Napoleon rules

A short, sharp bidding game for three to six players. Five cards each and no partnerships — one player against everyone else.

The deal

Five cards each from a 52-card deck. Aces are high. The rest of the deck is set aside unused.

The bidding

Going round once, each player either passes or bids the number of tricks they will take, from two to five. Each bid must beat the last.

The bidding starts to the dealer's left and nobody speaks twice.

The named bids

Nap — a bid to take all five tricks. Wellington — all five, at double stakes, and only biddable over a nap. Blücher — all five at higher stakes still, and only biddable over a wellington. Misère — take no tricks at all, ranking between three and four.

The declarer leads the first card, and its suit is trump. This is the whole of the trump-choosing mechanism: there is no separate declaration.

A misère is usually played with no trump suit at all.

The play

Follow suit if you can, otherwise play anything. Highest trump wins, or the highest card of the suit led. Everyone else plays together against the declarer without discussion.

The winner of each trick leads to the next.

Scoring

Settled in counters. A made bid of two, three or four pays that many units from each opponent; failing pays the same amount to each. Nap pays 10 if made and 5 if lost, which is the one asymmetry in the game and the reason a speculative nap is worth trying.

Misère is worth three, won or lost. Wellington pays and loses double what a nap does. What a blücher is worth varies from table to table, so agree it before you start.

An example

Four are playing and you bid three. You take three tricks, so each of the other three pays you 3 counters: you are 9 up. Had you taken only two, you would have paid each of them 3.

Playing well

With five cards and no partner, three good trumps usually make a bid of three. Lead your longest suit, since you name it as trump by leading it, and lead your top trumps early to draw the opponents' out.