How to Play Page One

Objective

Be the first player to play out all of your cards. Page One looks like a trick-taking game, and it is played in tricks, but winning tricks scores nothing. What matters is that every trick costs you one card, while being unable to follow suit makes you draw more. Hands grow and shrink quickly, and the lead can swing on a single draw.

Setup

Add one joker to a standard deck, for 53 cards. Choose a dealer and deal four cards to each player, one at a time. Stack the rest face down as the stock.

The joker is the highest card. Below it, each suit ranks from ace (high) down to two.

How to play

The player to the dealer’s left leads any card. Going left, each player must play a card of the suit that was led. If you have none, draw cards from the stock one at a time until you draw a card of that suit, and play it to the trick. You do not get to choose: the first card of the right suit you draw must be played.

The highest card of the suit led wins the trick, unless the joker was played, in which case the joker wins. If the joker is led, the next player may play any card, and everyone after must follow that card’s suit. The winner of a trick puts the cards aside and leads the next one.

When you have two cards left and play one of them, you must say “Page One!” to warn the table. If you forget and the next player takes their turn before you say it, draw five cards from the stock as soon as anyone notices. If you win a trick with your second-to-last card, you must say it before you lead your last card. If there is no stock to draw from, take the cards of the trick you won instead.

When the stock runs out, shuffle the finished tricks and stack them face down as a new stock.

1. 1Lead any card, or follow the suit that was led
2. 2If you cannot follow, draw until you get the suit and play it
3. 3The joker, or the highest card of the suit led, wins the trick
4. 4Say “Page One!” as you play down to your last card
5. 5Play your last card first to win

Winning

There are no points in the standard game. Each deal is a complete game, and the first player to play their last card wins it.

If you want a longer contest, play several deals and keep a tally of who wins each one.

Very rarely, the stock and the finished tricks are both used up and a player still cannot follow suit. When that happens, the hand is called off as a draw.

Variations

Deal five cards each instead of four for a longer hand with more choices.

Joker limits: some groups forbid playing the joker as your last card, so you cannot go out on it.

Bigger tables: with more than six players the stock runs low fast, so some groups change how a used-up stock is handled to fit up to eight. Agree on it before you start.

Page One belongs to the same broad family as Crazy Eights and Last Card, where announcing your final card is part of the game. The difference is that Page One is played in tricks, with suit following, rather than matching onto a single discard pile.

Tips from the table

Lead from your longest suit. Players who are short in it will have to draw, and every card they draw is a step back for them.

Save the joker. It wins any trick, so it is best used to take the lead at the right moment, such as when you want to lead your last suit.

Say “Page One!” every single time, out loud, the moment your card hits the table. A five-card penalty almost always costs you the game.

Frequently asked