Sticheln - Instructions
A miserable good game

1. Game setup
With /join you can enter the game, and with /start you can start it (3-6 players). By using the command /option dm before the game starts, you choose to play 4 rounds instead of 5.  
2. The game
 Sticheln takes five (or four) rounds. In each round every player gets 15 cards. At the beginning of a round every player has to choose one card which determines his/her 'misery color'. This is done by clicking on the card, followed by clicking on the 'Ärgerfarbe wahlen' button. Next 14 tricks are played. All colors except the color of the card that is played first are trump. You don't have to follow suite, unlike in most other card games! You can play any card you like.
3. Winning a trick
The winner of a trick is determined as follows.
  • If everyone has played a card in the start color (i.e., the color of the card that was played first), the person who played the highest card wins the trick.
  • If besides cards in the start color also one or more 0's are played, the person who played the highest card (in the start color) takes the trick.
  • If at least one trump card is played, the person who played the highest trump card takes the trick. In case of a tie, the person who played the first card of this value takes the trick
Note that you can never win a trick with a 0, unless you start the trick by playing a 0 and all other players also play a 0.
4. Trick example
 TORBEN starts with a red 4. dynamike plays a red 1. On this moment the trick is still for TORBEN. Now Niknase plays a red 7 and overtakes the trick. Romario can win the trick with every none-red card, that is not a 0. If he doesn't want the trick he has to play a 0 or a red card with value below 7. Note that the card next to the name displays the misery color; TORBEN and Romario have misery color yellow, dynamike has brown and Niknase has blue.
Speedy- starts with a yellow 3. dynamike trumps with a green 3. Now Excalibur can win the trick if he plays a none-yellow card higher than 3. He doesn't get it if he plays a yellow card or a card below 4.
5. Scoring and game end

A round is over if all 14 tricks are played. Then the points scored in the round are calculated. A player becomes +1 point for every card that has not the player's misery color. All cards with the misery color give negative points equal to the value of the card.

For example: Your misery color is red because you chose the red 1 at the start of the round. You have won 4 tricks in this round:
green 3 - green 6 - red 2 - blue 8
red 0 - brown 3 - brown 8 - green 9
blue 1 - blue 11 - green 4 - green 5
yellow 2 - yellow 4 - blue 10 - red 9

So you have 13 none-red cards; they give you 13 points. For the red cards (the 0, 2 and 9) you get -11 points. And for the red 1 (played when choosing the misery color) you get -1. In total you have won 1 point in this round.

The game ends after 5 (or 4) rounds. The points of all rounds are summed up. The person with the most points wins the game.

6. Tips and hints for beginners

Even experienced card players have to get used to Sticheln. Below are given some examples to help new players.

Misery color: It's best to choose a color in which you have many low cards. You should choose a card with a low value, because the value of this card counts as negative points. If you have a color with cards like 1, 2, 5, 7 then this would be a good misery color, and you could pick the 1 at the beginning of the round.

Speedy- starts with a brown 5. dynamike also plays brown because then he knows for sure that he cannot get negative points for this trick. If he would play an other color (and no 0) the next players could play green cards which would count negative for dynamike if he would win the trick. Excalibur's misery color is brown so he for sure doesn't want to get this trick. That's why he plays the brown 3. Madmax trumps with the blue 7, because no red is inside the trick yet. He chooses blue because he expects that TORBEN then doesn't want to steal the trick; TORBEN would get -7 for the blue 7 (and +3 for the brown 3, 5 and 8). Therefore TORBEN should play a red 7 or a red card with a lower value to give Madmax some minus points.
Madmax starts with the brown 4. TORBEN trumps with the green 3. In this way he hopes that no one else will take this trick because the others all have brown or green as misery color. Therefore Speedy- plays the brown 13 (it's always good to get rid of high cards in your misery color), and dynamike plays the green 2.
Because Excalibur doesn't want to get the brown 4 and 13, he also plays a brown card, namely the 11. TORBEN wins the trick and becomes 5 points for it since there is no blue card inside.
It can be dangerous to start a trick with a high card in your own misery color. Here TORBEN starts with the blue 13. All other players duck and play a lower blue card. If Madmax also plays a lower blue or a 0 then TORBEN will get at least 30 minus points!

The examples show that it is an advantage if you remember which cards in your misery color are played. You then know how high you can trump a trick without getting minus points.

It's important to keep some low cards in your misery color as long as possible. This also holds for the 0's. In that way you can defend yourself if someone attacks you by playing a card in your misery color. For instance, if the person in front of you starts with the 6 in your misery color, then it would be good if you could play a lower card in that color, or a 0.

With 3 players the game is played with 5 colors with the cards 0-8.
With 4 players the game is played with 5 colors with the cards 0-11.
With 5 players the game is played with 5 colors with the cards 0-14.
With 6 players the game is played with 6 colors with the cards 0-14.