The Deal

The standard 52-card pack is used to play Gin Rummy game. Ten cards are dealt to each of the 2 players. The 21-st card is opened face up (called "upcard") and put next to the table. The reminder or the deck is placed alongside of upcard and is called a "stock". At each turn a player draws a card by dragging it from the stock or from upcard. When a player discards a card, he places it on top of the current upcard so the newly discarded card becomes an upcard.

The Play

The non-dealer is the first player to move. Only at the start of the game the non-dealer would consider either taking up the upcard to his hand or refusing it. If he takes up the upcard he discards any other card from his hand face up (except for the newly taken - on the same place, where the upcard was before). If he refuses it (pressing "Pass" button in online game gin-rummy), the dealer in his turn would consider to do the same - either taking up the upcard or refusing it.

If both of gin rummy players refuse the very first upcard, the non-dealer must start a game by drawing the top card from the stock, add it to his hand and discard any card (including newly taken) face up on top of the original upcard to continue the waste pile. The play progresses. Each gin-rummy player in turn either takes up his opponent's last discard - the open card from the waste pile - the deck or initial upcard or draws a closed card from the stock and then discard. So, gin-rummy rules, if the open card is taken, it cannot be discarded on the same move, if it was a closed card it can be discarded on the same move.

Gin-Rummy Melding

The objective of Gin-Rummy is to build melds in player's hands. A meld consists of either 3 or 4 cards of the same rank or sequence of 3 or more cards in the same suit (Ace is a low only card, Ace & King are not considered consecutive, but Ace and 2 are ).

The objective of Gin-Rummy

The objective of the gin-rummy game is get all of player's cards matched into melds or enough of them to knock (or go down). In standard gin-rummy the player's unmatched cards (deadwood) can be up to 10 or less points. Ace is 1 point value, 2 - 2 points and so on till 10 - 10 points, all picture cards count 10 points value. A hand consisting entirely of melds with no deadwood is described as gin and carries a bonus. There is a popular version of Gin-Rummy called Oklahoma Gin, in which players cannot always knock with 10 points deadwood - the upcard determining the number of points to go out, so it can be from 0 to 10 points (Ace means 0 points here and Gin-only game). Gin-only game variation requires, that players can knock only having a gin hand (a hand with zero deadwood).

Knocking and Laying-off

When a player is satisfied with low value of his deadwood, he ends the game by knocking after he has drawn an 11-th card and before discarding the last card (in online Gin-Rummy it is pressing the "Knock" button). The final discarded card is placed face up on the closed stock. After knocking, both the knocker and the opponent will see their cards on the table face up, arranged in melds.

The opponent has the privilege of "laying off" any cards of his own deadwood which may be matched with any of the knocker's melds in order to reduce the penalty value of his deadwood. This privilege does not apply if the knocker has a gin hand with no deadwood.

Scoring and Winning

If the knocker has the lower count of deadwood, he scores the difference between their values of deadwood. For gin, the knocker adds a 25 point bonus.

If the knocker has higher or equal value of deadwood, the knocker receives a 25 point penalty for undercut plus any difference in deadwood values.

The 2 last cards of the deck may not be taken. If neither player has knocked before then, the drawn hand is announced and the deck is reshuffled.

The score is kept cumulatively for each player online. The winner adds his score for the hand to his previous total in order to make clear when 100 has been reached or exceeded. A 100 total points is a default, but players can choose 50, 100, 150, 200, 250, 300

The game ends as the player reaches the agreed upon number of points.