Klondike Instructions

JSolitaire home page: http://www.idiotsdelight.net/

Overview

The goal of Klondike solitaire is to place all the cards in each suit in stacks of ascending rank. Stacks of cards with alternating colors in descending rank can be built in the bottom half of the screen as an intermediate step.

Layout

There are three areas of the screen:

Building Stacks The building stacks are found in the bottom half of the screen. The leftmost stack has one card, with each subsequent stack having an additional card. Only the top card of each stack is face up. Removing the top card from a stack will turn over the card below it.
Deck The deck is located in the upper left corner of the screen and contains the cards which are not found in the source stacks. Three cards are initially removed and placed to the right of the deck with their face up. The top card of those three can be moved to another stack. Clicking on the deck, or right-clicking anywhere on the screen, will turn over the next three cards (if there are at least three cards remaining in the deck). If there are no more cards to go through in the deck, clicking on the outline of the deck will begin another pass through the deck. The number of passes through the deck is unlimited.
Suit Stacks The suit stacks are located in the upper right corner and are initially unoccupied.

Moving Cards

To move a card, click on the card (which will highlight it) and then click on the destination stack. The following are valid moves:

An ace can be moved to its suit stack. (This will usually be done automatically.)
A card at the top of a stack can be moved to its corresponding suit stack if the rank of the card at the top of that stack is one less than the card's ranke (Kings have a rank of 13, queens 12, jacks 11 and an ace has a rank of 1).
A king can be moved to an empty space.
A card can be moved from the deck, a suit stack, or a building stack to a source stack if the card at the top of the destination stack has a different color from and a value one more than the card.
Ordered cards at the bottom of a building stack can be moved to another building stack if there is a card in the ordered sequence which has a different color and a rank one less than the card at the top of the destination stack.

A card will be automatically moved to the suit stacks from the deck and building stacks if the cards which might be placed on top of it are already in the suit stacks. Clicking undo will retract an automatic move.

Options

Click on the button labeled options to bring up a dialog box with the following settings:

Number of cards drawn: This option determines the number of cards which are turned up from the deck at a time. The number can vary from 1 to 5, with 3 the default.
Number of redeals: This sets the additional number of passes which can be made through the deck
Display deck contents: Setting this option will display a listing of the deck, highlighting the available card. After the initial pass through the deck, upcoming cards will be displayed above the current card, with the accessible cards appearing in the rightmost column. Occasionally it is beneficial to refrain from removing a card from the deck because it will a set up a better order in the subsequent pass through the deck. Listing the deck will show when these instances occur.

Click here for information about common options and buttons

Scoring

10 points are received for every card moved to a suit stack. 5 points are awarded for turning over a face down card or moving a card to a building stack. Moving a card from a suit stack to a building stack incurs a penalty of 15 points. If three cards are drawn at a time, there is a cost of 20 points for each additional pass through the deck after the third. If one card is drawn at a time, every pass through the deck incurs a deduction of 100 points.

For Vegas scoring, games begin with a deficit of $52 dollars. $5 is won for every card moved to the suit stacks.

History

Version 2.0.0 (2002/12/03): Variable card sizes, backgrounds and card backs added. Card list placed in separate window. Scoring added.
Version 1.05 (2000/3/16): Right-clicking added.
Version 1.04 (2000/2/08): Starting rank option added.
Version 1.03 (2000/1/23): Options added.
Version 1.02 (2000/1/4): Modified to work in Java 1.0 browsers
Version 1.01 (1999/12/24): Various cosmetic improvements such as rounded corners and "ghost" cards in empty suit stacks.
Version 1.0 (1999/12/03): First public release