Differenzler rules: predict your points and hit them

What Differenzler is about

Most kinds of Jass reward lots of points. Differenzler is different. Here the winner is not the player with the most tricks but the one who judges their own hand best. Before every round you predict a number and then try to take exactly that many points. Every point too many and every point too few counts as a minus point.

Four people play, each for themselves. There are no teams and no partner. The cards, their values and their order are the same as in Schieber. Everyone gets nine cards, and every round holds 157 points in total, including the five for the last trick.

Trump is drawn

In Differenzler nobody calls trump. Trump is drawn every round, and everyone knows it before predicting their points. On wyys.ch the game picks the trump suit at random from the four suits. There is no Obenabe and no Undenufe in Differenzler.

Because you can’t choose the trump, every round is a new puzzle. Sometimes you hold the Buur and the Nell, the trump Under and the trump Nine, and know you will take a lot of points. Sometimes you have nothing but small cards and might predict zero. Both are worth the same, as long as you’re right.

The prediction: hidden or open

Before the first trick is played, everyone predicts how many points they will take. Any number from 0 to 157 is allowed. A prediction can’t be changed afterwards. The predictions don’t have to add up to 157. If everyone predicts very high, several players will simply end up off the mark.

On wyys.ch the predictions are hidden by default. During the round you see only your own number, and the others’ predictions are revealed only when the round is scored. The host can set the predictions to open instead. Then everyone sees at once what the others have predicted and can play accordingly. That makes the round more tactical, because you can deliberately push points onto another player or take them away.

How the round is played

The player to the dealer’s right leads the first trick. After that, as always, the player who took the last trick leads. The trick rules are almost the same as in Schieber, with one important difference:

• You have to follow the suit led if you hold it, or you trump.
• If you don’t hold the suit led, you may play any card you like. That includes a trump lower than the trump already in the trick. Swiss players call this rule ‘hindersi’.
• There is no Weis, no Stöck and no bonus for a Match.
• The trick goes to the highest card of the suit led or to the highest trump.

Undertrumping is allowed in Differenzler because the point is often precisely not to take a trick. Once you have the points you need, you don’t want any more. Then you’re glad of every chance to get rid of a card without winning the trick.

Minus points and the end of the game

After the last trick everyone counts the points in their own tricks. The player with the last trick gets five points on top. Then the difference between each prediction and the points taken counts as minus points. For example, you predict 40 and take 52 points, so you get 12 minus points. Had you taken only 31 points, it would have been 9 minus points. If you hit it exactly, you get zero.

Some tables give a bonus for an exact prediction or have special rules for Stöck. On wyys.ch you play without such extras, in line with the usual rule books.

You play an agreed number of rounds. The default is twelve, and at the table you can also set eight or sixteen. The number is always a multiple of four, so that everyone deals, and leads the first trick, the same number of times. At the end the player with the fewest minus points wins.

Tips for a good prediction

A good prediction starts with an honest look at your hand. These tips help you estimate:

• Count your sure tricks first. The Buur always takes a trick, and the Nell very often does too. Together those two cards are already worth 34 points.
• An Ace in a side suit is only safe if the suit isn’t trumped too early. If you hold many cards of one suit, the others will soon be unable to follow it.
• Think of the points you pick up without meaning to. When you take a trick, you get the others’ cards as well, and someone else’s Banner is worth ten points.
• With a weak hand a low prediction is often best. If you predict zero though, you have to avoid every trick, and that doesn’t always work.
• The last trick is worth five points. If you hold many trumps, there’s a good chance it ends up with you.

During the round it pays to keep an eye on the points you’ve taken. On wyys.ch the Differenzler board always shows how many points you have so far, so you know whether you still need tricks or would rather not take any more.

You can play Differenzler on wyys.ch for free and without signing up, on your own against three bots or with friends at a table. The bots, by the way, predict their points by the same rules as you. They see nobody else’s cards, as the article on our Jass bots explains. The short version of all the rules is on the rules page.