♠How to Join♦Register Screen Name♣Schedule♥Results♠Standings♦Lifetime IRPs♣Lifetime Wins♥Year-to-Date Wins♠Award Winners♦Past Internet Champions♣

The Basics To play a game of cribbage you need atleast two people but can have three or four people. Here are some guidelines which will depend on the number of people that are playing: 1. Two people: the dealer deals six cards each (pictured below) 2. Three people: the dealer deals five cards each and then one off to the side (pictured below) 3. Four people: the dealer deals five. Play matches with real boards or play via online software Tournament software to run your own small or large Cribbage Tournaments. It allows online as well as offline tournament or even a mix. Traditional Cribbage is a card game that has been around since the 17th Century. It involves creating hands composed of pairs, runs, flushes, and sums to 15. Here at eCribbage.com, you can play 2 player, 3 player, and 4 player games. (ACC cribbage commissioner Robert Milk comments, 'I play frequently on a 28.8 dial-up at the site powered by GameColony.com, and there is almost no delay.' Manual Scoring Option - This is a unique option for sites powered by GameColony.com - this option requires that you score your points during play and count your own hand and crib. The American Cribbage Congress (ACC) is the largest cribbage organization in the world. The ACC sanctions tournaments, and authorizes grass roots clubs (237) throughout North America.

National Cribbage Day Long Match see attachment

Click on the link to see the IRP chart for the National Cribbage Day
Frequently Asked Questions - NCD Tournament
Bracket - NCD Tournament

Please note:

If your name that you play with in the ACC tourneys at both eCribbage or GameColony does not exactly match the name(s) you chose to register with for each site, you will not get credit for the IRPs you meant to have earned. The new ACC statistician will no longer be required to look back to cross check, as this causes hours of tedious (volunteeer) work. This also means that 'grandfathering in' will no longer happen.

It is up to you to simply sign in with your EXACT screen name--which includes correct upper/lower case, spaces and underscores. If you don’t know the spelling of the screen name you registered at either site check: www.cribbage.org/newsite/internet/player_list_name.asp

Another option is to register a new name, so it is suggested that you do so immediately, if necessary. Go to https://accinternet29.wixsite.com/internetreg It is much easier to change/reset it here to the exact name you sign in with already, than to try to change it on the playing sites.

Thanks for your cooperation.

John Schafer

Play Cribbage Classic

Assistant Internet Commissioner

January 2021: Sam Sinram (ia503) is hanging on to the top spot. Look out Sam, you are approaching 150 tournaments and there are plenty of players that can catch you.

Please contact John Schafer if you have a dispute about Internet Rating Points.

Life eMasters - One Star
John Schafer (netview85) reached 10,000 IRPs in January.

Life eMasters

No member reached 6,000 IRPs in January.

Grand eMasters

Roger D. Baxter (rdbaster1) reached 4,000 IRPs in January.

eMasters

Terry Higgins (terryhi) reached 2,000 IRPs in January.

Free Cribbage Games Windows 10

Debra L Moulies (debncorbin) reached 2,000 IRP in January.

Player of the Month - January
With a total of 200 IRP's in January 2021 the Player of the Month is: Peter Legendre (legend397).

August 2020 news
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Top 10%

RANK	Player	GC_Screen_Name	eCribbage_Screen_Name	Tournaments	IRPs
1	Sam Sinram	IA503	IA503	132	759
2	Peter Legendre	legend397	legend397	104	606
3	Kelly Ann Burgar	lilthummper_	lilthummper	126	603
4	Gary Brandt	Eaglear39	Eaglear39	120	577
5	Mike Fetchel	mfetchCT425	mfetchCT425	91	565
6	Teri Murdy	MsT7536	Terim	118	537
7	Ronnie Murakami	HApegger1	Hapegger	102	509
8	Sue Edwards	CO434Sue	CO434Sue	89	499
9	Bob Hanes	ia801	ia801	105	496
10	Jeff Raynes	jeffraynes29	jeffraynes29	104	493
11	Ed Bloom	heliumman	heliumman	146	492
12	Jennifer Bolles	Jebbbifer	Jebbbifer	149	489
13	Nancy Rojas	nancribdr	nancribdr	134	483
14	Mel Ashley	Mellifluousone	Mellifluousone	134	478
15	Daniel Crete	dec0194	dec	70	465
16	Don Grumpy Howard	GrumpyDopey7	GrumpyDopey3	90	457
17	Bob Bartosh	acc_bob	Accbob	80	441
18	Meg Maenpaa	megaclarinets	megaclarinets	110	427
19	Kristy Haught	NC494	NC494	414	92

Cribbage Rules

Objective

The objective in Cribbage is to be the first player to get 121 points. The gameplay is divided into three distinct parts, The Deal, The Play and The Show. Each part is explained in detail below.

This version of Cribbage is for two players, there are many other variations possible, but these rules are only for the variation we've chosen for this site. There are a lot of rules, I've tried to explain them as best I can here, but you can also look at the rules at www.pagat.com or at Cribbage Corner, both of those are good places to learn how Cribbage works.

The Deal

The game starts with both players drawing a card from the deck to find out who is the dealer. The person that gets the lower card is the dealer. If the players draw equal cards then they draw again until the dealer can be determined. This way of determining the dealer is only done in the first round, in subsequent rounds who is the dealer will alternate between the two players.

The dealer deals 6 cards to himself and 6 cards to the opponent. Each player then chooses two cards from their hand to put face down into the crib. The crib belongs to the dealer and is used at the end of the round to gain extra points. Which cards you choose to put in the crib is very important, as it affects how many points you can get in later parts of the game.

At this point each player has four cards in their hand, and the Crib has four cards. The deck of cards is then put to the side, and the non-dealer (also called a pone) cuts the deck and then reveals the top card. This card is referred to as the starter or the cut. If the starter is a Jack then the dealer immediately scores 2 points. This is known as Two for his heels. Once the starter card has been shown, the players are ready to proceed to the next part of the game.

The Play

The pone (the player who is not the dealer) starts by laying down a card on the table and announcing its value, e.g. lays down a 6 and announces 'Six'. The dealer then lays down a card and announces the cumulative value of the cards on the table, e.g. he lays down a 5 and announces 'Eleven'. This continues with the players laying down one card each until a player cannot lay down another card without the cumulative value going over 31. The player then says 'Go' and the other player can then continue to lay down his cards until he also can't lay down a card without going over 31. He then says 'Go' as well, and the player who laid down the last card will score 1 point if the total value is under 31 but 2 points if the value on the table is exactly 31. They then reset the count to 0 and continue with their remaining cards, starting with the player who did not lay down the last card. An ace is counted as 1, face cards are counted as 10 and other cards are their normal value.

During this phase there are several ways to score points, based on how you lay down your cards. Points are scored as you lay down your cards, e.g. if your opponent has just laid down a 4 and then you lay down another 4 on top of it then you will score a pair. The starter/cut card is not used at all in this part of the game.

Players always announce the cumulative value of the cards on the table when they lay down a new card. If they score points they will announce the points as well, e.g. 15 for 2, or 31 for 2. When a player has said 'Go' then the other player will say '1 for the Go' when he's claiming the point from laying down the last card. He might also say '1 for last', if the other player has not laid down any cards since the value was last reset. 1 for the Go or 1 for last are just different ways of announcing the same thing, that the player gets 1 point because he laid down the last card under 31.

Scoring during The Play

• Fifteen: For adding a card that makes the total 15, score 2 points.
• Pair: For adding a card of the same rank as the card just played, score 2 points.
• Pair Royal (Three of a kind): For adding a card of the same rank as the last two cards, score 6.
• Double Pair Royal (Four of a kind): For adding a card of the same rank as the last 3 cards, score 12.
• Run (sequence) of three or more cards: Score 1 point for each card in the sequence. The cards do not need to be in order, but they do need to be all together. E.g. H2 C8 D6 H7 S5 is a 4 card sequence because C8 D6 H7 S5 can be re-arranged into S5 D6 H7 C8, but H2 C5 C7 D7 S6 is not a sequence because the extra 7 in the middle breaks up the sequence of 5-6-7. Basically if you can take n cards that are in order and re-arrange them so all the n cards form a numerical sequence then it's a sequence.
• Last card, total value less than 31: Score 1 point.
• Last card, total value exactly 31: Score 2 points.

It's worth noting that even though all face cards count as 10, you cannot create a pair, pair royal or double pair royal with cards unless they have the same 'real' rank. E.g. two queens are a pair, a queen and a king aren't, even though they are both valued at 10. For sequences an ace is always low, you can't make a sequence with a king and an ace next to each other.

It's also worth noting that you can make points in many ways with the same cards. E.g. if the cards on the table are DA C7 and you lay down H7 you will get 2 points because 1+7+7=15 and 2 points because 7+7 is a pair of sevens. So, in that case you would announce 'Fifteen for 4'.

This part of the game continues until both players have played all their cards. The scores are updated as soon as a player gets points, and if a player reaches the target score, 121, the game is finished immediately.

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The Show

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Once The Play is finished, the players take back their cards from the table and it's time to calculate the score for their hands, and the crib. These are always scored in the same order: pone's hand, dealer's hand, dealer's crib. As before, the scores are added to the scoreboard as soon as they are calculated, and if a player reaches 121 the game is over immediately, the other player doesn't get to count his score. This means that there's no chance of a tie, or both players going over 121 in the same round. The dealer will normally get more points since he scores both his hand and the crib, but the pone scores his hand first, so if they're both close to 121 the pone might win, even though the dealer would have gotten more points if he were allowed to count them.

The Show Scoring

The scoring for The Show is similar to the scoring for The Play, but with some important differences. The starter card is used here with both hands and the crib, so a hand is the hand + the starter, and the crib is the crib + the starter. You can use the same card for many different combinations, e.g. it can be part of a pair and also part of a sequence.

• One for his nob: For having the jack of the same suit as the starter, score 1 point. E.g. starter is H4, you have HJ.
• Fifteen: Any combination of cards that sum to 15. You can re-use cards, so if you have HJ, SJ and C5 you get 2 points for HJ C5 and another 2 points for SJ C5.
• Pair: For any pair of cards, e.g. SQ DQ, score 2 points.
• Pair Royal (Three of a kind): For any three cards of the same rank, e.g. S8 C8 H8, score 6 points.
• Double Pair Royal (Four of a kind): For any four cards of the same rank, e.g. HA SA DA CA, score 12 points.
• Run (sequence) of three or more cards: Score 1 point for each card in the sequence. E.g. for SA H2 C3 D4, score 4 points.
• Flush, 4 cards: If all the cards in your hand are of the same suit, e.g. SA S5 S9 SJ, score 4 points. These four cards all have to be in your hand, you cannot have three cards in your hand + the starter count as a flush. A 4 card flush also can't be used for the crib, only for your hand.
• Flush, 5 cards: If all the cards in your hand, and the starter card, are of the same suit, e.g. SA S5 S9 SJ SQ, score 5 points. You can also get a 5 card flush for your crib, if all the cards in the crib and the starter are of the same suit.

Skunks and Double Skunks

A skunk is when a player wins by over 30 points, his opponent has less than 91 points when the game is over. A double skunk is when a player wins by over 60 points, the opponent has less than 61 points. Normally a skunk will count as two games and a double skunk as 3. However, on this site we're not playing multiple games, we only track each game individually. We will however show you an image of a skunk or two if you get a skunk, and we do keep track of skunk counts for the statistics page.

Variations

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As with every game, there are slight variations in how people play Cribbage. I've tried to look at many sources and pick the most 'standard' rules I could. Some common variations is that the next-to-last hole on the scoreboard is the 'stinkhole' and not all points count there. I'm not using that variation on this site, you can score wherever you are. There are undoubtedly other variations that people like and would like to see here, if a lot of people request a specific variation I would consider adding it, but I don't want to start adding different options for the game, I like picking one way to play a game and sticking with it.