Schafkopf

Your Turn

• Play one card from your hand face up into the center.
• Follow suit if able: you must play a card of the trump suit if led with trump, or the led suit otherwise.
• If you cannot follow suit, you may play any card, including a trump.

Card Hierarchy

Rank / Suit	Description
Trump	All Obers (Jacks), then all Unters (Knights), then Hearts
Suit Cards	Ace, Ten, King, Nine, Eight, Seven

Winning the Trick

• The highest trump played wins the trick.
• If no trump is played, the highest card of the led suit wins.
• The winner takes the trick and leads the next card.

Basic Scoring

• Every completed deal is scored using game points (Augen) and evaluated against a base value.
• The active Soloist or Partnership must reach at least 61 points to win.

Card Point Values

Card	Points
Ace (Daus)	11
Ten	10
King	4
Ober	3
Unter	2
Seven, Eight, Nine	0

Winning Thresholds

• Schneider: Defending team gets 30 points or fewer (Doubles the score).
• Schwarz: Defending team wins zero tricks (Doubles the Schneider score).

Game Value Calculation

• Start with the base game value (depends on Rufspiel, Solo, etc.).
• Add modifiers: Laufende (consecutive Trump cards held), Schneider, Schwarz, and bock rounds if applicable.

Permanent Trumps

In Schafkopf, certain cards are always trumps regardless of the suit led, ranked from highest to lowest:

Rank	Card	Name
1	Ober of Acorns	Alter
2	Ober of Leaves	Ober
3	Ober of Hearts	Ober
4	Ober of Bells	Ober
5	Unter of Acorns	Unter
6	Unter of Leaves	Unter
7	Unter of Hearts	Unter
8	Unter of Bells	Unter

Suit Card Rankings

In a normal game (Rufspiel), non-trump suits rank from highest to lowest:

Rank	Card Value
1	Ace (11 pts)
2	10 (10 pts)
3	King (4 pts)
4	9 (0 pts)
5	8 (0 pts)
6	7 (0 pts)

Game Variations

• Solo: Only Obers and Unters are trumps; all four suits play normally without permanent trumps.
• Wenz: Only the four Unters are trumps; suits rank normally with Aces high.