play
There are two different varients, they only differ in the way the dealer deals the cards. For a traditional game of Machiavelli the dealer will deal 3 cards to each player. In the second, slightly faster version, the dealer will deal 10 cards.
We play with 2 decks in this game, it increases the total number of combinations, but also it can lead you to have “dead cards” i.e. duplicates that you cannot play.
In any given turn there are 3 things a player can do:
- Play a combination from your hand
- Add one or more cards to combination of cards already on the table (you must have played a combination first in order to do this)
- Draw a card from the deck, you must draw if you cannot play a card, your turn ends when you play a card.
A combination must always have a minimum of 3 cards when played from your hand or when altered on the table. Combinations appear as either same suit Straights e.g. 3♠ 4♠ 5♠ or 3 of a kind 7♥ 7♦ 7♠
Note, 3 of a Kind Cannot have duplicated of the same Suit e.g. 2 3’s of spades
The Key feature of this game is being able to make changes to already complete Straights and Runs of cards already on the table. The player whose turn it is can reorganize the cards in order to make new combos that allow them to play one or more cards in his hand. All new combinations must be valid as per the rules above. Players cannot remove any cards already on the table with the exception of Jokers that can be replaced.
Tips and Tricks
Don’t be scared to hold your cards, even if you pick up some dead cards, if you have control of the game you also control what the other players can or can’t play. For example if you hold 3 of a kind 4s this means that all other players on the table are less likely to be able to play runs that involve 4, i.e. 4,5,6 – 3,4,5 – 2,3,4 – when you consider you are blocking 3 suits, you have actually blocked 9 combinations from play. However, there is some risk and reward, if you open up the play and therefore allow your opponents to play cards this will open up some combinations for you as well.
The Art of shuffling runs: a fairly complicated concept, but if you see multiple Runs of different suits e.g. 7,8,9 – 6,7,8 – 8,9,10 – these can be swapped to create 3 of a kinds but adding cards from your own hand/taking cards from other Runs. The diagram below will help explain the concept better.
You may only effectively play one card from your hand, but every card counts when nearing the end game and it can be quite handy to get rid of those pesky dead cards
Variations
Guadalupe
This spicy Caribbean variation of Machiavelli is only slightly different to the core game. During your turn, instead of drawing one card, if you have not played any cards, you must draw 2 cards from the deck. After a player finishes their hand, all players that remain earn 1 penalty point for every card left in hand. In this way you can track the game over multiple sets. I would suggest playing to 20 points in this variation as a typical “loser” per set would gain 4-8 penalty points per game. In this way you would limit the game to under 1 hour.
Conclusion
Now we’ve taught you how to play Machiavelli. Its a hard one and will take some practice, but certainly fun in groups of 3-5.
Why Don’t you Check Out?
https://tabletoptemple.com/how-to-play-cambio/
Additional Readings
The Man Himself: https://www.britannica.com/biography/Niccolo-Machiavelli
