Teacher’s Corner: “5 & 10”, a game designed for use in the classroom

By John Marc Green
December 7, 2005

“5&10� is a set-collection and memory game in which 2-4 players compete for cards with which to score victory points for instances of five and ten.

SETUP
1) Take a standard deck of 52 cards; remove the Jokers.  2) Shuffle and place the pile face-down between the players.  3) Turn over the top card: at the end of the game, single cards of that card’s suit will give a player bonus points. 4) Shuffle that card back into the deck, and then deal each player a face-down hand of five cards. The remaining cards form the face-down Draw deck, placed between the players, to one side of the play area.

SEQUENCE OF PLAY
1) At the start of each new round during a game, players choose one card from their hand to put up for grabs: these are played face up between the players, and the winner of the previous round must reveal the first card. In the first round of the game, the oldest player goes first. 2) After each player has put a card up for grabs in the center of the play area, players then choose another card from their hand. This is their Battle card.  3) Players reveal their Battle cards simultaneously; the player with the highest card (Aces are always High), based on the TRUMP RULES, takes whichever card he wishes from the cards up for grabs, followed by the player with the next highest battle card choosing one from the remaining cards, etc., until each player has chosen a card. 4) Players take the cards they win in this way and place them face-down close to them, forming a growing pile which will be used to create scoring pairs at the end of the game. (Battle cards are NOT scored). Players may not look through this pile until the end of the game (they must rely on memory).  5) The battle cards are placed face-up in a discard pile on the opposite side of the playing area from the face-down draw deck. 6) After each round, each player chooses two new cards to bring their hands back up to five cards. The player who won the round turns over two new cards for each player from the draw deck and displays them all face-up in the play area. The round winner also chooses the first card, with players choosing one card at a time beginning to the player’s left and continuing clockwise until all players have chosen two new cards for their hands. Then, the next round begins, and the winner of the previous round must play the first card.  7) When the draw deck is gone, players continue to play from their HAND until they run out of cards or have only one left; they must add any single leftover card to their scoring pile. The single card left in the DRAW deck in a 3-player game is discarded. Scoring occurs only at the end of the game, and is based only on the cards won during the battle rounds. The battles only decide the order of players to choose cards from the set up for grabs during a round.

TRUMP RULES
The normal order of trumps in many card games is traditionally Spades (S), Hearts (H), Diamonds (D), Clubs (C). In “5&10â€?, this order forms a four-item repeating cycle (S-H-D-C-S-H-D-C…), in which the high trump may change based on certain card play. Think of this series as having a fixed order like notes on a musical scale or points on a compass.  While the relationship between them is fixed, any suit may at some point become “firstâ€? in the series as the high trump.

1) In every regular hand of 5&10, the traditional order of trumps applies for purposes of determining who wins card battles (S-H-D-C). HOWEVER, If the FIRST card played at the beginning of a round is a FACE CARD (NOT the first Battle card but the first card played that will be up for grabs), then the order of trumps for that round ONLY will change:  If the first player in a round plays a face card, then the order of trumps in the Battle phase for that round will begin with the suit of the face card played. The possible orders of trumps then becomes: (S-H-D-C), (H-D-C-S), (D-C-S-H), (C-S-H-D). It may be helpful to make a simple player aid with the four orders of trumps listed in columns, and use a marker of some sort to indicate the current trump order for each round. In any trump suit order, Aces are always high, 2s are always low.

2) All battles in “5&10� are resolved by SUIT first, THEN by rank. Aces are high. This means any card of a higher trump will beat any card of a lesser trump. If Spades are the high trump, any Spade will beat any Heart; any Diamond will beat any Club, and so forth. This increases the utility of changing the order of trumps with face cards during a round.

BATTLE EXAMPLE: Player A won the last round, and plays the Jack of Diamonds as his first card in the current round. Players B, C, and D notice this and adjust their battle strategies. After each player has played a card into the play area, they all select a Battle card and reveal them simultaneously. Player C happens to play the Ace of Diamonds, which is now the highest trump possible in the round, and gets first choice of the four cards up for grabs. He could have tried to win it for himself to use as a “1� for scoring purposes, but decides he wants the 10 of Clubs someone else played, since Clubs is the bonus suit for that game. Player A plays the King of Diamonds and gets second choice of the cards. Player B plays the 7 of Clubs, which beats the 9 of Hearts played by Player D, since all battles are resolved by SUIT first, THEN rank.

SCORING
From the pile of cards won during the game, players attempt to make scoring pairs of cards in which the sum or difference is 5 or 10. Scoring pairs earn 5 victory points for each pair. Single 5s and 10s earn 2 victory points each. Finally, 1 bonus point is earned for each card they have in the current game’s bonus suit (see Setup rules). Bonus points may cause some cards to be scored twice, since bonus points are applied in addition to points for scoring pairs or a single 5 or 10. Face cards have no numeric value for scoring, but may count for bonus points. Aces count as “1� and may be combined with a 9, 6, or 4 to create a scoring pair. Ties go to the player with the most bonus points. Any further ties go to the player with the most cards of the current bonus suit used in scoring pairs.

PLAYER REFERENCE
Scoring pairs yielding 5: 2+3, 1+4, 10-5, 9-4, 8-3, 7-2, 6-1
Scoring pairs yielding 10: 5+5, 6+4, 7+3, 8+2, 9+1
Victory points:  Scoring pairs>>5 vp, Single 5 or 10>>2 vp
Bonus points: Cards in the bonus suit (see Setup rules) in pairs or singles, including single 5s or 10s >>1 bonus point.  (A single 5 or 10 in the bonus suit yields a total of 3 points: 2 vp and 1 bonus)

OPTIONAL RULES:

IGNORE THE FIRST TRUMP RULE: The special Trump Rule #1 in 5&10 may be confusing for younger players; if this is the case, simply ignore it and resolve every battle based on the traditional order of trumps: Spade-Heart-Diamond-Club; Aces are still always High, and Suit always precedes Rank in determining the outcome of battles. Battle cards are always discarded and never scored.

DOUBLE DECK 5&10: By adding another deck to the game, you may play with more than 4 players, up to 6 players. Shuffle each deck separately and keep them separate during play: BOTH decks will be placed face-up as normal, and at the end of each round players may draw from either or both decks. However, the game ends when one deck is exhausted, and scoring begins as normal. If identical battle cards are played during a round, those two players may keep either the card they put up for grabs or the battle card they played and discard their other card. In a 3-player game, the remaining player must keep the card he put up for grabs and discard the battle card he played in that round; in a 4-player game, the two remaining players compete for the remaining two cards on the table as in a 2-player game.

NOTES
I designed 5&10 to be a fairly simple, yet strategic, card game in the European style. For this design, that meant more strategy, less luck, no trick-taking, and elements of set-collection and memory. While there is some luck in the game, it is minimized by player choices. And unlike most card games, there is much more public information: players who pay attention will know much of what their opponents have in hand. Memory will play a large role in strategy, both for knowing what you have and what you need, as well as for knowing what other players have and want. For younger players, the game should also provide valuable practice in adding and subtracting to produce “5&10�. This skill will be quite helpful in performing mental calculations throughout life.

“John Marc Green is a photojournalist and game enthusiast living in Birmingham, Alabama. He came up with the idea for “5&10” on an hour-long road trip after a news assignment. You may contact him for any questions about the game at book_gnome@yahoo.com”

© 2005 Tom Vasel

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Hi! I hope you will enjoy “5&10”. I would like to recommend it to anyone who enjoys the games “For Sale” by Stefan Dorra or “Cribbage”, as a light strategy game for kids and adults. Posted by J.M. Green on Dec 7, 2005 at 10:21 AM | #

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