Tripoli is a card game that is played with four to seven players in three stages. The game is played with one deck of cards, poker chips and Tripoli board or cloth. It is sold under various names including Tripoley, Michigan Rummy and Royal Rummy in addition to Tripoli.
Dealing and Placing the Stakes
Before the hand is dealt, each player will place one chip on each of the nine spaces on the Tripoli board. One the chips are placed, the dealer will deal out the cards, face down, to each player and one card for an extra hand. The extra hand doesn't belong to anyone, but must be dealt.The deal continues until the dealer runs out of cards and some players will have more cards than other players. The dealer has the option to exchange his hand for the extra hand without looking at the cards first. The extra hand can also be auctioned off to the remaining players for chips if they don't like their hand. No one can look at the extra hand before the swap and the person who chooses to swap his cards cannot swap back.
Stage One: Collecting Stakes for Pay Cards
In stage one the players will collect chips from the pay cards. Sections of the board are labeled for the ace, king, queen, jack and ten of hearts. The players who hold these cards will receive the chips in the respective spaces. In addition, there is a space that is labeled king-queen of hearts. If a player holds both the king and queen of hearts, they will collect the chips from this space leaving the chips in the spaces labeled separately. The chips in the space labeled eight-nine-ten can be picked up by any player who has an eight, nine and ten of one suit. If more than one player has this combination, the chips are split evenly between them with any extras left on the board. The chips unclaimed are left on the board for future hands.
Stage Two: Poker
Each player chooses five cards from her hand to play the poker phase with and set the remaining cards to the side. The round begins starting with the person to the left of the dealer. Each player has the option to place or raise a bid, fold his cards or call. Players who choose to fold place their card down and do not continue to play this hand. Players who call will place the amount of chips that were bet by the first player in the game. All chips should be placed in the middle section labeled "pot" and the betting ends when all players have either folded their cards or all players have bet the same amount. Players then show their hand and the one with the best poker hand wins the chips in the pot.
Third Stage: Michigan
All players will pick up all of their cards and the person who won the poker stage will start the Michigan stage. A card of any suit will lead the hand, but it must be that person's lowest card of the suit the choose. The player who holds the next highest card of that suit will then play her card. This will continue until the ace is reached or no one can play a card. When the end of the sequence is reached the player who laid the ace or the last card played will begin the new sequence. This will continue until someone runs out of cards. The player who runs out of cards will win all of the chips in the "kitty" space and chips from each other player for the amount of cards left in their hand.
Ending the Game
At the end of the three rounds, there are normally chips left on the board. These chips can be earned by dealing each person five cards and playing an extra round of poker the same way round two was played. The winner of this hand will receive all of the chips on the board. The player with the most chips at the end of the game wins.
