A complete guide to the three-handed card game: the deal and the widow, bidding for the contract, marriages and trump, playing tricks and scoring your way to the coveted thousand. Plus controls on muta.pro.
Thousand is a three-handed card game with bidding and tricks. A game runs over many deals, and the overall score builds up from deal to deal. The goal is to be the first to score 1000 points. Points come from won tricks (by the value of the cards in them) and from declared marriages — pairs of a king and a queen of the same suit.
Before each deal the players bid: the winner of the bidding takes on a commitment (contract) to score the declared number of points. Make it — you gain that much; fail — you lose the same amount.
The game uses a deck of 24 cards: ace, ten, king, queen, jack and nine in each of the four suits. Each player is dealt 7 cards, and another 3 cards go into the face-down widow (talon) on the table.
Card values when counting tricks: ace — 11, ten — 10, king — 4, queen — 3, jack — 2, nine — 0. There are 120 points of card value in a deal, to which marriages are added.
Players take turns raising the bid (minimum 100, in steps of 5) or passing. Whoever is left last with the highest bid becomes the declarer, and their bid is the contract.
The declarer takes the three widow cards into their hand, then discards one surplus card to each of the two opponents, evening out the hands.
The declarer confirms the contract — how many points they commit to score in this deal. No trump is set at the start: it will be established by the first declared marriage.
Play proceeds in tricks. A player lays down a card, the others must follow suit; anyone who cannot must trump or discard. The highest card takes the trick, and the winner leads the next one.
On your turn, when you lead a trick, if you hold a king and queen of the same suit you may declare a marriage: that suit becomes trump, and you are credited with its bonus.
Once the cards are played, points for tricks and marriages are totalled. The declarer's contract is scored as a plus or a minus, after which a new deal begins.
The value of each player's taken cards is added to their declared marriages. A marriage — king and queen of the same suit — is worth: hearts — 100, diamonds — 80, clubs — 60, spades — 40. The declared suit becomes trump until the end of the deal.
The declarer compares what they scored with the contract: score at least as much — the contract is added to their overall total; fall short — it is subtracted. Opponents receive the points they honestly scored during the deal. The first to reach 1000 wins. When a player has 880 or more ("on the drum"), a special home-stretch rule applies. Scoring, bidding and the widow on muta.pro are handled by the server — there is no need to track the arithmetic by hand.
Add up the points of your aces and tens and add any possible marriages. Bid as much as you can realistically take, no more.
A king and queen of hearts give you 100 points at once. Do not rush to break up the pair — declare it when you lead a trick.
The most "valuable" cards are aces (11) and tens (10). Try to make sure they end up in your tricks.
Failing a contract costs you as many points as it was worth. A cautious bid is safer than a risky maximum.
Before bidding, a hand is judged not by the number of "picture cards" but by two resources: ready marriages and point-scoring aces and tens. A marriage is a king and queen of the same suit in hand; it brings a fixed bonus regardless of the play. Aces (11) and tens (10) bring points only when they land in your trick.
A hearts marriage — king and queen of the same suit — gives 100 points and makes hearts trump.
First add up the bonuses of your ready marriages: hearts 100, diamonds 80, clubs 60, spades 40. These are points that do not depend on how the play falls out.
Aces and tens are "valuable haul," but you still have to win them with a trick. Add to your estimate only those that will realistically end up in your hands under the cover of high cards.
A lone king without a queen gives no bonus. The three-card widow sometimes completes the pair, but you cannot factor those points into your bid in advance.
A marriage is declared only on your turn, leading a trick. The general rule — open your most valuable marriage as early as possible, while both cards of the pair are still in your hand: if you are forced to discard the queen or king, a bonus of up to 100 points burns away along with the broken pair.
Having declared the marriage, lead with the queen (3), keep the king (4), and the trump ace will finish the trick later.
Declare the marriage by laying down the queen (3 points), and keep the king (4) as the stronger card for the next trick.
If under the new trump the opponents hold others' aces and tens, lead with the king: it takes the lead at once and draws out the valuable haul.
With two marriages in hand, naming spades (40) as trump instead of hearts (100) is minus 60 points and a weak suit. Open the higher marriage.
There are only eight point-scoring cards in the deck — four aces and four tens — and they carry 84 of the 120 card points of a deal. It is for them that the fight in the tricks goes: losing a trick with an opponent's ace and your ten means giving away 21 points at once.
The ace is higher than the ten: one trick with an ace and two tens is 31 points of haul at once.
The ten is higher than the king and queen but lower than the ace. By leading a mid-height trump, you often force an opponent to give up a ten if they have no trump ace.
If your suit has become trump and the ace in it is unprotected, hold it back: let the small cards go first, and the ace will take its due when the opponents run out of trumps.
After a marriage there are six trumps in the suit. By marking the ones played, you will know when your trump ace or ten becomes unbeatable.
Thousand is a "two against one" game: while the declarer gathers their contract, the two opponents play against him together. Their aim is not so much to score themselves as to wreck the bid, since if he falls short the whole contract goes into the declarer's minus.
A defence partner slips an ace and a ten into a trick lost by the declarer.
When a trick is clearly taken by your ally rather than the declarer, discard your ace and ten there — the points go to the defence, not to the bidder.
Do not let the declarer calmly run the tricks: beat his card to take the lead and wreck his plan for gathering the contract.
If an opponent bid more than their hand can bear, they only need to fall one point short. Hold your high cards to the end — the last trick often decides the outcome.