Talk:Pitch (card game)

Untitled
What no five hand pitch and I was under the impression one had to "Shoot the Moon" if one thought he could recieve all points in one round and then and only then could he win with out recieving full points.

Let's say three players are down to one card each. The trump suit is diamonds. P1 has Kd, P2 has Jd, P3 has 2d. P1 takes the trick. Do the points for High, Low, and Jack go to P1 or are the points based on starting hand?

- In the version I play, high and jacks go to the trick winner, and low goes to the starting hand. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 73.115.118.216 (talk) 04:55, 29 July 2023 (UTC)

Pitch with jokers
This may be a regional variation, I have played it this way with more than one group in Missouri. I don't know a name for it, it was always called "Pitch". If someone has a name for this specific variation, please change the subsection title.Rt66lt 01:47, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

I found a title on a website.Rt66lt 03:21, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

Oklahoma?
Is "Oklahoma Ten Point Pitch" what some people actually call the game? Or does that heading mean that the rules described are how pitch is played in Oklahoma? In Nebraska we played the game like this, but we just called it "Pitch". Bugloaf 04:28, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm an Oklahoman, and the game is just called "Pitch." And some parts of the family actually play the Ten Point Pitch variant, and other parts (my part) play Seven Point Pitch, and that causes a lot problems when someone pulls a trey (because the trey is worth 3 points in ten-point and none in 7-point). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 73.115.118.216 (talk) 04:28, 29 July 2023 (UTC)

Some Corrections need to be made here
Parts of this article are incorrect or incomplete. Here are my points that need to be added or corrected, because it requires some major changes, I figured I would leave these points here up for discussion for a week or so, if no-one disagrees, I will apply the corrections to the article.

Many of these items were taken from Hoyle, the Parker Bros? (Pitch 6) Card game, and a couple Pitch video games.

Pitch is an old-english card game.

It is pitch, not high-low-jack that requires players to deal out 2 or 3 cards at a time, in doing so the dealer "pitches" the cards, and that is how the game got the name 'pitch'.

Standard pitch is a four point game, the five is meaningless, the five may have meaning in another variation called 5 point pitch.

Another feature of pitch missing from this is the smudge bid.

There are two variations of the smudge bid and what it is worth. The smudge bid means that you are going to win ever trick that is played. The smudge bid is a gutsy bid because the entire game, win or lose is on that bid. (you get your bid you win the game, you miss your bid you lose your game). The score is irrelevant with a smudge bid. One variation of this rule requires the jack is played (thus recieving all 4 trick points) in addition to taking all the tricks. Another variation of this rule only rewards the smudge bid with 5 points (losing 5 for missing the bid).

Supernerd 20:58, 29 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure how one determines what standard pitch is but I agree that the five is meaningless (or no different than the 4 or 6) in any Pitch game I have played. Liblamb 21:02, 29 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Pitch with the 5 (and possibly the 9) being special point cards is listed as a variant family called Pedro in . --Ironphoenix 18:19, 29 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Guess I should have read the discussion first... I moved the five card bid to a variant (probably should rename it to "5 point pitch" from above.) I agree also that the smudge bid variant should be in there as it can usually be very entertaining. devanl 13:40, 18 April 2006 (MST)

Rule variations.
I have played around mid new york and encountered anecdotally many rule variations on pitch. One of the main problems in trying to describe this game is that many regions use the same name to describe different variations all described on this page.

I have heard of a variation which allows for a 5 bid where the 5th point is a called "smudge". It involves collecting all the tricks in addition to the 4 points standard to pitch, High, Low, Jack, and Game.

There is another variation which involves using the 5 of trump as a point, a single point, such that there are 5 points in a game. I use this to play 2 handed, to avoid the pattern of only the first 2 tricks determining 2 of the points, and playing through what is normally 4 empty tricks to find out that there is no more points for game and no jack in play.

It is possible to play pitch for money, when allowable by law. It involves no teams, so cuthroat up to 8 players. A bid cannot be matched by the dealer, and the dealer cannot be forced to bid. The player who makes the bid either wins or loses : a set value is agreed upon for each point. If the player wins, he receives that value multiplied by the amount per point. If the player fails to make his bid, he pays that value multiplied by the amount per point to each remaining player. Another slight variation involves "Double on spades" where the amount wagered is doubled if spades is chosen as the trump suit.


 * I'm also familiar with the "smudge" bid when I've played pitch.--BigCow 04:10, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Another Variant
I've played where a single joker is added to the deck and called the "jick", it's a trump, worth one point, worth 1/2 point toward game, and is played between the 10 and the jack. It has the effect on gameplay of making the jack of trump more powerful, since it can score one more point, and the ten of trump less powerful since there is one more card that can take it. Makes a 5 bid valid, obviously, and also provides some nice variation within a hand once trump is pitched. By the way, my understanding of the name "Pitch" comes from "pitching" trump, the first card played. It's never required to state the trump suit, only to "pitch" it. Jdaniels2007 01:14, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

"Pitch" is cited as the term used for the opening lead in, so I think you're right about that being the origin of the name. --Ironphoenix 18:03, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

Contway 6-point
I'm looking to get feedback on the entry I added for Contway 6-point. Indeed, we use the joker as a 1/2 point towards game as mentioned by Jdaniels. We also place it between the Off-Jack and the 10 during normal play. We also are completely off the map in the usage of the word "pitch". We have used it to denote when a player is re-dealt all 6 cards. They got "pitched". If the redeal has no trump either, after play is over, people will say they got "double pitched". Perhaps this is from pitching the discards? Might be unique to our game.

I realize that my entry only adds to the variation problem and I was a bit wary to change sections to add exceptions such as our variation that you can throw trump on the redeal when that isn't played anywhere else from what I've read. ShemJ (talk) 15:20, 30 August 2012 (UTC)

Restructuring Proposal
This page is pretty disorganized, mainly because there are so many variants listed that it's hard to find anything specific. I suggest restructuring it into the following major sections: This will have the benefit of separating explanations of how rules work from the listing of playable variants, and make specific rules or variants easier to find and understand. --Ironphoenix 18:10, 29 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Introduction (including history)
 * Basic rules
 * Optional rules
 * Variants (commonly-played collections of optional rules to be used with the basic rules)


 * I'll try to revamp the page with better organization soon. Check my sandbox in the meantime. --RhoOphuichi (talk) 06:28, 17 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Reorganized and re-wrote the whole article.
 * I kept detailed descriptions only of the most common (as determined by web search) and most unusual variants. Other variant rules were included in a single section rather than detailed again and again in the list of every variant.
 * Tried to use neutral language rather than pitch jargon.
 * Removed info about the creators of some variants - could find no verification or information of any kind about any of them.
 * Removed info about the championship in portland - could find nothing about this supposed championship online, and the section smacked of self-promotion.
 * --RhoOphuichi (talk) 18:13, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Cleaned things up a bit. There is clearly still a problem between variants and optional rules. But I think the structure is better anyway.Shemjohnson (talk) 12:45, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Setback vs. Pitch
I've seen references to Setback vs. Pitch on the Setback page, the Pitch page, and the Pitch talk page. Either the games are exactly the same and the pages need to be merged, or they are very similar but distinctly different (as the rules laid out on each page show), in which case the opening sentence of each needs to be changed. Thoughts? I'll do the latter if no one objects.--Qfl247 (talk) 13:50, 24 April 2010 (UTC)


 * According to all sources that I have seen, Pitch, Auction Pitch and Setback are exactly the same game, but with numerous variants, none of which is particularly associated with one of these names. We had no less than three articles on this game:
 * Pitch (card game)
 * Setback (card game)
 * Auction Pitch.
 * This is of course harmful for the development of the subject; see WP:CFORK. The present article seems to be the oldest, and is definitely the most developed, so I have merged Setback (card game) into this one. Auction Pitch consisted only of material from two sources: the Encyclopedia Britannica 1911 article on the game, and the article Buckpitch (card game). The EB1911 material seems to be partially obsolete, so I have simply left a prominent template here directing readers to that article. I have merged the Buckpitch material into this article as yet another variant.
 * Now it's time to clean up the article. Hans Adler 14:50, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks! Just what it needed. --Qfl247 (talk) 15:35, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Smear vs Pitch
And what about what is the key defining difference between pitch and smear, is there any? Variant called smear is played to 21 points and tends to have jick and other extra points? I don't think this amounts enough for smear to have its own page. Merge?

--Eero Ketonen88.195.7.227 (talk) 12:22, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

The name "pitch"
I read many years ago that the name "pitch" refers to leading a card by pitching it onto the table. I never read this story that it was black as pitch. Whoever wrote the lede seems to know a lot about the origin, yet there is no cite.  Randall Bart    Talk   15:50, 21 June 2012 (UTC)


 * That was just an obvious hoax. I deleted it. Hans Adler 22:55, 21 January 2013 (UTC)


 * Given that in modern England the game that goes by name all fours the trump is determined by the eldest hand by pitching the first card in the same manner as in North American pitch, could it be that the game has been called pitch before it acquired the bidding round? --87.100.210.133 (talk) 17:52, 21 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Yes, I think that's quite likely, and it's not clear on which continent this happened. See All Fours for a description of the most basic rules and the modern English game.
 * All-Fours-based games are folk games with no clear correspondence between names and rules. As soon as a new rule is introduced, the game acquires an alternative name that describes the rule. From then on it is typically known under both names when the rule is included. This makes organising the articles about the games of this family rather tricky. I have done a lot of work on this a few years ago, but it's still a bit chaotic and may in fact have become more so while I didn't look. Hans Adler 22:55, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

Adding Pitch Variant
I'd like to add a regional variant of pitch detailed below to the Nine-Five variants section. I had edited the page earlier but it was pointed out that I had initially referenced a person that is not considered notable by Wikipedia standards. I understand that point and removed the reference in the description below. It was also suggested that this version has the same or very similar rules to other variants on this page but it is different for the reasons detailed below. Unfortunately I don't have any online references to this specific ruleset, but that is sort of the point of adding it here. It is a variant that has been alive and well and played on a daily basis for decades, even if it is only a regional variant.

It is certainly a Nine-Five variant, but it doesn't match up to any of the listed Nine-Five variants.

Some of the differences from the "Nine-Five variants of Pitch" section of the page are:
 * Forced 1 bid to dealer if everyone passes

Differences from "Nine-Five" section:
 * 6 initial cards dealt rather than 9 in the Nine-Five main variant
 * Dealer is not allowed to look at the remaining deck
 * 64 points to win
 * There is a 4-card kitty

Differences from "Variant" section
 * All of the above
 * The bidder must lead trump on the first trick
 * (Hotshot sounds like shooting the moon in the Bonanza version)

"Nine_Five Regional (Northwest Connecticut)" and "Nine_Five Regional (Northeast Connecticut)" are even more different than the previous variants.

I also can't tell if the 18 points for the Nine-Five variants section are the same 18 points listed in the Bonanza variant I brought up since they are not explicitly listed on the wikipedia page.

Here are the rules of this particular variant that I would like to add.

Bonanza Pitch

Four players play in 2 sets of partners, with partners sitting across from each other. Each player is dealt 6 cards, with 4 face-down cards in the kitty. There are 18 total points that can be earned in a round: High (1 pt), Low (1 pt), Jack (1 pt), 10 (1 pt), 9 (9 pts), and 5 (5 pts). There is an auction bid that continues until all but one player has passed. Players can bid up to 18 or Shoot the Moon. If all other players pass, the dealer is forced to bid 1.

The player that wins the bid must declare trump before collecting the kitty. Players then discard all cards that are not trump. If the player that wins the bid has more than 6 cards, they must discard down to 6 cards and show the other players which trump cards are being discarded. The dealer then deals each player back up to 6 cards. The player that won the bid must lead trump on the first trick. Players must always follow suit when possible. If a player does not have a non-trump suit that was led, they may play a trump card to take the trick.

Shooting the moon means that the team that won the bid must get all 18 points. Teams cannot shoot the moon if they are "in the hole" (they have a score below zero) or if either team has a score of 46 or above. If they succeed, they win the whole game. If they fail to win all 18 points, that team loses the game.

A team has won the game when it reaches a score of 64 or above. If both teams exceed 64 points on the same hand, the team the won the bid for that hand wins the game, even if that team has a lower score.

LWileczka (talk) 20:31, 12 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Ah! OK, forgive my misunderstanding. Thank you for explaining. Please go ahead and restore your edits; I won't revert it again. Jtrevor99 (talk) 15:29, 13 April 2021 (UTC)