Playcard games

Indian rummy: questions and answers

Short answers to the questions people ask most about Indian rummy. Everything else is in the full rules.

How many cards are used in Indian Rummy?
Two 52-card decks with their jokers, for two to six players. Everyone gets thirteen cards, and you always hold thirteen at the end of your turn: draw one, throw one.
What is a pure sequence?
Three or more consecutive cards of the same suit with no joker in it, such as 4♥ 5♥ 6♥. You need at least one to declare, and without one every card in your hand counts against you, however well the rest is arranged.
What do you need to declare in Indian Rummy?
All thirteen cards in valid combinations, with at least two sequences, at least one of them pure. The rest can be more sequences or sets. You draw, place your fourteenth card face down, and show the thirteen.
What is the wild joker?
At the start of each deal a card is turned up, and every card of that rank, in every suit, is wild for that deal — alongside the printed jokers. A wild joker can fill a gap in a sequence or complete a set, but a sequence with a joker in it is not pure.
What is a set in Indian Rummy?
Three or four cards of the same rank in different suits, such as K♦ K♣ K♥. Because there are two decks, two identical cards cannot be in the same set. Jokers may fill a set.
What happens if you declare wrongly?
You take 80 points and are out of that deal, while the others play on. It is the largest penalty in the game, so check your two sequences and your pure one before you press declare.
How are points counted?
The player who declares scores zero. Everyone else counts the cards not in valid combinations: aces and court cards 10 each, number cards their face value, jokers nothing, and never more than 80. Without a pure sequence, every card counts. With a pure sequence but no second one, only your sequences are safe.
How long is a game?
Points are bad. The game is played to a pool — 101 or 201 at the table here — and ends when someone reaches it. The lowest score wins.