Kings corner rules: the layout, the kings and going out

Kings in the Corner takes its name from the four corner spaces. Kings go there. The rest of the layout is a plus sign of four piles, and a small foundation area off to the side.

Set the table like this before anyone looks at a hand:

• North, east, south and west: one face-up card in each spot. These are the four inner piles.
• Northeast, southeast, southwest and northwest: empty. These corners stay empty until a king is played.
• A foundation row with room for four piles, one per suit. Nothing is dealt there. Aces start them later.

That is eight tableau spaces in all, four occupied and four waiting. Use one 52-card deck. Jokers stay in the box.

Some families never build ace-up foundations. They only shed cards onto the eight downward piles. That is a real variant, and it is not the game taught here. This page uses both areas: the eight piles build down, and the four foundations build up. If you learned the version without foundations, the deal and the kings are the same, and the extra area is the part to add.

The game is a shedding race more than a puzzle with one solution. It sits with the other short card games on the games of chance topic. Two players can play, and six is the practical maximum, because seven cards times six is 42, plus four layout cards, which leaves only six cards in the stock.

Shuffle and cut. Deal the four inner cards face up first, so everyone sees the start. Then deal seven cards to each player, one at a time, clockwise. Players may look at their hands. The remaining cards are the stock, face down, within reach of the table.

With two players, the stock is long: 52 minus 4 minus 14 leaves 34 cards. With five players, 52 minus 4 minus 35 leaves 13. With six, the stock is short, and players will pass more often near the end. That is normal.

If one of the four inner cards is a king, the first player may move it into an empty corner as their first action and fill nothing behind it until a later king appears. The inner space does not take an ordinary card. An empty inner pile, like an empty corner, takes a king. Moving a dealt king is optional, but it is usually right, because a corner king opens a new pile everyone can build on.

The player to the dealer's left plays first. Play passes clockwise. There is no trump and no bid. Rank on the tableau runs from king down to ace. Ace is the bottom of a downward build: it plays on a 2 of the opposite color, and nothing plays on an ace except when that ace is moved to a foundation.

Deal passes to the left after each hand, whether or not the dealer won.

On your turn you may play as many legal cards from your hand as you can. You may also move cards that are already on the layout, under the same build rules.

Downward builds:

• The card you play is one rank lower than the card you cover.
• The colors alternate. Red on black, black on red.
• A sequence of face-up cards may be moved as a unit if the bottom card of the sequence fits the destination.
• You cannot slip a card into the middle of a pile. Only the top card is a legal target.

Kings:

• A king may start any empty corner.
• A king may fill an inner pile that has been emptied.
• A king in the middle of your hand is not a dead card. It is the only card that opens a space.
• Once a king is down, the next card is a queen of the opposite color, then a jack of the first color, and so on down to ace.

Foundations, covered in the next section, are the other place a card can leave your hand. A card that can go to a foundation and a card that can extend a tableau are both legal. You choose the order. New players should move aces to foundations early when the ace is not holding a pile in place, because a foundation ace starts a suit that every player can use, and it gets a card out of your hand.

Example. The north pile shows a black 8. You hold the red 7 and the black 6. You may play the 7 on the 8, then the 6 on the 7. If the east pile is a red king in a corner, your black queen plays on it. If you also hold the ace of hearts and the heart foundation is empty, you may start that foundation before or after the tableau plays. All of those plays can happen in one turn.

If a move empties an inner pile, pause. Only a king fills that hole. If you have no king, the space stays empty until someone else plays one.

The four foundations are not the corner piles. They are a separate row.

• The ace of a suit starts that suit's foundation.
• Build up in suit: ace, 2, 3, and so on to king.
• Only the next rank of the same suit plays. A red 4 does not go on a black 3, and a heart does not go on a diamond.
• Any player may play to any foundation on their turn.
• You may move the top tableau card to a foundation when it is the next card of its suit. Cards under it stay put.
• This page does not allow a card to come back off a foundation. Once it is built up, it is out.

The king on a foundation and the king in a corner do different jobs. A corner king starts a downward, alternating-color pile. A foundation king ends an upward suit pile. You will often have both on the table at once. Read the pile before you play: a corner pile has mixed suits and mixed colors, and a foundation is one suit in order from ace.

Because only a king fills an empty tableau space, clearing a pile down to nothing is awkward unless a foundation can absorb the last cards or you hold a king to reopen the space. Plan the last few cards of a pile. Moving a 2 and an ace to their foundations can empty a column. If you empty it and cannot replace it, you have removed a target the table needed.

Suits on the foundations are independent. Hearts can be at the 6 while spades are still waiting for the ace. There is no rule that the foundations must stay level.

When the layout and the foundations between them have no legal play for your hand, you draw. You do not discard. Kings Corner is not a draw-and-discard game like rummy. Cards leave your hand only by being played to the layout or to a foundation.

The turn is short.

1. Play any number of legal cards from your hand, and make any legal moves on the layout.
2. If you play at least one card, you may stop whenever you like, and the turn passes. You are not required to play every card that fits.
3. If you cannot play anything, draw one card from the stock. If that card is playable, you may play it and continue. If it is not, the turn ends.
4. If the stock is empty and you cannot play, you pass.

Holding a playable card back is legal in this version. It is sometimes right, near the end, to keep a king so you can reopen a space on your next turn rather than spend it now and help the player who is about to go out. It is also a way to stall, so some houses require you to play if you can. If you adopt that must-play rule, say so. This page allows a pass over a legal play only when you have already played at least one card this turn, or when you choose to stop. You may not draw while you still have a legal play.

The first player to play the last card from their hand wins the hand. Cards left in the stock are nobody's. Cards left in other hands are losers' cards. You do not need the foundations to be finished, and you do not need the corners to be full. Empty hand, you win.

Optional scoring for a longer session: the winner scores nothing, and each other player scores the cards left in hand, face cards 10 and others their pip value, ace 1. Low total after a set number of hands wins. Or play single hands, winner takes the deal onward, and ignore points. Single hands are the usual family game.

With six players the stock vanishes quickly. After it is gone, turns are play-or-pass until someone empties a hand or the layout locks. A lock, where nobody can move and nobody can draw, ends the hand. The player with the fewest cards in hand wins the lock. A tie on count is a draw.

Agree the short list, because the name covers more than one layout.

• Foundations or not. This page uses ace-to-king foundations beside the eight piles. The no-foundation variant only builds down on the eight piles.
• Empty inner piles. This page fills them with kings only, the same as corners. A looser variant lets any card, or any king-led sequence, refill an inner space while corners stay king-only.
• Same-suit corners. A few tables build corner piles down in suit instead of alternating colors. The inner piles stay alternating. Do not mix this in silently.
• Must play. Some tables require every legal card to be played before the turn can end.
• Draw one and stop. A simpler school version says the drawn card ends your turn even when it fits. This page lets you play the drawn card.

None of these adds a house percentage. The winner is a player at the table. If adults stake a small amount on the hand, keep it agreed and small, and 18+ applies. A different kind of two-player stake is a coinflip between two people, which is not this layout and does not use these cards.

Two habits save arguments. Square each pile so the top card is the only one you can see in full, with a corner of each card under it offset enough to read the sequence. And say "king to the corner" when you open a space, so the next player sees the new target.

Count the deck at the end of the night. Foundations, corners and hands all scoop into one pile, and a king left under a placemat makes the next deal short. Seven cards each plus four inner cards plus the stock should be 52.

For a different seven-card feel at the same table, 31 is a three-card hand and a knock, not a layout. Kings Corner stays on the table in front of everyone, which is why the corner rule has to be said out loud once and then kept.

See also klondike solitaire, double solitaire and nertz.