Clover Leaf Solitaire
How to play Clover Leaf
Clover Leaf is a one-deck solitaire game dealt face up into sixteen fans of three that build up or down by suit, where clubs and spades go home from the Ace and hearts and diamonds from the King.
Sixteen fans built up or down in suit, with clubs and spades going home from the Ace and hearts and diamonds from the King.
The goal of Clover Leaf
Move every card onto the four foundations: clubs and spades build up by suit from Ace to King, hearts and diamonds build down by suit from King to Ace.
How to set up Clover Leaf
The Aces of clubs and spades and the Kings of hearts and diamonds start on the four foundations. The other 48 cards are dealt face up into sixteen fans of three, and there are no free cells and no stock.
Clover Leaf rules
Fans build up or down one rank at a time in the same suit, and a fan can change direction as it grows. Only the top card of a fan moves, one card at a time, onto its foundation or onto a fan where it builds.
An empty fan can be filled only with an Ace or a King. A card on a foundation never comes back into play.
Click a card to play it: to its foundation if it fits, otherwise onto a fan. Drag a card to choose where it goes yourself. With Autoplay off in Settings, only a drag moves a card.
How to win at Clover Leaf
You win when all 52 cards are on the foundations. When the cards left are lined up so the next card each foundation needs is always on top, Auto complete, on by default in Settings, moves them up for you. The game is stuck when no card has a legal move left.
Clover Leaf strategy tips
Every build is in one suit, so apart from an empty fan a card has at most two places to go: onto the card of its suit a rank above it, or the one a rank below.
Hearts and diamonds go home from the King down, so a fan where they climb toward the top is already in the order they leave.
The cards that can fill an empty fan, a red Ace or a black King, are each the last card their foundation takes. Parked in an empty fan, one only gathers the cards next to it in its suit, and those go home before it does, so it never blocks anything.
The clubs and spades start from their Aces, so each wants its Two next. The hearts and diamonds start from their Kings and want their Queens.
Sixteen fans of three put sixteen cards on top at the start, and none of the other 32 is more than two cards deep.
Clover Leaf questions and answers
How do you play Clover Leaf solitaire?
Start the black Aces and the red Kings on the foundations and deal the other 48 cards face up into sixteen fans of three. Move the top card of a fan onto a card one rank higher or lower of the same suit, or to its foundation, one card at a time. Only an Ace or a King can fill an empty fan.
Which foundations build up in Clover Leaf?
The clubs and the spades, which start from their Aces and build up to the King. The hearts and the diamonds start from their Kings and build down to the Ace.
Can every Clover Leaf deal be won?
The solver has proved none lost, but it cannot settle them all. Of 100 shuffled Clover Leaf deals, it proved 57 winnable within the quick search it runs while dealing and 69 within the Hint button's longer one, and ran out of search on the rest. Alexander the Great, the same game on twelve fans of four, came out at 32 and 41, with more than a third proved lost. Switch on Winnable in the menu beside New deal for a board the solver has proved.
Is there a daily Clover Leaf game?
Yes. Clover Leaf 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.