How to play Shanghai Card Game
Shanghai is a version of rummy which can be played between 2-10 players. There is a series of 7 rounds consisting of differing requirements of book/run combos in which players try to discard/lay down as many points as possible before the round ends. The player with the least points at the end of 7 rounds wins.
Setup: You must use half the number of decks as the number of players (rounded down). Shuffle decks together and deal according to the card requirement for each round. Determine someone to be the “dealer” who will shuffle first.
Counting Points: Points are tallied by the types of cards you have remaining and the number of cards.
For example, someone with a 2, 7, 8, 10, J, K, and Ace would have 5 + 5 + 5 + 10 + 10 + 10 + 15 points = 60.
Making Sets: Rounds require a specific number of books or runs. A book is 3 or more identical card values of any suit. A run is 4 or more consecutive cards of the same suit. A joker can be used in place of any card. An ace be placed before the 2 or after a King.
Starting each round:
The dealer shuffles and deals the number of cards required for the round.
The player to the left of the dealer opens the first card and determines to keep the card or pass. If it’s passed, this continues clockwise until someone picks up that “freebie” card. Once this is picked up, the player to the left of the dealer begins.
Beginning a turn:
To start a turn, the player draws a card from the draw pile. They check to see if the round objective has been reached with cards in their hand. If so, they “lay down” the required cards. The turn ends with the player discarding one card.
On the next turn, the player can choose to pick up the last discarded card or draw a new one.
Cards discarded in previous turns cannot be picked up.
Buying cards:
At any time between the discard and draw, any player can say “buy!” The next player will either choose to let them buy the card discarded (the purchaser takes the card and the first face down card), or decline it by taking the discard themselves. In the event of multiple buys, the first person to say buy (judged by the player after the discard) will obtain the card.
Laying down cards:
When the player has reached objective for the round, they may “lay down” those cards. While Books and Runs can be any number of cards, you may not lay down more than the required number of Books or Runs.
For example, in Round 2 a player may “lay down” a 3+ card book and a 4+ card run, but they may not lay down two books and a run.
Once cards are laid on the table, these become community “down” cards which any player may use during their turn. The player who went down may then place any remainder cards in their hand on any “down” community cards, and their turn ends with a discard as usual. The game only ends when a player has no remainder cards after the discard.
When a joker is used in place of a card in the community “down” cards, a player may place the value held by the joker and may then shift the joker to any available position in the same set.
For example, if a [2H, 3H, Joker, 5H] combo exists on the community down cards, a player on their turn may remove the joker to place a 4H, then shift the joker to the right of 5H (to hold the value of 6H) and then place a 7H.
Shanghai!
If a player discards a card which could have been placed on a community set, anyone else may say “Shanghai!” before the next player draws or a buy is started (player takes discarded and/or new card). The first player to call out “Shanghai!” can discard any card in their hand, while as the player who was attempting to discard that card has to reclaim it and draw an extra card from the punishment deck. The discarded card from a Shanghai action cannot be bought or claimed.
Winning the Round:
Once a player is able to lay down and discard all remainder cards, the round stops and points are tallied for all remainder players. The player with no cards scores 0 points for that round.
Points are tallied (usually on a piece of paper) and all rounds are added up as the game progresses. The player with the least points at the end of the game wins.
Round 7:
While there are usually no exceptions to the number of buys one can make, Round 7 has two special rules:
- Maximum number of buys is 3 (Tally is kept for each buy). Once this is reached, the player may not buy further cards.
- No player may “Lay Down” cards until they are able to lay all cards down simultaneously as part of their 3 runs.
Tips (may not always be true):
- Prioritize Runs as they are harder to make than books
- Prioritize going down as quickly as possible to reduce the number of points in your hand
- Discard a higher point card first to reduce the number of points in your hand
- Pay attention to the discard phase as you want to be the first to yell “buy!” if you need the card
- Later rounds usually cause higher point scores, especially the last round- so underdogs always have a chance to take the lead.
- House rules: choose to enforce or be lenient with accidental buys or someone changing their mind