BEFORE YOUR FIRST GAME
How to play Copas
Players and cards
Hearts is a game for four players, each playing for themselves.
The deck contains all 52 cards of a standard deck.
The cards in each suit rank from highest to lowest as follows:
Ace
King
Jack
Queen
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
In Hearts, the aim is to avoid taking any hearts or the queen of spades.
Each heart is worth 1 point and the queen of spades is worth 13 points.
There are 26 penalty points in the deck (13 hearts + the queen of spades).
However, if a player takes all the penalty points, these are assigned to each opponent and that player receives none.
Getting started
Play runs clockwise and the first player to shuffle is chosen at random. Each player receives 13 cards.
At the start of each deal, players may pass 3 cards to an opponent as follows:
- Round 1 — 3 cards to the opponent on the left
- Round 2 — 3 cards to the opponent on the right
- Round 3 — 3 cards to the opponent opposite
- Round 4 — no passing
- Round 5 — 3 cards to the opponent on the left
- …and so on, always in the same order.
After passing 3 cards, each player also receives 3 cards according to the rule above.
Playing the game
The player with the two of clubs leads first. Players must follow suit whenever they can.
If unable to follow suit, a player may play any card, including a heart or the queen of spades, except on the first trick, when point cards are not allowed.
Scoring
The aim is to take as few penalty points as possible.
A player who takes all 26 penalty points wins 104 RISCOS (the other players’ RISCOS remain unchanged).
If nobody takes all 26 penalty points, each player receives 26−X RISCOS, where X is their penalty-point total.
Example:
| Player | Penalty points taken | Ranking marks awarded |
| 1 | 2 | +24 |
| 2 | 0 | +26 |
| 3 | 13 | +13 |
| 4 | 11 | +15 |