Pyramid rules

Clear a pyramid of cards by pairing them to thirteen.

  • Solo
  • Standard deck

A short patience built on a single number. Cards are cleared in pairs adding to thirteen, and it takes about three minutes.

The layout

Deal 28 cards face up in a pyramid — one card in the top row, two in the second, down to seven in the bottom row, each card overlapping the two beneath it. The remaining 24 cards are the stock.

Card values

Ace 1, number cards their face value, jack 11, queen 12, king 13.

The goal

Remove the entire pyramid.

The moves

A card is available only when no card overlaps it — so at the start, only the bottom row of seven.

Remove any two available cards totalling thirteen: ace with queen, two with jack, three with ten, and so on. Remove any king on its own, since it is already thirteen. Available cards include the top of the waste pile, so a stock card may be paired with a pyramid card.

The stock

Turn cards from the stock one at a time onto a waste pile. Depending on the version you allow one, two or three passes through it. One pass is the classic and the hardest.

Winning

Clear the pyramid and you have won, whether or not the stock is exhausted.

The deals are far less often winnable than Klondike — perhaps one in twenty with a single pass. The skill is in looking ahead before making an obvious pair: removing a card that was the only partner for something buried higher up loses the game several moves before it becomes obvious.