Bastion Solitaire
How to play Bastion
Bastion is a one-deck solitaire game dealt face up into ten columns of five that build up or down in suit, with two free cells that start with the last two cards.
Ten columns that build up or down in suit, with the last two cards dealt into two free cells.
The goal of Bastion
Move every card onto the four foundations, building each one up by suit from Ace to King.
How to set up Bastion
The whole deck is dealt face up: 50 cards into ten columns of five, and the last two into the two free cells. The four foundations start empty, and there is no stock.
Bastion rules
Columns build up or down one rank at a time in the same suit, so the Seven of spades can go on the Six or the Eight of spades. A column can change direction as it grows, but a King and an Ace never count as next to each other.
Only the top card of a column moves, one card at a time, onto its foundation, onto a column where it builds, into an empty free cell or into an empty column. Any card can fill an empty column. A card in a free cell can go back onto a column or up to its foundation, and a card on a foundation never comes back into play.
Because a column can build both ways, a run never moves as one, however many cells and columns are empty: you shift it a card at a time.
Click a card to play it: to its foundation if it fits, otherwise onto a column, otherwise into an empty free cell, and only then into an empty column. Drag a card to choose where it goes yourself. With Autoplay off in Settings, only a drag moves a card.
How to win at Bastion
You win when all 52 cards are on the foundations. Once every column is in descending order, Auto complete, on by default in Settings, moves the remaining cards up for you. The game is stuck when no card has a legal move left.
Bastion strategy tips
Both free cells start full. Playing those two cards onto the columns or the foundations early gives you somewhere to park a card.
The two cells are Bastion's whole margin over Fortress. Keep one empty when you can, and remember that a parked card can come back onto either neighbour in its suit, the card one rank above it or the one a rank below.
Moving a sequence of one suit card by card into an empty column turns its order around, which can bring the card a foundation needs to the top.
At the start twelve cards are within reach: the top card of each of the ten columns and the two in the free cells. Look among them for an Ace, or for two cards one rank apart in the same suit.
An Ace left in a column takes only the Two of its suit, and a King only its Queen, so each is a poor card to build on.
Bastion questions and answers
How do you play Bastion solitaire?
Deal 50 cards into ten columns of five and the last two into two free cells. Move the top card of a column onto the next higher or lower card of its suit, into a free cell, or up to its foundation, one card at a time. The foundations build up by suit from Ace to King, and any card can fill an empty column.
What is the difference between Bastion and Fortress?
Both build up or down in suit and move one card at a time. Bastion deals ten columns of five and puts the last two cards into two free cells, where Fortress deals all 52 cards into ten rows and has no free cells.
Can every Bastion deal be won?
Most can, and the solver can tell which. Given 100 shuffled Bastion deals, it settled every one inside the quick search it makes while dealing: 84 winnable and 16 impossible. Fortress deals, with no free cells, were proved winnable only 22 times in 100. So the Winnable switch in the menu beside New deal rarely has to reshuffle here, never more than three times in testing. The Hint button looks for a winning line from wherever you are before it suggests a move.
Is there a daily Bastion game?
Yes. Bastion has a daily board, the same deal for everyone that day, dealt the way a Winnable board is. You need to be logged in to play it.