Cardice — Official Rules
Five suits. One die. Trump isn't your choice — it's the roll's.
The Deck
Cardice is played with a 65-card deck across five suits: Spades, Hearts, Diamonds, Clubs, and Bells.
Card rank: Ace (high), King, Queen, Jack, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2.
Suit rank (alphabetical, high to low): Spades > Hearts > Diamonds > Clubs > Bells. This only decides who deals first — it has no bearing on play.
The Die
The special die shows six faces: X, Spade, Heart, Diamond, Club, and Bell. Rolling X means the hand is played no-trump — an equally difficult, equally scored contract.
Players
Cardice is played by 1 (vs. AI), 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6 single players, or by 2 or 3 partnerships.
Rounds & Deal
A standard game is 12 rounds. Each player is dealt 12 cards (6-player games deal 10 cards each, to keep rounds dividing evenly). Every player deals the same number of times. Undealt cards form a face-down stockpile that isn't used that hand — the source of Cardice's bidding uncertainty.
Deciding Trump
Before bidding begins, the player to the dealer's right rolls the die. All players see the trump suit (or no-trump) before bidding starts on that same hand.
Bidding
There are two rounds of bidding, starting with the player to the dealer's left. No one may pass; a bid of 0 (nil) is allowed; the maximum bid equals the number of cards dealt.
- Round 1: each player states how many tricks they expect to win.
- Round 2: each player may change their bid — for example after hearing a partner's round-1 bid — or keep their original bid.
- Partnerships: partners' final bids are added together into one team contract and one team score.
The Play
The player to the dealer's left leads the first trick. Players must follow suit if able. A player who cannot follow suit may play any other card, including trump — trumping is never mandatory.
- The trick is won by the highest trump played, or if none, the highest card of the suit led.
- The trick winner leads next.
- Joker: exempts the player from following suit, and automatically wins whatever trick it's played into. It can never be led — except during the final hand of the game, where it may be led and automatically wins that trick.
Scoring
- Made contract: score equals the bid exactly. Overtricks earn nothing extra.
- Broken contract: score is negative — e.g. bid 4, win 3 → score of −1.
- Nil (0) bid, made successfully: scores a +5 bonus (can be turned off in Cardice-Pro settings).
- End-of-game tie: all tied players/teams play one additional decider round.
Kudos
Kudos is Cardice's free-to-earn currency — it never converts to real money. Earn it through daily login streaks, ad views, milestone badges, skill-based bonus rounds, referrals, weekly leaderboard placement, and Bonus Kudos.