In Kaluki (or Kalooki), 106 cards are used (2 decks and two jokers) and each player is dealt 13 cards regardless of the number of players participating in the game. Aces are high and are therefore worth 11 points. The jokers take the value of the cards they are pretending to be whilst in play and a value of 15 for the purposes of scoring.
After 13 cards are dealt to each player the dealer forms the face-down stock pile using the remainder of the pack and then turns the top card face-up and uses it to start the discard pile. Play begins with the player to the left of the dealer and rotates in a clockwise direction. Each player’s turn consists of 4 parts.
The first action on each turn is the draw, which is compulsory. The first player may draw from the stock or discard pile, but the following players are restricted to drawing from the stock pile only until they have laid down an initial meld of at least 40 points. However, they are able to draw from the discard pile provided that they use the card they draw on that turn to lay down their initial meld.
The second action is melding, which is optional. This involves the player laying down melds of cards in the form of sets or runs. A set is a group of three or more cards of the same rank and of different suit. As two packs are used in Kaluki there will be two cards of each rank and suit in play. However, as the cards in a set must all be of different suits, it is not possible to have both in a single set. Runs are sequences of three or more cards of the same suit in order: the 8, 9 and 10 of Spades, for example. Note that Aces are high in Kaluki, so the run Queen, King, Ace is valid, whereas the run Ace, 2, 3 is not.
The third action is laying off (also known as building), which is also optional. When building a player may add cards from their hand to melds that have already been placed on table by themselves or another player. The meld must be valid after the addition of the cards and the rule that sets must not have cards of the same suit still applies. A maximum of two cards can be added to the same end of an existing run, so you could not add the Jack, Queen and King to a run consisting of the 8, 9 and 10. Although a player is allowed to build in the same turn as laying down their initial meld, the building cards do not count towards the value of the initial meld.
The final action of a turn in Kaluki is drawing, which is compulsory. This involves a player discarding one card face-up on the discard pile.
The jokers add a twist to Kaluki in that they can be used to represent any other card in a meld. For example, with only a pair of twos you can lay down a melded set of twos by adding a joker. A player who has the genuine cards to complete a set can use them to replace a joker. So if a set consisted of the Jack of Hearts, Jack of Diamonds and a Joker and a player had the Jack of Clubs and Jack of Spades, they could add those two cards to the set and take the Joker. However, they must use the Joker they pick up either in a meld or in building on the same turn. They cannot add it to their hand. If the player only had the Jack of Clubs in their possession they could still add to the set, but they would not be able to pick up the Joker as the set would then be a closed set with the Joker as the Jack of Spades. If a set consisted of three cards, two of which were Jokers, a player could add two cards of the correct rank and different (required) suits to take one Joker and form a closed set. Jokers can also be used in runs, where they have a definite identity as a specific card. They can be swapped with that card by any player who possesses it. They cannot add the Joker to their hand and must meld or build with it immediately.
The game ends when one player discards their last card, which is called “Calling off”. The other players are not able to meld or build after this point and are left with their remaining cards. The points values of these cards are summed and added to each player’s individual score as penalty points. The “Calling off” player receives 20 bonus points. If a player plays all 13 of their cards in a single hand this is called Hunt (or Kaluki) and earns the player 20 extra bonus points (total 40) and means that all penalty points earned by other players in that hand are doubled. Once a player reaches 150 penalty points they are eliminated from the game.
