6.       Variations

These variations may be added to the rules, or modify rules, depending on player preferences.

·        (2.i) ADDED RULE: “(Variation) EXTRA HAND FOR DEALER” At the start of each round, the Dealer is dealt TWO hands. He may look at only one of them. If he doesn’t want to keep it, then then the other hand is NOT FOR SALE and he returns the hand he looked at back into the pick-up pile; he then picks up the other hand, which becomes his hand for play. If the Dealer likes the first hand, he announces that the other (extra) hand is “for sale”. Beginning to the dealer’s left, each player may “bid” a number of cards. Subsequent bidders may bid higher. Bidding continues in the clockwise order until no one wants to bid a higher number. The bid is simply a number of cards that will be REMOVED from the top of the extra hand before giving the hand to the winning bidder.  For example, if the winning bid is “two cards”, then the dealer will turn the top two cards of the extra deck over to reveal their values to the table before placing them randomly into the pickup pile. Then, the remainder of the hand (11 cards now) is given to the bidder. The bidder then mixes their original hand into the pick-up pile before taking the new hand. Note: this variation was added to make play more fun and give players a potentially better hand if needed.

●       (3.h, Discard pile rule - ADDED RULE: “OPEN WITH SIX OF ONE CARD”) A player whose team has not gone down yet and who has six of one card (six 8’s, six 10’s, etc. with no wildcards) in his hand MAY pick up the entire discard pile on his turn if the top card matches his six cards.  If he chooses to do this, 1) he must play the entire 7-card canasta as a clean canasta, 2) he does NOT need to meet the minimum point requirements for his team to go down, and 3) his team may immediately pick up their foot.

●       (3.i.iv Creating a Canasta rule - ADDED RULE: “STRAIGHT FLUSH CANASTAS”) - [NOTE: Must also add the scoring rule to 5.d.i below]  A STRAIGHT FLUSH canasta may be played by any player on his turn.  This is a canasta of seven cards of the same suite in numerical order.  Jokers may not be played in a Straight Flush canasta and Aces may be played either low or high.  If played, the Straight Flush Canasta is passed immediately to the team’s “points” keeper and will be counted as 1500 points for the team’s base score.  Individual points for cards in a Straight Flush canasta will be counted as they are for clean and dirty canastas.

●       (3.l.iv1, Going out with Black 3s - REPLACEMENT RULE: “MAY GO OUT WITH MORE THAN SEVEN BLACK THREES”).  This would REPLACE Rule 3.l.iv1.a:

a. The number of Black 3’s in the player’s hand (not counting a discard card even if a black three) must be 7 OR 10 or more.  Here are some examples:

I. Player has 7 black threes.  He may play any playable cards, lay down the 7 black threes for 1500 points, and must discard another card to go out.

Ii. Player has 8 or 9 black threes. This player may not go out, because after laying down his 7 black threes he would not be able to go out because he is holding two other black threes and may only discard one of them.

Iii. Player has 10-12 black threes.  He may play any playable cards, lay down the 7 black threes for 1500 points, lay down three or more of the remaining black threes for 100 points each, and discard either another card or his last black three to go out.

●       (5.d.i - Scoring - ADDED RULE: “1500 POINTS FOR STRAIGHT FLUSH CANASTA”) Add the following: 1500 points for a Straight Flush canasta.