Coinche
Belote with bidding: call it, double it, make your contract.
Coinche keeps the cards and tricks of belote but replaces the turned-up card with real bidding. Each team commits to a number of points and a trump suit, and the opponents can double the stakes. More tactical, more tense.
- Players
- 4
- Game length
- about 30 min
Rules
Objective
Two teams of two, 32 cards, 8 cards each dealt in one go. The team that wins the bidding must score at least the number of points it announced.
Bidding
In turn, each player passes or bids a contract: a number of points from 80 to 160 in steps of 10, or “capot”, together with a trump suit, “no trumps” or “all trumps”.
Each bid must be higher than the previous one. Bidding ends when three players pass in a row. If everyone passes straight away, the cards are redealt.
Coinche and surcoinche
An opponent who thinks the contract will fail can “coinche”: the points of the deal are doubled. The bidding team can answer with a “surcoinche”, which quadruples them. A coinche ends the bidding.
Playing the cards
The rules are those of belote: follow suit, trump if you cannot (unless your partner is winning), and overtrump when you can.
At no trumps, no suit trumps and the order is Ace, 10, King, Queen, Jack, 9, 8, 7. At all trumps, every suit follows the trump order: Jack, 9, Ace, 10, King, Queen, 8, 7.
Scoring
If the contract is made, the team scores the value of the contract plus the points it took. If it fails, the defenders score 160 points plus the value of the contract.
Belote-rebelote (King and Queen of trumps) is worth 20 points and counts towards the contract. A game is most often played to 1000 or 2000 points.