Pishe Pasha, also spelled Pisha Pasha: the card game for two

Which Pishe Pasha we mean

Pishe Pasha is competitive patience: a solitaire that two players play against each other. John McLeod's pagat.com page files it under that heading, and our rules follow that page. Each of you has a stock nobody looks at. Four piles in the middle, the foundation piles in pagat's word, are shared. The winner is whoever gets rid of every card first, on those piles or, the twist, on the other player's discard pile.

The name is a trap. Pagat lists Pisha Pasha and Pisha Paysha as other spellings, and says several books of card games use the name for a much simpler game of pure chance, like War. Wikipedia's article on Pisha paysha describes a game like beggar-my-neighbour, typically played with children. One rules site gives a twelve-card reserve where ties stay on the table. None of those is this one. We deal pagat's game, and say so.

Where it comes from, as far as we can source it: pagat says it has been played in America, primarily in Jewish communities, since at least the mid twentieth century, and presumably originated in Europe. That is all we can source, so we leave the longer stories to the pages that tell them.

The rules in full

Each of you gets 26 cards from one standard 52-card deck, face down as a stock, and neither of you looks at either one. Four piles in the middle, one per suit, are built from ace up to king. A card fits when it is an ace or one above its suit's top. The seat that did not deal goes first, and the dealer changes every deal. On that first turn an ace goes home, you keep turning while each card fits a pile, and the first card that does not fit starts your discard pile and ends the turn.

From then on your turn runs in a fixed order. If the top of your discard pile fits a suit pile, it goes there first. You have no say in it. Otherwise you may give the top of your discard pile to your opponent, if it is exactly one rank higher or lower than the top of theirs, any suit. Or you turn the top card of your stock, and that card is dealt with before you may give anything from your pile. A turned card that fits a suit pile must go there, even if it would also fit on theirs. One that fits only theirs you may give, or keep, which puts it on your own discard pile. Anything else lands there too, and your turn ends. You can pass up a give without penalty. Give away the top of your pile and the card under it is the new top, which may be forced home or fit theirs in turn.

When your stock runs out, your discard pile is turned over as a block, without shuffling, oldest card on top, and becomes the new stock. First to hold no stock and no discard pile wins the deal, even in the middle of a turn.

One turn, worked through

Say the clubs pile stands at the 3, the hearts pile at the 6, and nobody has started spades. The top of your discard pile is the 6 of spades, over the 7 of hearts. Theirs is the 7 of diamonds. Your 6 fits no suit pile, but it is one below their 7, so you may give it. Give it, and the 7 of hearts is your new top card. It fits the hearts pile, so it goes home, and nobody asks you.

Now you turn a stock card: the 4 of clubs, which fits the clubs pile, so home again. You turn another, a king. It fits no pile and is not one rank from their new top, the 6, so it lands on your discard pile and the turn is over. On the table that is three presses: Give the 6 to their 7, Turn a card, Turn a card, with the panel naming each step. You are three cards lighter, they are one heavier, and that is a good turn.

Scoring, and where the rule sets differ

The winner of a deal scores one point for every card left in the other seat's stock and discard pile, so the winner always scores. Pagat gives no target for a match, so the length is ours and the host picks it: one deal, first to 50 points, or first to 100.

Pagat also lists what we left out. Its stop call, for a missed forced play, has no use here, because the table never misses one. Sam Caron's version, where you must give a card whenever you can and a called mistake carries a three-card penalty, is not here. Nor is the three-player game with one pile that wraps from king to ace. Denexa's rules page has no score at all, first out just wins, while pagat scores it and so do we.

Play it online, with a friend or against the computer

Two seats. Open a table, drop the other person a link, and the host chooses how long a match runs. The server shuffles and deals, and it never sends either of you a stock card, so your own stock is as unknown to you as theirs. A discard pile shows its top card and a count. A panel lists this turn so far and the other seat's last turn, forced steps included, and when a card cannot be given a line under the buttons says why: their pile is empty, it is not one rank above or below their top, or yours is empty.

Against the computer you sit in the first seat on the same board, with buttons for the match length and a new match, and a high contrast switch that the table remembers on your device. The computer moves on a timer, one flip or one give at a time, so you can watch its turn. Nothing else is kept at that table, and a closed tab is a finished match. There is surely an app somewhere, but here you open a page and start, no account and nothing to download. It is free, and you may see an ad now and then; we will try to keep them discreet.

What the computer does, and strategy

It gives you a card whenever it is allowed to. It looks at the top of its own discard pile first, chains a run if one is there, the 7 on your 8 and then the next 8 on that 7, and only then turns a card. It sees what you see and no more: the tops of both discard piles, both counts, the four suit piles, never your stock.

We tried two cleverer versions: one that holds back a king, and one that will not give a card only two above a pile. Over 1,000 deals each against always giving, they won about 2 and 28 in a hundred. That agrees with pagat's advice to get your highest cards onto the other side. It is not the hardest card game of all time, in our opinion, since the choices are few. The real game is memory: your discard pile becomes your next stock in the same order, so what you discard now is what you turn later.