Hakka Chinese tradition · Multi-trick · 3 active players
六虎 Liuk Fu · Six Tigers
One card can win a trick. A whole run can change the hand. Reach six winning cards — then decide whether to take the win or ask for more.
Gold OLD badges use your hand and known cards, including your own hidden discards.
Hand complete
This page offers the three-player game with 36 cards: you and two bots. Payments are recorded as units. Four-person play, with an extra card and a non-playing dealer, is described among the variants below.
Each of four money suits contains ranks 1 through 9, with 1 lowest and 9 highest. The suits, from highest to lowest, are Sup (Tens, 拾), Gong (Myriads, 貫), Sok (Knots, 索) and Tyen (Coins, 綫). The digital cards show both their number and suit name. Deal all 36 cards, twelve to each player.
Deal and play run anticlockwise. In this three-player game the dealer is Master and leads first. The Master may lead immediately or pass. If the Master passes, the next player may say Play or pass; if necessary the third decides. Everyone passing produces a redeal by the next dealer. If anyone says Play, the Master still leads.
A non-Master who says Play becomes Vulnerable. A Vulnerable loser normally pays both losing shares instead of just one. The Master can never be Vulnerable in this version. A Master who passed cannot later lead a four-card set or a run of four or more, although heading a play with such a combination is still possible.
A normal lead is one card, three or four cards of one rank, or at least three consecutive cards in one suit. Pairs are not normal leads. Every player contributes the same number of cards. A three-card multitrick gives its winner three trick units: only the winner's own three cards are displayed as winning cards.
You must beat the highest play already on the table if you can. A single needs a higher card of the same suit. A set needs a higher-ranked set of the same size; when a set of 1s is led, only a matching-size set of 9s can beat it. A run needs the same length, either higher in the same suit or in any higher suit. If no heading play is available, discard the required number of any cards face down.
The four 9s and the 1s of Tens and Coins start as Old Cards. Other cards become Old when the player can establish that opponents cannot hold a higher card of that suit, using their own cards and cards known to have gone. Holding a top sequence can therefore make several cards Old. An opponent's hidden discard is not proof that a higher card has gone. The low Old Aces of Tens and Coins win when led alone, but cannot beat a single already led.
For an ordinary single lead, a non-Vulnerable player must use their highest suit containing a non-Old card. Old singles are normally reserved: you may lead one when you hold only Old cards and no legal multitrick. A Vulnerable player may lead singles freely, or lead a group of Old Cards together. Old cards can also be included in normal sets and runs.
When you have the lead, you may reveal one or more known Old Cards if those cards plus your existing winners reach at least six. This declaration ends the hand and counts the revealed cards as winners. Select them and use Claim with Old Cards. This also lets you add guaranteed extra winners before settling the hand.
The first player to win with six cards may stop immediately. They may instead continue for a larger reward. If another player then takes the other six, that second player is the sole winner. Once seven or more are secured, nobody else can reach six. If all the cards are used without anyone reaching six, the hand is drawn.
This table uses one unit from each loser for six winners, plus one unit per extra winner: seven pays two each, up to twelve paying seven each. A Vulnerable loser normally pays both shares. Revealing a four-or-more-card set or run after passing marks an unfair pass; if that player is the other loser, they pay both shares instead of the Vulnerable player. An all-pass or drawn hand changes no totals. The dealer stays after a Master win and rotates otherwise, including after draws.
Luk Fu is also written Liuk Fu or Lioek Foe. The spelling 六虎 and English name Six Tigers appear in historical accounts, although the meaning of the second syllable has been discussed as a reference to points as well as a pun on tigers. The goal of six winning cards gives the first syllable a clear connection with the number six.
Accounts of related play appear in nineteenth- and twentieth-century card-game literature. The form used here was documented among Hakka Chinese players in Gloucester, England, in 1993. Its narrow money-suited cards belong to a different tradition from the familiar European pack. A multitrick turns one lead into a contest for several winning cards, while concealed discards make the changing status of Old Cards an exercise in incomplete information.
With three players, only the four nine-card suits are used. Four-person forms add an Extra Ace: three people still play twelve cards each while a fourth participant receives one card and takes part in payments. The extra card also makes a special Five Aces declaration possible. Neither the Extra Ace nor that declaration is part of this 36-card table.
Families and accounts differ over the next dealer, permitted Old-card leads and payment tariffs. Some double selected high scores or increase payments exponentially. There are also different approaches to inspecting earlier face-up plays. This page uses a linear tariff, keeps winning cards visible, leaves discards concealed, and rotates the dealer after every draw.