These rules describe Spider as implemented in the app: two decks (104 cards) across ten tableau piles, cards building down regardless of suit while only same-suit runs move together, and the goal of assembling eight full King-to-Ace runs, one suit each, which bank automatically as they complete.
Complete eight King-to-Ace runs of a single suit. Each completed run is removed from the tableau automatically — the game is won when all eight are done.
- Tableau: Ten piles where cards are played and rearranged.
- Run: Face-up cards of one suit in strict descending order — the only multi-card unit that moves together.
- Completed run: A full King-to-Ace run of one suit — it leaves the tableau on its own.
- Stock: The face-down pile that deals one card onto every tableau pile at once.
- Suits (difficulty): The two decks are composed of 1, 2, or 4 distinct suits, always 104 cards.
- Use two standard 52-card decks (no jokers). Difficulty changes the composition: 1 suit (eight sets of Spades), 2 suits (four sets each of Spades and Hearts), or 4 suits (two full decks).
- Tableau: Deal 54 cards left to right: the first four piles get 6 cards, the remaining six piles get 5 cards, only the top card of each pile face up.
- Stock: The remaining 50 cards, face down (five deals of ten).
- Completed runs: Eight spaces bank finished runs as they leave the tableau.
- Build tableau piles down in rank, regardless of suit (e.g., a red 6 may land on any 7).
- Nothing may be placed on an Ace.
- Several cards move together only as a face-up, same-suit descending run. Mixed-suit or gapped stacks move one card at a time.
- Any card or movable run may fill an empty pile.
- When the last face-up card leaves a pile, flip the newly exposed face-down card face up.
- Tap the stock to deal one face-up card onto every pile (ten cards per deal, five deals in a game).
- Dealing is not allowed while any pile is empty — fill every space first.
- The moment a pile's top thirteen cards form a face-up King-to-Ace run of one suit, the run is removed automatically and banked.
- A dealt card can complete a run, and one removal can expose another complete run beneath it.
- Start at 500.
- −1 for every move, including each stock deal.
- +100 for each completed run.
- On a win, a time bonus is added: it starts at 900 and drops by one point per second of play.
- The score never drops below zero.
You win when all eight runs are completed. With good play, roughly one in three 4-suit games is winnable, 2-suit games considerably more, and 1-suit games almost always.
Published Spider rules differ in scoring and stock handling. This implementation uses:
- Classic Spider scoring. The 500-point start with −1 per move and +100 per run, rather than the per-card schemes some sites use.
- Deals blocked over empty piles (the standard rule, though some implementations allow dealing across gaps).
- Suit-count difficulty as deck composition. The two decks are made of 1, 2, or 4 suits, always totaling 104 cards, and each mode keeps its own statistics.