Talk:Euchre/Archive 1

Latest comment: 8 years ago by ChristopherTStone in topic Scoring
Archive 1

Renowned Masters?

Does anybody have any reference for the alledged renowned masters added in this unsigned edit? I've never heard of them, and I can't find anything on the web to back this statement. If nobody can find anything, I'm inclined to move the comment to the discussion page until we can find sources. --William Pietri 07:06, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

Actually, given that the original text is still in the diffs mentioned above, I'm going to remove it as the other anonymous edit from that address was bunk. --William Pietri 16:22, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

Gaelic origin? Doubt it.

I'm checking more, but the anonymously added comment that the name comes from Gaelic seems dubious. It seems to come from a continental game called Jucker. Unless somebody backs up that sentence, I'm likely to nix it soon. --William Pietri 07:24, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

Yep! The folks at IrishGaelicTranslator.com say it doesn't ring any bells, and I didn't find anything in the Scottish Gaelic dictionaries I looked at. For now, I'm taking it out. If anybody wants it back, please post a source. --William Pietri 16:22, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

I'll second the removal of both the Gaelic origins and renowned masters bit. Mindmatrix 20:48, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

Organization of the entire article

I've edited the entire article for organization and added some content. Some terminology (e.g., "Jack Shit" and "Bitches' Hand") may be offensive to some readers, but are widely accepted by many regular players of the game (I've played this game for over 20 years and have rarely encounted those unfamiliar). The preceding unsigned comment was added by 65.77.67.15 (talk • contribs) .

The "Cheating" section has been accused of being indistinct from other card games and not adding "value" to the article. My guess is that it contains well known aspects of the game that do carry over in other games, but they are still worthy of mention. --64.91.161.14 03:59, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

I tend to view the Cheating section as of dubious worth, as stated by the person who deleted the now-restored verbiage. Given that the rules of euchre are enumerated in the article, it should follow that anything contrary to the rules constitutes cheating. It is not then necessary to enumerate the violations; table talk, stealing the deal, failing to offer a cut, and stacking the deck are verboten in common with every card game I've ever played. Can anyone name a common card game where stealing the deal or stacking the deck are legal?
The section about Winning tricks should mention rules specific to euchre — such as reneging — along with their penalties. The rest is chaff. — JonRoma 06:07, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I agree with merging it instead with other parts of the article. --64.91.161.14

Scoring rituals

An anonymous contributor removed the "scoring rituals" section, calling is "silliness". I agree that the assorted rituals are silly, but we are talking about a game here, so I don't see that as inappropriate. And although these rituals might apply to other games, the rituals in this section that I have experienced are always Euchre-specific. So I reverted the change pending further discussion. --William Pietri 03:02, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree. I've noticed the inclination to delete things on Wikipedia for no other reasons than an individual's sensibilities (e.g. silliness). This seem's disrespectful to other people's contributions, if not anti-social. Regardless, Wikipedia is the home to articles like FSM. Let's be consistent. --71.161.210.77 20:00, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

It is silly, which by itself is fine, but it is also completely unsupported by any references. This combination of characteristics makes it prone to the suspicion of being mostly or entirely made up. Some form of support for the section should be added, or it should be removed. --Trystan 16:47, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

It is getting a little long and convoluted, added {{trivia}}, does anyone have a better idea? -- Thinboy00 talk/contribs 22:40, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

I took out the second paragraph, as it said exactly the same information as the first, without introducing anything new. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.54.38.97 (talk) 01:09, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Origin of the Word Euchre

I am removing the sentence about the word Euchre being from Greek. The following excerpt from the Oxford English Dictionary confrims that the origin is unknown, possibly German or Spanish.

As BOWER, one of the terms used in this game, is of Ger. origin, it has often been supposed that the word euchre is also from German, but no probable source has been found in that lang. Can it be a. Sp. yuca, in the phrase ser yuca, given by Caballero as an American expression for ‘to be cock of the walk, to get the best in anything’ (ser el gallito en alguna cosa, sobresalir en algo)?


I found this entry on the playing cards history page:

The joker is an American innovation. Created for the Alsatian game of Euchre, it spread to Europe from America along with the spread of Poker. The joker was ideated around 1865 by Samuel Hart. The initial denomination of the card was Best or Imperial Bower (Bauer or Boer in German language is the name of the jack of trump in the game of Euchre). From the Alsatian name of the game, Juker, derived the actual appellative of the card.

Source:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Playing_card in the section "Later design changes"

If it is correct then perhaps it might be useful to add some reference to the Alsatian game?

65.203.88.194 15:51, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

"In the United States the only teaching of the game, except a few paragraphs in the late American editions of Hoyle's Games, and of Bonn's New Hand-Book of Games, is contained in The Game of Euchre". Surely this is not true. It is 2012. Timeframe? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.125.68.34 (talk) 22:39, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Why is this quote in the text: "Euchre appears to have been introduced into the United States by the early German settlers in the Midwest and from that region gradually to have been disseminated throughout the nation."?

It makes the item and Wikipedia in general, seem parochial. Or is this site run by the CIA, like everything else seems to be these days?

Weatherlawyer (talk) 12:05, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

Scoring

  • In Upstate NY, the scoring is almost always done with a 2 and a 3. the score is the number of pips shwoing. When the score is 5 or more the cards are turned into a V shape and then the score is 5 plus whatever is showing. The V is supposedly for the Roman numeral for 5. I have added this info to the article.Unklelemmy 20:42, 28 September 2005 (UTC)
    • In particularly superstitions upstate games, there is a variation of scoring called "two on top," where the two card is never the bottom of the pair. This is done because the three would "weigh down" the two, stopping that teams score from increasing. --horsedreamer 03:06, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
  • I'm from the Midwest (Wisconsin) and in terms of scorecards, we have always used a 6 and a 4 to score the game for each team. This, of course, eliminates the need to do any "shaping" (such as the 'V' mentioned above). This is from personal experience, but the convention has remained consistent from family, to high school, and through college.
    • In Northern Michigan we just use two fives. vanis314 05:26, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
  • I've never heard of giving a team 2 points for stealing the deal. Someone caught stealing the deal simply gives up the cards to the proper dealer with no penalty. Is this a regional variation? Should it be marked as such?--TsuKata 06:44, 8 January 2006 (UTC)
    • TsuKata: When I learned to play euchre in central Illinois 20+ years ago, we didn't consider stealing the deal to be part of the game; it was either a sign of alcohol-induced memory loss, or a wilful desire to cheat. In the former case, it helped to be more sober than one's opponents, so one could detect and correct a mistaken notion of the proper dealer. In the latter case, cheating was not tolerated by many of the hardcore euchre players I've played with; the miscreant would surely have been ordered to leave the table if not worse. I have never played euchre with anyone who considered stealing the deal as a routine part of the game which scored or lost points.
    • In a related vein, we scored a renege (failure to follow suit) as 2 points for the opponents, but if the reneger noticed his error before the next player threw a card down, he was allowed to withdraw the improperly played card, leave it face up on the table until it could be legally played (to remind everyone of the reneger's stupidity!), and replace with the correct card — all with no penalty. — JonRoma 07:46, 8 January 2006 (UTC)
      • When I played at college, we did the same thing. It lead to a few interesting discussions on reneging during an opponent's "alone" to net them 2 points instead of 4, but the issue never actually came up during game play. We never accurately decided on how such a situation played out. We allowed new players to take a card back, but anyone else we held to the renege; if they pointed their mistake out before the next card was played they still gave up 2 points. ialsoagree (talk) 20:59, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
    • Related to stealing the deal, I've never heard of it relating at all to scoring. For reference, I play upstate. The way we play is when the kitty is flipped, the deal is official. A misdeal may be recalled and redealt before the kitty is flipped, and once the kitty is flipped on a stolen deal, the stealing dealer keeps the deal. If the proper dealer notices the error before this occurs, they claim the deal back. Maybe it's just esoteric, but that's how we play.--horsedreamer 03:06, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
      • Deal stealing is played the exact same way in Michigan. ChristopherTStone (talk) 14:24, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

Three Player Euchre (Cut-throat)

As a three player variation on Euchre I've seen around upstate NY, the game is played normally as far as dealing, and makeup of the deck. After the cards are dealt, players have the normal proceedure for selecting trump. The player selecting trump goes alone in this version, with the remaining two players acting as defenders, thus, your partnership changes from hand to hand. Scoring is done normally as well (although without the option of going alone), each player keeps their own score (as they don't have static teams). The first player to 10 points wins, although I cannot recall how ties are resolved (ie: two players both having 8 points when the third calls trump and gets euchred). --MagusDrumheller 16:51, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

  • Three-player Euchre is also played in Indiana, where it is often referred to as "dummy euchre" for the unplayed "dummy" hand dealt at the beginning of each round of play. Edeans 15:53, 10 November 2006 (UTC)


-- I've played quite a bit of 3-handed. Dealing varied, in that a three-card hand was dealt to the fourth seat (called the widow) and whomever calls gets these three cards. Thus, a dealer may get up to four cards extra when calling trump. I also think we usually played to 15, but I don't know how offical that rule is.

I'm fairly sure the rules are laid out in an old edition of Hoyle I have at home somewhere, and I'll make the updates once I have the source.

--- Mid-Michigan and also up north/hunting camps etc., 3-handed Buck Euchre aka Bid Euchre is played by dealing all cards to the 3 players, so there is no kitty.   Player left of dealer bids first then around, and highest bidder names trump.   S/he then has to make their bid or go back that amount.  The other players defend and score whatever # tricks they make, and if bidder makes overage they score all the tricks they took.   Play to 21.   Exception to the defense is when one player gets close to going out, the other two stay ganged up trying to deny any further points whether s/he is bidder or defender.   This can also be played as 4 handed Bid Euchre, no partners, still Buck or Cutthroat style each man for himself.    (tbird1836)  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Tbird1836 (talkcontribs) 00:44, 29 January 2014 (UTC) 

Two-man Euchre?

Is anyone able to write a section on two-man euchre? I can play it, but trying to describe the card layout escapes me. We play standard euchre deck, five card hands, with three cards up and three cards under in front of each player, and a two card kitty. You can play from hand or the cards in front of you, but you have to play the card that's up before you can reveal what's underneath. Does anyone know what I'm talking about? It's sometimes called "Canadian Euchre", to those from Upstate. --horsedreamer 03:19, 27 April 2006 (UTC)


I've played a different style of two-player euchre, which is effectively the same as four-player, excepting that the pack doesn't include 9's (only Ace-10 of each suit). There are no partners, so scoring of each hand is either 1 point for 3 or 4 tricks, 2 for getting all five tricks, or 2 points for euchring your opponent. First player to 10 points wins. Deal alternates from one hand to the next, the player not dealing leads the first trick, and the player that took the last trick leads the next durring a hand. --MagusDrumheller 16:57, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Renege is part of the game?

Someone recently added this to the section on scoring:

Note that a renege is part of the game. A player is more than welcome to renege. It is up to the opposing team to detect the renege. If the renege goes undetected then there is no penalty.

I believe that some people play that way, but I don't think the cheating-is-ok-if-you-get-away-with-it style is part of standard Euchre. Would it be better to have a section on cheating with, e.g., info pulled from the Columbus Book of Euchre? -- William Pietri 01:23, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

That was my attempt to clarify things... In one paragraph it said that a player must follow suit. In the next paragraph it said what happens if a player does not follow suit, which you would think would be a non-issue if everybody must follow suit. But, ya, I agree that not everybody agrees with that style of play. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 206.223.167.125 (talkcontribs)

External links

There seems to be some disagreements about the appropriate external links for this page. Before making further changes to them, let's discuss it here. See User talk:2005#External links on Euchre article and the page history for the genesis of this. William Pietri 01:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

I removed the sentence to the inappropriate rant since that has already been removed. If someone wants to start a discussion about the external links, here is the place to do it. The previous edit removed the WP:EL compliant links, one of which had been there for over three years and another for over two. Those two certainly are extremely valuable. The blog one is very extensive, but as a blog has to be held to a higher standard that perhaps it doesn't meet. In any case though, some links on this article are obviously appropriate so they should not just be randomly removed. 2005 01:23, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
Editing talk pages is vandalism, just as much as spamming is.
What you removed on User Talk:2005 was

External links on Euchre article

NONE of the external links on the Euchre article meet the criteria for inclusion.

  • Sites used as references aren't supposed to be in "external links"
  • It's not an article about an organization, person, web site, or other entity with an official site.
  • This is not an article with multiple points of view.
  • Those are not sites that contain neutral and accurate material not already in the article.
  • Those are not sites with other meaningful, relevant content unsuitable for inclusion.
  • Those are not professional review sites.
  • Those are not directory categories.
  • Euchre is not a topic with many fansites.
  • Those sites don't contain material that cannot be included for reasons of copyright.

SO WTF ARE YOU DOING, REVERTING THE DELETION OF LINKSPAM? ClairSamoht - Help make Wikipedia the most authoritative source of information in the world 23:58, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Hi. That is clearly incivil, and calling 2005's action vandalism is a clear failure to assume good faith. We can certainly have a discussion about the links, and I invite you do do that on the Euchre page. For now, I'm restoring them with the exception of the recently added BoardGameGeek one, which doesn't seem immediately useful to me and perhaps triggered the response. If a minor disagreement is causing you to swear at your fellow editors, perhaps it's time to take a break. Thanks, William Pietri 00:58, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
And then 2005 edited William Pietri's talk above, which originally said, "See User talk:2005#External links on Euchre article and the page history for the genesis of this."

So let's look at the whole story. NONE of the links in external links qualify as external links under Wikipedia:External links, so I removed them, AS IS APPROPRIATE.

Then 2005 reverted my edits saying "(rv WP:EL". That page SAYS THE LINKS SHOULDN'T BE THERE. If that's not bad faith, WHAT IS? And just to underscore his bad faith, 2005 has made repeated edits of what both he and others have posted on talk pages.
Wikipedia policy is that the burden lies with one who wants to INCLUDE questionable material, not one who wants to remove it.
So justify the inclusion of those links, 2005. Don't just vandalize the page without explanation. Show me which justification in WP:EL exists for each link you want to include. ClairSamoht - Help make Wikipedia the most authoritative source of information in the world 03:11, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
The links clearly meet WP:EL. Please read the guideline. "...because the site has a level of detail which is inappropriate for the Wikipedia article." Is just one way they meet the criteria to be linked. More to the point, these links have been there for years, and seen by dozens of editors including yourself. They are not "linkspam". that is both offensive and foolish. Please engage in civil discussion, especially when making changes to things that have been in the article for years, and have been deemed appropriate by dozens of editors in that time. To this point you have not even had the courtesy to state what your problem is with them. The pagat link in particular is far more detailed than appropriate for this article. Also the links cover "how to" and rules content that should not be in the article. 2005 05:28, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
As long as we're reading what WP:EL says, let's not quote it out of context. The complete paragraph says, "Sites that contain neutral and accurate material not already in the article. Ideally this content should be integrated into the Wikipedia article, then the link would remain as a reference, but in some cases this is not possible for copyright reasons or because the site has a level of detail which is inappropriate for the Wikipedia article."
The "Semi-official" link isn't neutral and accurate. They themselves assert that their credibitility is shot. The "Euchre Universe" link isn't neutral and accurate, either. They assert that Euchre is "A game that has acceptable cheating written into its rule book" which is a bald-faced lie. And the "Paget" link has a whopping four paragraphs. So much for high level of detail.
Why do you assert that the RULES for a game shouldn't be a part of the game article? IF you remove the rules from the article, all the article except half the introduction and a paragraph of history would disappear.
My problem is that THESE SITES ARE CRAP. They don't have any content that is necessary for the article, nothing that adds anything. My problem is that I CARE ABOUT THE CREDIBILITY OF WIKIPEDIA. Why don't you? You claim that other editors have found no problem with the external links; but how many of them do you suppose bothered to click on them?
You argued in Wikipedia Talk:External Links last July that crappy external links should be removed. Why are you changing your tune now?
You said "I personally think blogs are a plague" on that page, and Euchre Universe is one of the "plague-iest".
You said "I am only opening the gate to high quality content that meets the various criteria of the external links guidelines." These three links don't lead to high quality content.
You also argue on that page that users don't come to Wikipedia because of the Verifiability policy; they come in order to get accurate information. But the reason people expect accurate information from Wikipedia is that Wikipedia has STANDARDS. And when you argue that these incredibly crappy external links are important, you really drag down Wikipedia.
If this article were Eating bugs or Getting drunk, then Euchre Universe might be an acceptable site to link to. If this article were Contests that involve streaking, then it might be acceptable to link to Semi-Official. If the article were Making money with little content and lots of ads, then Paget might be a good external link. But this article is about Euchre. There are NO links in that list to neutral and accurate pages providing a depth of information that Wikipedia should not offer.
Since you have a nasty habit of trying to rewrite talk pages to please yourself, 2005, I'm posting a copy of this on William Pietri's talk page as well. Even if you delete it there, he'll get notice that there've been changes to his talk page, and he might find it in the page history. ClairSamoht - Help make Wikipedia the most authoritative source of information in the world 11:58, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
If you want to seriously discuss these links, please do so below without the rants, bold type or misinformation. I will just add here though: "If the game is notable for its rules, a brief synopsis of the rules. Lengthy sections should be avoided -- after all, Wikipedia is not an instruction manual." 2005 21:03, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

External links, take two

I'm finding the discussion above unmanageable, so I'm just starting a fresh new section here. 2005, editing my talk page comments is completely inappropriate. Please don't ever do that again. Clair, I feel your tone, your rudeness, your unnecessary accusations, and your failure to assume good faith are making discussion impossible. I think the discussion is worth having, so I'd ask you both: Can we agree to have a civilized discussion and not edit the article until we've come to consensus? Thanks, William Pietri 15:23, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Please remove the link that goes nowhere. It is inappropriate to have it there and you know that. You should never have linked to something inappropriate in the first place. 2005 20:22, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
I'm willing to agree to a civilized discussion. 2005, however, has posted to you that he intends to continue to refuse to honor Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines#Behavior that is unacceptable which says that editors Don't edit others' comments and Don't change your text.
Even before you made your request that we not edit the article until we come to a consensus, I had already concluded that, in the interests of conciliation, I should refrain from editing those links. Strictly speaking, that's not necessary. The Wikipedia policies state that the burden is on the editor that wishes to include questionable material, not on the editor that wishes to exclude it. The links should be absent until we reach some sort of consensus that they are appropriate. But to indicate that the links were questionable, I attached a {{unverifiable external links}} warning to users. AFTER you posted your request, 2005 edited the page to remove the warning.
WP:AGF says This policy does not require that editors continue to assume good faith in the presence of evidence to the contrary. What would YOU consider to be evidence of bad faith? ClairSamoht - Help make Wikipedia the most authoritative source of information in the world 21:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
Please discuss the external links below, without the bold type or inappropriate comments please. 2005 21:06, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Hi, 2005. I won't be removing the link that now goes nowhere. It went somewhere at the time, and I believe it was an appropriate link. We agree that Clair could have written his message in a more friendly and productive fashion, but his concern is a reasonable one. I would love it if both of you could see past surface issues and devote the bulk of your energy to encyclopedia-building. Thanks, William Pietri 22:43, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Clair, I'm glad you're willing to focus on a productive discussion. If 2005 continues to do things that are inappropriate, that's all the more reason to keep a cool head. Hopefully, he won't; looking at his posting history he seems pretty reasonable, and perhaps he just feels provoked by your speed and vehemence. If you'd like to add a warning to the links, start a section to dicuss that below. If it looks like it will take us a while to sort this out, I'd be in favor of some sort of warning, but perhaps there's a more appropriate one. Regarding good or bad faith, so far all I see evidence of is that we don't all concur on the appropriate external links for this article, and it seems like you and 2005 disagree on the right way to interpret WP:EL. That other people disagree with your interpretation of a style guide or its applicability to a situation doesn't prove that they are acting in bad faith unless you've shown that no reasonable person could have an interpretation other than yours. Since you haven't even asked me or 2005 what our respective reasonings are, you couldn't possibly know that bad faith is the only reasonable explanation. William Pietri 22:58, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

External links on article

Currently there are three external links on this article. One has been there three years. The second has been there two years. The third is newer.

You're asserting that Wikipedia is a lost cause, and we should give up on improving it?

The first link is to pagat.com, the most respected card games site on the web.

Is it? When I google for "most respected" paget, there's nothing there about card games. Most of the pages are for a book called "How to Give Her Absolute Pleasure - Totally Explicit Techniques Every Woman Wants Her Man to Know".
if you try it with "pagat" instead of "paget" you might have better luck. 67.84.72.225 (talk) 19:15, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

The content there is 10,000+ words on all varieties of Euchre.

This article isn't about all varieties of Euchre, though. And 10,000 words isn't very much. One newspaper page is about 6500 words.

It easily meets the level of detail criteria to be linked... although this article also needs citations, and the pagat article should be the principle place to get those.

Please give ten examples of items on the paget site which are too detailed for this article. I can't imagine even one. I mean, if we're going to mention that "a single jack and nothing else except 9's and 10's containing only non-trump" is called "Jack Shit", what detail should be omitted?
IMO, the best place for citations should be Scarne, and the two most respected Hoyles - Frey's and Gibson's. Scarne is the most recognized expert on card games in history, and Hoyle is, after all, Hoyle. But if Paget has something you can't get from an authoritative source, sure, go ahead and use it.

The second "semi-official" link seems fine, but likely could be removed from external links since it too should be used to cite this article. The third link has an awful lot of strategy, and since strategy is almost never appropriate for articles, it seems to very much merit a link, although I don't play Euchre so it could be poor advice.

Does grossing out your opponents by eating bugs really count as strategy? The existing article does already have a strategy section, where we are told "Thou shalt not trumpeth thy partner's ace." But blogs are considered unreliable at Wikipedia:Reliable Sources except when the article is a bio, and it's the subject's own blog, and even then, they are frowned on because even permalinks have a way of quickly disappearing.
I agree that the paget and semi-official sites might be used as references in a pinch, but I believe there's nothing of value at EuchreUniverse to this article. (There's an old story about an fellow who got beat up, and he explained that the other guy had a club in his hand. And what did you have in your hand, he was asked, and he replied, "Only the fellow's wife's bottom, and it's a really nice bottom, but it's not worth much in a fight." I don't mean that EuchreUniverse doesn't have an appeal of sorts, just that it's not worth much to this article.)

There is an awful lot of text so I'm not sure if it has citeable material as the first two, but it certainly again has a level of detail not appropriate for the article.

It has a lot of irrelevant material, but I don't see the detail you're talking about. Euchre is a pretty simple game, which is why on that blog, you see all the liquor bottles and the women that are clearly feeling no pain. A big part of Euchre is that you can play it when you're brain-dead from exhaustion, unlike Poker or Bridge or even Gin Rummy, which require you to think. There's just not a whole lot of detail to go in to. ClairSamoht - Help make Wikipedia the most authoritative source of information in the world 21:57, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
Breaking up my statement is not appropriate. You are not the only person in the world, and now you have rendered it difficult for anyone else to comment on. Please refrain from that in the future. You should try and remember we are talking about three links on a card games article, not the end of Western civilization. Next, try googling the right spelling: card games pagat. If you are unfamilar with pagat.com or the The International Playing-Card Society I'd suggest you consider you may not be the best person to judge the value of card game related content. The pagat link is authoritative. Asserting it is not is silly. I would not object to the other two links being removed, but I also would not object to them staying. I also think either could be valid as citations when the article is cleaned up and properly sourced. None of these are "linkspam". That was an inappropriate statement. At worst the semi-official and universe sites merely don't achieve a level of value necessary to be linked. That is an entirely different thing. So, if you want to remove the semi-official and universe links, go ahead, but I would not be surprised if other editors use them as sources in the future. 2005 22:13, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

I fear I may have precipitated this argument when I added the link to the Euchre entry at BoardGameGeek. In doing so I was attempting to follow the article structure recommendations of the board and table games WikiProject, of which this article is a part. I realize that that may have been a stretch, since the recommendation to add a Board Game Geek link only applies to board games. Sorry, I didn't realize this would end up being so controversial! -- AmbientArchitecture 22:21, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

the Board game geek links are good in some places, but really pushing it in others. There is a linked page on the BBG Euchre page that has some value, but it mostly just repeats what is here or on pagat, so I would not add the BGG link here. In any case it is a bigger issue, but I'd encourage you not to just add BGG everywhere it plausibly could, but add it where it is a clearly valuable thing to add. 2005 22:29, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
No need to apologize, AmbientArchitecture. You didn't precipitate anything. I have about 350-400 articles on my watchlist, and I'm working on upgrading them all, mostly in getting decent citations for them, but a couple of the articles I worked on recently had HUGE lists of external links, and most of them only had one or two appropriate, so I was looking for inappropriate external links when I came to the article.
But even if you HAD precipitated this, there's no need to apologize unless you did something deliberately wrong. You're supposed to be bold. Mistakes get made, and fixed, all the time. My nose got bent out of shape when another user reverted my deletions without justification. The basic rule is that the burden is on an editor to show that content should be included, rather than being a burden on the editor wanting to exclude matter, so I felt reverting the deletion without justification was uncalled for. Then he was making deletions on talk pages, which is a REALLY big no-no, (you can use strike-throughs to retract your own words, but you definitely don't make it look like someone else said something other than what they said) and my nose got further out of joint for that. The big argument here isn't about the links; that's small potatoes. The biggie is whether fundamental Wikipedia policies need to be followed.
You're invited to weigh in on this matter, by the way. Even if you disagree with me. ClairSamoht - Help make Wikipedia the most authoritative source of information in the world 23:01, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
Yep. In this case, it didn't seem helpful to me. Perhaps you should update the WikiProject so that others don't make this mistake. Thanks for commenting, though! I had wondered about the broader context, and your edit seems perfectly reasonable within that. Thanks, William Pietri 23:05, 9 September 2006 (UTC)


Hi, Clair. As long as you are getting upset about 2005 editing my comment, perhaps you could not edit his? I understand you were trying to do a point-by-point reply, but it destroys the coherency of his post and makes the discussion harder for other people to follow. If you'd like to do a point-by-point reply (which personally, I don't recommend), you can always quote the bits you want separately rather than editing his comments directly. Thanks, William Pietri 23:05, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Hoyle's Rules say that you may not call a suit trump if you don't have it in your hand. Perhaps this is according to Hoyle...Whoever he is. But in the game played by people on Yahoo, Pogo, and most college parties in the midwest, this rule is non-existent. In fact in higher-levels of play calling a suit you don't have is critical to winning.

ex. The score is 9-6 with your team ahead and you're in first chair. The Jack of hearts is turned up and you hold in your hand: A-K-Q-J-10 all spades. With a hand like yours you cannot stop a loner and the chance of the dealer having a loner hand is really good. You deliberately order up the Jack to "Donate" and negate any chance of the other team scoring 4 points and stealing a victory. You will most likely get euchred, but you will be dealer next turn where you stand a better chance of scoring a point and getting the win. Yahoo euchre and Pogo both allow this play.

Six-Player Version (Canadian Euchre?)

I learned a six-player version of this game as "Canadian Euchre". It has 3 teams of 2, and adds the 7's and 8's, as well as two jokers (one black and the other red, so if identical one needs to be marked) and the two of spades. The trump ranked: joker of the named suit's color (no trump play is not an option), other joker, two of spades, right bower, left bower, A, K, Q, T, 9, 8, 7. I don't recall any scoring changes, though it might have been more generous for a lone hand (facing 4 oponents by yourself is a pretty fair challenge, especially having to draw from a wider field of cards).

I haven't seen this variation played anywhere else, looked various places online. I learned it from a couple while vacationing in Ontario. Has anyone else seen this variation, or is it obscure and unworthy of mention? Anthonypetre 17:17, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

David Parlett makes a mention of it in the 2008 edition of The Penguin Book of Card Games, though he calls it the 'Cornish Version'. It describes two possible versions, one with 7 through A and only one joker, or 2 x 9 through A and two jokers. Sounds like Canadian Euchre is a mix between the two. I'm not sure any of these versions warrant a mention beyond their names and the fact that they are 6-handers, as the rules beyond that are not significanty different from Euchre. Emperor Dalek (talk) 14:57, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Spelling Consistency

The highest trump cards are spelled "bower" in some sections and "bauer" in others. Does anyone know which is correct? 24.155.108.246 10:51, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

I believe that Bower is the English spelling, and Bauer is the German spelling. I've attempted to clean up the article a bit.Nzseries1 09:36, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Renege is spelled r-e-n-e-g-e, not r-e-n-i-g. 164.144.123.1 13:27, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Six player and {{howto}}

The six player version reads very much like instructions and advice, so I added {{howto}}. Thinboy00 talk/contribs 16:51, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Sorry to break the not-a-forum rule, but...

Is Euchre really that popular specifically in Rochester? I've lived in Rochester all my life, and I just assumed everybody else in America plays it all the damn time too. heh, you learn something new every day (that is, if we can trust Wikipedia... I wish this article were better sourced!!) --Jaysweet 17:55, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Well, I think the more important question is: Who cares? On a global level, followings in specific areas in specific states aren't notable - I've removed them. Nzseries1 10:32, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Notability really only applies to entire articles. And the specific regional nature of Euchre is indeed an important part of the history of the game. So I'd say those facts belong. William Pietri (talk) 01:14, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Euchre is really only very popular in certain places. A good rule of thumb being; if you live near Amish country, you probably play euchre (as it wa invented by the Pennsylvania Dutch). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.207.40.215 (talk) 16:41, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

Split out variations section

The article was indeed too long, so I split the section on variations out to Euchre variations. I tided it up a little, but it could use more work. William Pietri (talk) 01:43, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

I moved a couple of other sentences referring to rules variations to the Euchre variations article. Emperor Dalek (talk) 07:20, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Ten Commandments

In the link to Harvey Lapp's page, number 7 contains no reference to a deity, and number 10 refers to "The Lord thy Euchre God." Why the change to "Excelsior"? Elofgren (talk) 14:33, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

The Ten Commandments is fine for talk over a beer but should not appear in this article for the following reasons:

a) In general these are 'rules of thumb" not unbreakable laws, commandments or principles on how to play the game of euchre. There are numerous situations for exceptions to most of the Ten Commandents as cited in this article, any good player will confirm this.

b) What is the definition of a Commandment as used by the author in this article? And upon Who's authority that says these are even the most important principles?

c) Would it not have been better to say, "The Right Bower is the only guarantee in Euchre, ... The Right Bower is guaranteed to win one trick." --72.82.61.90 (talk) 00:55, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Euchre in Modern Culture

This last part of the article, right before the references, about "Euchre not being at the forefront of something...", I just deleted it. We can't have any clumsy, half-written portions in any article. Once someone has a referenced paragraph about Euchre in modern culture, then we can include that. --Uriah is Boss (talk) 07:49, 13 November 2008 (UTC)

Hoyle says.....?

we always played the rule that you must have one trump in order to pick up/order up....and we always played that the left bower doesn't count as trump until AFTER trump is made....ie: if the jack of spades is the up card, and you, as dealer, have the jack of clubs in your hand, but no other trump, then you can NOT picks up the jack of spades.....but i have heard others play it differently....does this belong in the article? Macenblu (talk) 08:18, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

Euchre Terms?

The last item under the "Euchre Terms" seems to be completely random (vandalism maybe?). I've never heard the term "picking up Benny", which is used in definition. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Holshy (talkcontribs) 18:14, 11 February 2009 (UTC)


I haven't heard that either, it seems like vandalism to me.

I'd like to suggest the term "sitting in the bushes," if this is something others have heard of -- it means that you had high trump well-protected enough that it doesn't get drawn the first two times trump is led. When you play it to take the last trick, you were sitting in the bushes. Euchreplayer (talk) 21:16, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

The problem with most of these terms is lack of references to back them up (or linkage, as in what reference goes to what term.) The simple fix is to remove them; the right answer initially, however, would be to mark them for fixes. Caisson 06 (talk) 01:16, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
The 'Benny' refers to the joker which is used in a euchre variation popular in Cornwall, England and maybe elsewhere. A 26 card pack is used with the 'Benny' outranking all other cards, irrespective of which suit is trumps. If the 'Benny' is turned up by the dealer, then they are free to pick it up and choose any suit as trumps. Organised Euchre Leagues are popular in that part of the world, with strict rules prohibiting speaking or signalling during bidding to discourage cheating.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.74.97.211 (talkcontribs)

8 Suits

Probably the rules for six or eight players can be condensed further by stating only the differences from standard rules. As I don't know the game (and haven't even read the article) I'm not the one to do it. (I got here from Special:Contributions/Blfeaster; see also Talk:Suit (cards).) —Tamfang (talk) 10:24, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Links

Links have been added to the Article. Krenakarore (talk) 21:49, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

Extra suit play?

The large section of variations with regards to adding extra suits for more players seems like it should a) belong in the Variations section or b) belong in its own article. It is significantly different to standard Euchre. Emperor Dalek (talk) 06:16, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

  • Agreed. There are many other variations and aspects of the game that have not yet been mentioned. This long list of variations should go to a new section. Krenakarore (talk) 23:33, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

British Euchre

It seems no mention of the British Euchre rules are given. See here. Regards, SunCreator (talk) 19:32, 7 November 2010 (UTC)

How do strategy and Chinese food go together?

The first sentence in the Strategy section says "In the instance of winning two consecutive games, it is customary for the winners to buy the losers Chinese food." Convention ≠ strategy, and due to its seemingly out-of-place nature this needs to be either cited and put in a more appropriate location or deleted altogether. 67.142.168.29 (talk) 17:25, 13 June 2010 (UTC)