Golf Solitaire Strategy: 9 Tips for a Lower Score

Golf looks like a game of pure luck: a card fits or it doesn't. Play a few deals, though, and you notice that two people given the same cards can finish with very different scores. All 35 cards on the table are face up from the start, so there is a great deal you can plan. The only thing you can't see is the order of the deck.

These nine tips are written for the standard rules, where nothing can be played on a King. They are the same ideas the Hint button in our Golf Solitaire game is built on, plus a few a hint can't give you. If you are new to the game, read the rules first.

The Arithmetic of Golf

Start with one sobering sum. There are 35 cards to clear and only 16 cards in the deck, plus the one that starts the pile. That is 17 chances to start a run. To clear the table, your runs have to average a little more than two cards each.

So a deck card that removes just one card from the table is a small loss, and a deck card that removes nothing is a real one. A run of four or five is what pays for those. Everything below is about making long runs longer and wasting fewer cards of the deck.

1. Trace the Run Before You Tap

When more than one card fits, don't take the first one you see. Follow each choice with your finger: "6, then 5, then that 4 comes free, then 3…" Remember that taking a card uncovers the one beneath it, and that card may keep your run alive.

Suppose the pile shows an 8 and you could play a 9 or a 7. The 9 is followed by a 10 and a Jack: three cards. The 7 is followed by a 6, and under that 6 lies another 7, then an 8 elsewhere, then the same 9, 10 and Jack: seven cards. The second line contains the first. That happens often: going one way first lets you come back and take the other way as well.

2. Zigzag Whenever You Can

The best runs change direction. If the table shows two 6s and a 5, a 7 on the pile lets you play 6, 5, 6: three cards from what looks like a two-card run. Pairs of the same rank are your friends, as long as there is a neighbor between them. Before each run, look for a rank that appears twice among the last cards and ask how you can pass through it twice.

3. Make the King the Last Card of a Run

A King is a dead end. Nothing goes on it, so playing one ends your run on the spot. That is fine when the run was over anyway. It is a mistake when you had other cards to play.

With a Queen on the pile and both a Jack and a King available, play the Jack side first if it leads anywhere, come back up to a Queen if you can, and only then finish on the King. A good habit: say to yourself "the King goes last" every time you see a Queen on the pile.

4. Count Your Queens

Every King needs a Queen to sit on, and it needs that Queen to be the top of the pile at the right moment. There are four Kings and four Queens in the deck, but some Queens will be played onto Jacks, and each of those is one less way to get rid of a King.

• At the start of the deal, find the Kings. A King at the end of a column is easy. A King buried under four cards is a problem to solve early.
• If Kings are still on the table, try to arrive at a Queen from below (10, Jack, Queen) and then step up to the King, so the Queen is not wasted.
• When a Queen turns up from the deck and a King is free, take the King unless a much longer run is on offer. That chance may not come again.

5. Mind the Aces Too

An Ace is not quite a dead end, because a 2 can follow it, but it is a narrow road. Only a 2 lets you play an Ace, and only a 2 lets you leave it. A run that goes 3, 2, Ace, 2, 3 is wonderful when the cards are there. Otherwise, treat an Ace as you treat a King: play it at the end of a run, and keep an eye on how many 2s remain to carry the other Aces away.

6. When It's a Tie, Take From the Taller Column

Sometimes two cards of the same rank are free and either will do. Take the one from the column with more cards under it. Tall columns hold more buried cards, and the last cards of the deal are far easier to clear when they are spread across several short columns than when they are stacked in one.

There is one exception. If you can see that the card under one of them is exactly what you need next, take that one, whatever the height.

7. Dig for the Cards That Block You

Look at what sits at the top of each column, furthest from you. Those cards will be the last to come free. If a column has a King at the very top, the whole column can only be finished when a Queen is on the pile at the right time. Start working that column down early, so that you are ready when the Queen arrives.

The same goes for a rank you are short of. If three of the four 9s are gone and a 10 is still on the table, the last 9, wherever it is, has become an important card.

8. Spend the Deck Slowly

Never turn a card from the deck while a useful play is still on the table. The deck can't be reused, and a card you could have played now may not fit later. Our game shows the number of cards left on the deck. Check it now and then against the cards left in the columns:

If you are behind the pace, stop thinking about a win and think about the score. Getting from nine cards down to six is worth just as much on a nine-deal scorecard as any other three strokes.

9. Use Undo to Learn

Undo is unlimited here, and it takes back deck cards too. When a deal ends with a few cards left, go back a dozen moves and try the other branch. You will soon start to see the patterns: the King you played too early, the Queen you spent on a Jack. That is the fastest way to improve, and nobody is keeping score but you.

About the Hint button. The hint shows the card that starts the longest run you can make from what is on the table right now. It prefers a run that does not end on a King and, in a tie, a card from a taller column. It never looks at the deck, so it knows nothing more than you do. It does not plan for Kings and Queens several runs ahead. That part is up to you.

If You Play the Easier House Rules

With Queen on King switched on, a King is no longer a dead end, and tip 3 matters much less. The Ace is now the awkward card, so tip 5 moves to the top of the list. With wrap around, there are no dead ends at all, and the game becomes almost entirely about tips 1 and 2: finding the longest zigzag.

The Short Version

• Follow every choice a few cards ahead and take the longest run.
• Look for runs that double back through a pair.
• Kings last. Aces nearly last.
• Keep a Queen for every King still on the table.
• Take from tall columns and dig toward buried Kings early.
• Don't turn the deck while a good play is waiting.

Enjoy this kind of game? Tri Peaks uses the same one-up, one-down play on a different layout, and FreeCell is the game to try if you like having every card in view and plenty of time to think.