King Albert: the rules

King Albert is a patience game similar to the ubiquitous card game for one player played with seven columns of cards that is bundled with Microsoft windows and called "solitaire", but simply called "patience" in England.

As with ordinary patience, the object of the game is to arrange all the cards in ascending numerical order in the four suits on the four piles, each pile following suit. To achieve this, cards can be placed on any of the columns or heaps, but only in descending numerical order, with colours alternating red-black-red-black etc.

For people who know ordinary patience, the main differences between it and King Albert are:

• There are 9 heaps rather than seven, and all the cards are dealt face up, so you have perfect information about the entire position at all times.
• Cards can only be moved one at a time. You cannot move a whole pile of cards from one heap to another - only the very top card.
• Any card can be placed into an empty heap, not just a king.
• There are only seven spare cards left over after the rest are dealt. Any of these can be played on any pile or heap at any time.

Thus, at any given time, the possible moves are

• Move the last card of one of the nine heaps, or any of the seven spare cards, onto one of the piles, following suit and in ascending numerical order. In particular, an ace can be placed on any empty pile.
• Move the top card from one of the four piles, or the last card from one of the nine heaps, or any of the spare cards, onto the end of a heap: any card at all can be placed on an empty heap, but if the heap is not empty, you can only place a card of immediately lower numerical value and of the opposite colour on that heap. (E.g, a 2 of diamonds on a 3 of clubs.)

Cards cannot ever be returned to the "spares" section.

Moving cards from the aces piles back to the heaps is called "worrying back". This manouvre is not always needed, but does give a few other somewhat subtle stategies for getting you out of difficulties.

Cards cannot be moved in a group: they have to be moved singly. This, and the fact that any card at all can be placed on an empty heap, is the main difference between King Albert and ordinary patience, but the combination of these two rules does allow a special shortcut.

If there is an empty heap, it can be used as temporary storage, two cards can be moved together by putting the top card in the temporary storage, moving the next card to the destination, and then placing the card in temporary storage on top of the card just moved. Similarly (think about it!), with two temporary storage spaces, 4 cards can be moved in a block; with three temporary storage spaces, 8 cards can be moved in a block; and with four temporary storage spaces, any number of cards can be moved in a block. This computer version of the game allows you to make such moves as if they are single moves.

You will need Java (and also JavaScript) enabled in your browser to be able to play the game. The moves are all done by drag-and-drop, and should be easy to do. A short-cut to drag-and-drop is that if you click a card, it will be placed on the aces pile if at all possible.

For more information on the buttons, and how to save your current or original position please click here.

• You will discover empty heaps are worth more than (almost) anything else: grab them when you can, and then look after them; don't throw them away lightly!
• Think twice before you do any operation that is not reversible.

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These web pages and all the applets and perl scripts here are written and maintained by Richard Kaye.
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