Gin Rummy: Straight

How to play Gin Rummy (Straight)

Gin Rummy is a card game for two players in which you form your cards into sets and runs and try to end the hand, by knocking or going gin, before your opponent does.

No knocking: only gin or big gin ends a hand. Played to 100 points.

About Gin Rummy (Straight)

Straight allows no knocking: a hand ends only when a player goes gin or big gin, or when the stock runs down and the hand is void.

Since nobody knocks with deadwood, nothing is laid off and nobody is undercut. Gin scores 25 points plus your opponent's deadwood and big gin 31, and the game is played to 100 points.

Hands run longer, and a hand that reaches the end of the stock scores nothing, so keep cards that can finish more than one meld and throw away high cards your opponent does not seem to want.

With nobody able to knock, most hands run deep into the stock. Once only a few cards are left and you are still more than one card from gin, the hand is unlikely to finish in your favour; holding on to cards your opponent seems to want can then run it out to a void, where nobody scores.

The computer player sees every card you take from the discard pile, and over a long hand those pickups show what you are building. Taking from the stock gives nothing away, so take from the pile only when the card completes or extends a meld. Every gin scores at least 25, so four are always enough to reach 100.

Straight is the one game of the four where your deadwood matters only when your opponent goes gin: it is then the number added to their 25 or 31. Every hand that is not void is won by a gin or big gin, so each hand you win is worth at least 25 points, plus the line bonus of 25 in the final totals.

The goal of Gin Rummy

Gin Rummy is a card game for two players, and here you play against one computer player. In each hand you try to form your cards into melds and bring down the points left over, and to end the hand before your opponent does.

How to set up Gin Rummy

Gin Rummy uses a 52-card deck. The first dealer is chosen at random, and after that the deal alternates. Each player is dealt 10 cards, one at a time, starting with the player who is not dealing.

The next card is turned face up to start the discard pile; this card is the upcard. The other 31 cards are placed face down as the stock.

Gin Rummy rules

A meld is a set or a run. A set is three or four cards of the same rank. A run is three or more cards in sequence in one suit. Ace is always low, so A-2-3 is a run but Q-K-A is not. A card can belong to only one meld.

Deadwood is every card that is not in a meld. Aces count 1, twos to tens count their face value, and jacks, queens and kings count 10 each.

Each hand opens with the upcard. The player who did not deal may take it or pass, and if they pass, the dealer may take it or pass. Whoever takes it then discards. If both pass, the player who did not deal starts by drawing from the stock.

On each turn you take the top card of the stock or the top card of the discard pile, then discard one card face up. You may not discard the card you just took from the discard pile.

Instead of an ordinary discard you may knock when the deadwood left in your ten cards is no more than the knock limit, which is 10 in the classic game: you discard and the hand ends. Knocking with no deadwood at all is gin. If all eleven of your cards form melds after you take a card, you can declare big gin without discarding. You may knock on your very first turn.

You never have to arrange your cards yourself. When a hand ends, both hands are laid out in the melds that leave the least deadwood.

After a knock, the other player lays off deadwood onto the knocker's melds: a fourth card on a set of three, or the next card at either end of a run, one after another. Layoffs are also made for you, in the way that leaves the least deadwood. Nothing can be laid off after gin or big gin.

Once only two cards are left in the stock, a player who discards without knocking ends the hand, and it is void. Nobody scores, and the same dealer deals again.

The full Gin Rummy guide, with strategy tips and common questions