📍 Cribbage
🂡 Cards · 4 playsCribbage
The old pub game of fifteens, pairs and runs, pegged out to a hundred and twenty-one.
About Cribbage
Cribbage has been played much as Sir John Suckling left it in the 1630s: six cards dealt, two discarded to the crib, and the hand scored twice — once in the pegging play, where the running count must not pass thirty-one, and once in the show, where fifteens, pairs, runs and flushes each earn their points. The discard is the game's soul: when the crib is yours, feed it a pair or a five; when it is the opponent's, starve it of anything that consorts well. First to a hundred and twenty-one wins, and the board's geography matters — positional play near the end decides close matches.
How to Play
Discard two of your six cards to the crib, which the dealer scores as a second hand. During play, cards accumulate toward 31: score for reaching 15, for pairs, for runs, and for 31 exactly. After play, score your hand with the starter card — fifteens, pairs, runs and flushes. First to 121 wins.
💡 Tips & Strategy
Discard first for your crib, defensively for theirs. To your own crib, send pairs, fives, and touching cards — a five is the single best crib card in the game, consorting with every ten-count card in the pack. To the opponent's crib, send wide-spaced unmatched cards; kings with nothing near them are traditional, and giving away a five to the wrong crib is the beginner's tithe. Never gut your own hand to starve their crib unless the score says the game is closing.
In the pegging, lead from a pair if you hold one — if your lead is paired for two points, you have the third card for six. Avoid opening with a five, which invites fifteen-two; a four or below is safe from it. Keep your running-count arithmetic ahead of your hand: cards that let you answer with fifteen or thirty-one, and holding close cards that can extend runs, win the play a point or two at a time, and cribbage is a game decided by a point or two at a time.
Keep hands whose shapes score: runs with a pair attached — like 4-4-5-6 — are worth eight before the starter helps, and any three touching cards give the starter two ways to fatten the run. Count every hand carefully and in order — fifteens, pairs, runs, flush, nob — because points miscounted are points gone.
Play the board's geography in the endgame. First to 121 wins and the dealer pegs second, so near the finish, compute whether you or the opponent will likely count out first: when you are ahead of the pace, keep safe cards and peg defensively; behind it, hold the hand with the highest ceiling and take pegging risks. Games are stolen in the last two deals by players who counted positions as well as points.