Gin Rummy Rules

The purpose of this site is to give a concise summary of Gin Rummy rules.  But first, let’s start with a little history of the game. Gin rummy was a simple card game for two players that was invented by Elwood T. Baker and C. Gramham Baker, his son, in 1909, Gin rummy rules evolved from “whiskey poker.” This game was created to be faster than the standard rummy. The object of Gin Rummy is to score more points than your opponent. The cards are a regular 52 card deck; the scoring of each card are as follows with the aces being the lowest in point value; going from lowest to high:  Ace, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, Jack, Queen, and King.

The very basic strategy is to make the hand better by creating what are called melds and getting rid of what is called deadwood.

There are two melds to this game. Sets of three to four cards having the same numbers; example 2 of hearts, two of clubs, Two of spades and two of diamonds.

Then there is the meld of runs of three or more sequential cards in the same suit; example would be like, three of spades, four of spades, five of spades, six of spades, seven of spades. The deadwood cards are cards that don’t fit into any of the melds. This may sound complicated when you are first learning how to play gin rummy, but don’t worry – you’ll pick it up quickly!

Scoring is: aces are valued at one, the number cards are valued at the number on them, such as a three card is valued at three, the face cards are valued at ten. Here is another catch if a player has a set of three cards and a three card run but they share number a common the player can just count that card once; making two of the cards deadwood.

Deadwood cards are the sum of the point values on the deadwood cards. A player “may end the game by melding with unmatched cards that add up to ten points or fewer.” This was cited from “The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition,” and has been the case through Gin Rummy card game history.

Online Gin Rummy

To have a “Gin” is when a player matches all the cards. The first player to reach 100 points wins. To determine who deals first, the deck is cut, lowest card deals 10 cards to each player the 21st card faces upwards and is called the wand. The remainder of the deck is placed face down. The first player may take the first card up; if not then the dealer can. Play starts when the player takes the first card from the stockpile.

A turn is when a player takes a card from the top card from the stockpile or the discard pile, and then discards a card. The game continues until a player “knocks” or the stockpile has only two cards left. In this instance, the hand ends as a draw. Understanding “knocking” is when a player has 10 or less points in deadwood. The player must knock when the deadwood points are 0; “that is called going gin or holding a gin hand.”

To knock, the player knocking ends his/her turn by discarding as normal then declares that he/she is knocking by placing the discard card face down, lays his/her hand down with the melds separated from deadwood. Then the other player may lay down any of his/her deadwood cards that be played on the knocking player’s melds. For instance, the knocking player has a three king meld and the defending player has a deadwood king. He/she can then lay down that king, lessening their deadwood by ten points. However, if the player who is knocking has a gin then the defender cannot lay down. It takes some practice, but free Gin Rummy gives you a chance to hone your skills without spending any money!

Gin Rummy Rules

The scoring in online Gin Rummy goes like this:

• Knock points… When a player knocks, that player scores an amount that is comprised of the difference between the two hands. An example to better understand… “If a player knocks with 9 and the other player has 13 deadwood points in his/hers hand after laying down, the knocking player gets 4 points for that hand.”

• Bonus… When a player goes Gin, the player gets a 25-point bonus plus all of the count of the deadwood in the other’s hand.  Gin rummy rules statehere isn’t the option of laying down when someone goes Gin.

• Undercut… Is when the defender has a deadwood count that is lower or equal to knocking player’s hand. When this happens, the defender gets a 25-point undercut bonus as well as the difference between the two hands.

• Game bonus… After a player reaches 100 points the game is finished and the winner receives an additional 100 points.

• Line bonus… This bonus is added when the game is over. For every hand the player won, he/she gets 25 points.

• Big Gin…Before knocking off if all the player’s eleven cards form a legitimate gin, the player may keep the extra card as part of the hand. This earns the player an extra six points as a ‘Big Gin‘ bonus.

• And finally the Shut Bonus… This happens when the player who won has won all of the hands. According to Gin Rummy rules, the points for every hand are doubled before the line bonus is added.