Rook 4+
Kentucky Discard
fishdog.net
-
- Free
Screenshots
Description
Rook is a popular trick-taking card game using a special card deck numbered from 5 to 14 (and optionally 1) in 4 suit colors, plus a Rook card. In this app, the Rook card is a castle chess piece and the cards are designed to be color-blind friendly.
Dealing: Deal passes around table for each hand, to the left. Dealer deals 9 cards to each player, and 5 cards to the widow in the middle of the table.
Bidding: Players bid for the right to name the trump suit. The player to the left of the dealer starts the bidding at 70 (or passes), and bidding proceeds to the left, usually in 5 point increments. A player that passes is out of the bidding for that hand.
Widow, Naming Trump: The high bidder collects the 5 widow cards (which are shown to all players), names a trump suit for the hand, and discards 5 cards from her hand (not shown to the other players). The 5 discards can include point cards which will, depending on your settings, go to either the high bidder or the winner of the last trick.
Tricks: The dealer (or the high bidder, you can change this) leads the first trick. Play proceeds to the left until all 4 players have played one card. Players follow suit unless they are out of that suit (or play the Rook card to win a trick with lots of points). If a player cannot follow suit, any card may be played. If there were no trump cards played on a trick, high card in the lead suit wins the trick. If trump cards were played on the trick, the highest trump card wins the trick. The trick winner pulls in the cards (adds them to his won tricks pile), and leads the next trick. The Rook card is the highest card of the trump suit. The ranking of cards from high to low is Rook-14-13-12-11-10-9-8-7-6-5.
Hand results: Both teams count the points from their won tricks piles: Rook card is worth 20; 14 and 10 cards are worth 10 each; 5 cards are worth 5. The other cards count nothing. If the bidding team did not score enough points to cover its bid, its score decreases by the bid amount.
Winning: First team to 300 points (or to be 300 points ahead) wins the game.
A paid Rook Gold app with no ads is also available on the App Store.
What’s New
Version 3.5.0
Adds support for latest devices and OS; minor bug fixes.
Ratings and Reviews
Oh what fun!
Great game from childhood. Has a few glitches in the program but after you play for awhile you know what card is coming next. Irritating is when partner leads with a trump when trump color is evenly dealt among all players. Also, it is crazy when an apposing player plays a 13 on a 14 when they have a 5 to sacrifice and gamble on taking more points to set the apposing team with their 13.
My husband and I both play this game daily and will continue. Which we could play as opponents.
Fun but has flawed AI. Perfect for true beginners.
I’ve played Rook for forty-plus years. This game is only playable on the highest difficulty, but that is when the AI flaws truly manifest. There’s an absolute within the AI that 14s are held even when it’s a safe play to set or simply save the ten points by throwing them off suit. This happens late in the hand when there’s just a few tricks left and all power cards are known. By not playing a 14 at this point one is almost absolutely guaranteed to lose it verses absolutely winning the hand. Makes no sense. Again and again your AI partner will hold them and cause you to lose.
There are other issues, but they are more player-type related, so I can’t fault the program in that regard. That said, you’ll mostly come out ahead by out-bidding your partner on plus-ninety hands when you don’t have the Rook in the version I have been playing.
A Red 1 option would be a nice upgrade.
Suggestions
This is a good rook game. It is fun. But wish it had more options to change the rules of the game. In my state, and the 4 surrounding states, people play without the Rook at all. And you have to call the color of trumps before you pick up the widow. Also you cannot discard counters. And lastly, if you do discard trumps, you have to turn them up so everyone can see them. These rules add a lot of dimension to the game and make it a lot more interesting and challenging for those who need a little more challenge. If these options were available, this would definitely be a 5 star game and a lot more people would download and play it. People would even pay money for these added options.
App Privacy
The developer, fishdog.net, indicated that the app’s privacy practices may include handling of data as described below. For more information, see the developer’s privacy policy.
Data Not Linked to You
The following data may be collected but it is not linked to your identity:
- Location
- Identifiers
- Usage Data
- Diagnostics
Privacy practices may vary, for example, based on the features you use or your age. Learn More
Information
- Seller
- fishdog.net, LLC
- Size
- 23.3 MB
- Category
- Games
- Compatibility
-
- iPhone
- Requires iOS 12.0 or later.
- iPad
- Requires iPadOS 12.0 or later.
- iPod touch
- Requires iOS 12.0 or later.
- Apple Vision
- Requires visionOS 1.0 or later.
- Languages
-
English, French, German, Hindi, Spanish, Swedish, Turkish
- Age Rating
- 4+
- Copyright
- © 2018-2023 fishdog.net, LLC. All rights reserved.
- Price
- Free