Four players, two teams, a race to 500. Here's everything you need to sit down at the table and hold your own.
Tarabish (pronounced TAR-bish, the second "a" is silent) is a trick-taking game played across Cape Breton kitchens, legions, pubs, and fire halls. You and your partner sit across from each other and take on the other two. Every hand, one team names a trump suit and promises to out-score the other. First side to 500 wins.
If you've played Forty-Fives, Belote, or Euchre, a lot of this will feel familiar. If you haven't, don't worry. The whole thing clicks after a hand or two.
New to it? Start a Solo Play game against the computer, keep this page open in another tab, and just feel your way through a couple of hands. Nothing here beats playing.
Tarabish uses a stripped-down deck: a standard 52 with the 2s, 3s, 4s, and 5s taken out. That leaves 36 cards, six through Ace in each suit.
Everyone gets nine cards, dealt three at a time. You look at your first six to decide on trump. The last three, the kitty, stay face down until trump is settled.
In the trump suit only, the pecking order changes. The Jack becomes the boss card, and the 9 jumps to second. So in trump the order from the top is Jack, 9, Ace, 10, King, Queen, 8, 7, 6, and that holds for both trick-taking power and points. In the three plain suits, the trick-taking order is the usual Ace-high (Ace, King, Queen, Jack, 10, and down). But don't let that fool you on points: off-trump, the 10 is worth more than the King, Queen, or Jack. It's second only to the Ace. So when you're collecting points, the order that matters is Ace, 10, King, Queen, Jack.
That promotion of the Jack and 9 is the whole character of the game. It is why a hand full of middling trump can still be a monster.
At the end of a hand you count the value of the cards your team won in tricks. There are 162 points on the table every hand: 62 in trump, 90 in the plain suits, and 10 for winning the last trick.
| Card | Points |
|---|---|
| Jack | 20 |
| 9 | 14 |
| Ace | 11 |
| 10 | 10 |
| King | 4 |
| Queen | 3 |
| 8, 7, 6 | 0 |
| Card | Points |
|---|---|
| Ace | 11 |
| 10 | 10 |
| King | 4 |
| Queen | 3 |
| Jack | 2 |
| 9, 8, 7, 6 | 0 |
Last trick is worth an extra 10. Grab it if you can.
Bidding just decides who picks trump. Starting to the dealer's left and going clockwise, each player either names a suit or passes. Name a suit and your team is on the hook: you now have to score more than half the points that hand, or you lose the lot.
If it comes all the way round to the dealer and everyone has passed, in the common Cape Breton version the dealer is forced to call something. No throwing the hand in.
Forced at 400. A rare and interesting house rule: once your team is over 400, you are forced to call rather than let the deal slide to the other side. If both teams are over 400, the higher team is forced. You won't see this implemented in the online game.
The player to the dealer's left leads the first card. Play goes clockwise. The winner of each trick leads the next.
And one more that catches people: any time you play a trump, you have to beat the best trump already on the table if you're able. You can't duck under with a low one to save it.
Keep your won tricks tidy and face down. You are allowed to peek at the last completed trick, but nothing before it. Once a trick is turned over, it is done.
A run is a sequence in the same suit, and it is worth bonus points on top of the cards. Runs use the normal card order (6, 7, 8, 9, 10, J, Q, K, A) even in trump, so the three top trumps (J, 9, A) do not sit next to each other for run purposes.
There are two steps, and the timing matters:
Only one player scores runs each hand. If more than one person calls, the best run wins the right to count, and everyone else keeps theirs in hand. A fifty beats a twenty. Between two of the same length, the higher top card wins. A run in trump beats the same run in a plain suit. Two identical runs in plain suits cancel each other out and nobody scores.
The upside if you win the run contest: all of your runs count, not just the best one. So two twenties is 40, three twenties is 60, a fifty and a twenty is 70.
Bella is the King and Queen of trump in the same hand, worth an extra 20. To get the points you have to call it as you lay down the second of the two.
Do not call it early. Announcing the first of the bells tells the table you are holding another guaranteed trump, and by the official rule it is table-talk and forfeits the points. Call it on the last one.
The one exception: if the King and Queen are part of a run you are showing, the bells are already on the table, so you can declare Bella right then along with the run.
When the cards run out, each team totals the points in the tricks it won, plus any runs and Bella. The catch is on the team that called trump: they've got to finish with at least one point more than the other side. Fall short and it's a bait: everything you took goes to your opponents instead.
Land exactly on half and it's a half-bait: the calling team scores zero, and the other side keeps its own points.
Running tallies carry from hand to hand. First team to 500 takes the game.
Most points possible for a team in one hand is 282: two fifties and Bella. Rare, but it happens, and it is a thing of beauty when it does.