Prepare 40 cards
Take the 8s, 9s and 10s out of a standard deck. Cards rank A, 7, K, J, Q, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2 from high to low. Play moves clockwise.
Portuguese trick-taking · 4 players
Sobe e Desce
Change your hand, win just enough tricks, and be the first to bring your score down to zero.
NNorth3 cards
WWest3 cards
EEast3 cards
Exchange stock28
YYou3 cards
Round complete
Scores updated
01 How to play
Five tricks.
Scores up or down.
Sobe e Desce is a four-player Portuguese game in which everyone plays for themselves. Each player starts at 20 points, and the first to reach zero wins.
Choose trumps
The player left of the dealer receives the first three cards, chooses the trump suit, and then receives two more. Everyone else also receives five cards, in order.
Exchange or sit out
Starting with the trump chooser, each player may sit out or discard one to five cards and draw the same number from the remaining stock. Sitting out leaves the score unchanged. You may not sit out three rounds in a row, and a Hearts trump makes everyone play.
Follow and beat
The first active player leads. Follow the led suit if possible; otherwise play a trump if you have one. If you have a legal card that beats the current winner, you must play a beating card. If none can beat it, you may play any legal card.
Lead the trump Ace
When you lead a new trick and hold the Ace of trumps, you must play it. The highest trump wins a trick; without trumps, the highest card of the suit led wins. The winner leads the next trick.
Score five tricks
After five tricks, each active player removes one point per trick won. An active player who takes no tricks adds five points instead. A player who sat out scores nothing.
The suit changes the stakes
With Clubs as trumps, both gains and losses count double: two points come off per trick, or ten are added for taking none. With Hearts as trumps, sitting out is forbidden.
Win the match
The first player whose score reaches zero wins. If more than one player reaches zero in the same round, they share the win. The dealer moves clockwise for the next round.
02 History & variants
A score that moves both ways.
A documented Portuguese ruleset
A Portuguese description from 2019 ↗ records this four-player form with five-card hands and a starting score of 20. Its name means “up and down”: winning tricks lowers your score, but missing them raises it.
Different from Sueca
The Ace–Seven–King order and 40-card pack are familiar from Portuguese trick games, but this table has no fixed partnerships. Choosing trump before the final two cards, exchanging at least one card, and deciding whether to sit out make each round a fresh tactical problem.