Bela (Belot)

Croatian card game (called Belot in Bosnia and Serbia) – 4 players in two fixed partnerships – 32 cards

Cards and deal

Partners sit opposite each other; dealing and play go anticlockwise.
Everyone gets 6 cards (3 + 3) and 2 face-down cards (the talon), picked up only after trumps are chosen – then everyone holds 8.
In trumps: jack (dečko) 20, nine 14, ace 11, ten 10, king 4, queen (baba) 3, eight, seven 0. In other suits: ace 11, ten 10, king 4, queen 3, jack 2, nine, eight, seven 0. The cards are worth 152, the last trick +10 – 162 in all.

The player after the dealer (on his right) starts: looking at six cards, he names trumps or says “dalje” (pass). Everyone speaks once.
If all pass, the dealer must name trumps (mus). The team that named trumps is the calling team.

The player after the dealer leads; then the winner of each trick leads.
You must follow suit, and you must beat the highest card of the led suit if you can (iber) – unless the trick has already been trumped.
If you cannot follow, you must trump (even when your partner is winning), and overtrump a trump already in the trick if you can. On a trump lead you must also play higher if you can. Only with neither the suit nor trumps may you discard anything.

After the talon is picked up: a sequence of 3 cards in a suit (terca) 20, 4 cards (kvarta) 50, 5 or more 100 (order 7, 8, 9, 10, jack, queen, king, ace); four jacks 200, four nines 150, four aces, tens, kings or queens 100. Here zvanja are declared automatically.
Only the team with the best declaration scores – then all its declarations count (the partner’s too). More points win; at equal points four of a kind beats a sequence, then the longer, then the higher sequence; a full tie goes to the player nearer the dealer’s right. The winning cards are shown after the first trick.
Bela: king and queen of trumps in one hand, 20 points, announced when the first of them is played.
Belot: all 8 cards of one suit – the team wins the game at once.
Declarations and bela count only for a team that takes at least one trick.

Each team scores its card points, declarations and bela; taking all 8 tricks (štiglja) is worth +90.
The calling team must take more than half of all points of the deal (162 + declarations). If not, it falls (pad): all points go to the opponents.
The game is played to 1001 (option: 701 or 501), counted at the end of a deal – if both teams pass the target, the higher score wins.