A variation of the venerable favorite, War! It sounds more complicated than it really is, just give it a shot and you'll see. Because there's three different stacks of cards at any given time, the rules can sound overly-technical.

Needed: One standard deck of 52 cards (No Jokers)

Rules of Play:

  • Deal 26 cards to each player, face down. This will form the draw pile.
  • Each player takes five cards from the draw pile and places them face up in a row. This is called the skirmish line.
    Each player then takes four more cards from the draw pile. Three are placed face down in a separate stack called a skirmish pile. The fourth card is placed face up on top of that pile. Whichever player has the highest face up card on the skirmish pile, takes the other player's skirmish pile.
  • Both skirmish piles are placed facedown in the winner's discard pile.
  • Starting with the winner of the skirmish pile, the player chooses one of his face up cards in his skirmish line and takes a card of lower rank from his opponent's skirmish line and places both facedown in his discard pile.
  • The other player then takes one of his face up cards in his skirmish line and repeats the same action.
  • Play continues by alternating turns until the skirmish line is empty or neither player can take another player's card. If cards remain on the skirmish line, they are put in the discard pile.
  • When the draw pile is empty, a player must shuffle their discard pile and use it for the new draw pile.
  • Play ends when a player concedes defeat, or one player has four or fewer cards.

Other rules:

  1. Any time a player needs to add cards to his skirmish line or skirmish pile, he must shuffle his discard pile and use it for a new draw pile.
  2. If a player has fewer then 9 cards total. In other words, the total number of cards from the draw pile and discard pile is less than nine, the player places as many cards as he can on the skirmish line, saving four for the skirnish pile. For example, if a player has seven cards left, he places three on the skirmish line and uses the last four to create the skirmish pile.