How to Play the Card Game Conquian

Today I want to share with you how to play Conquian the card game. Conquian is a very old card game that originated in Mexico in the 1800s. It goes by many names including Cooncan, ConKin, and CoonKing. This Mexican game is believed to be the start of Rummy style games.  

Conquian is a more challenging cards game similar in difficulty to the games 3 to 13, Hola and Hearts.

Let’s learn how to play and see the variations there are.

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What you Need For Conquian

Conquian is a two player game. It uses the Spanish card deck. You can get a Spanish deck or you can make your own by removing the 8, 9 and 10s of each suit. In the new deck, the jacks come after the 7s then the queens and kings. Aces are low.

The Object of Conquian Card Game

The object is to meld all of your cards, including your draw card. Melds are formed with three or more of a kind and runs. Runs do not wrap around so you can’t play a run with King, Ace, two. Nor can you play a run of queen, king, ace. Melds do go 6 -7 –Jack-Queen and so on.

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Playing Conquian

To start, deal each player 10 cards then place the rest of the deck in the middle of the playing area to form the stock pile. Do not flip over the top card.

The player who didn’t deal picks up the top card. She now has to use it to make a meld or discard it. If she is going to use it to meld, she places the melded cards on the table in front of her. If she has other cards in her hand that make a meld, she doesn’t have to place them down at this time. She can choose to wait or place them down. Now she has to choose a card form her hand to discard.

When she has discarded, the dealer takes his turn. He can choose to pick up her discarded card or take the top card off the draw pile. He must use the card to make a meld of his own or discard it. Again, he can choose to keep any other melds in his hand or place them on the table in front of him. Once he has played he must discard.

A player can’t add to the other player’s melds but can add to his own melds at any time during his turn. He can also rearrange the cards in his meld piles. For example, if he has the 3, 4, 5, 6 of clubs on the table and has the 7 and Jack of clubs in his hand, he can move the 6 to form to meld of 6, 7, Jack. When moving cards around, a player must make sure that melds remain with a minimum of three cards.

The other rule in Conquian is that a player can do is that he can force his opponent to use a card. A player can’t refuse when told to use a card. This move could slow a player down and ruin her plans.

Play continues with players either taking the top card of the discard or the top draw card and either melding the card or discarding it.

Winning Conquian

The first player who is able to meld all 11 cards—the 10 from dealing and one from picking up—is the winner.

Draw Pile Empty

In the event that neither player is able to meld all 11 cards before the draw deck is emptied, then the game is a tie.

Conquian Variations

9 Cards

A common variation of Conquian is to deal 9 cards instead of 10. In this case, a player would need to meld all ten cards to win.

Scoring

Another way to play is to keep score. A player gets points for the cards left in his opponents hand after melding all the cards in his own hand. The points are 15 points for an ace. The numbered cards 2 to 7 are worth their face number. Jacks, queens and kings are all worth 10 points. Players will have to decide before starting if they will play a set number of rounds or to a set number of points.

Not-So-Spanish Deck

The Spanish card deck has 40 cards. In the Conquian game above, you remove the 8, 9 and 10 cards. In this variation, you take out the face cards, so the Jack, Queens and Kings and leave the 8, 9, 10 instead. The game is played the same but could be easier to follow as a run would be 7, 8, 9 instead of 7, Jack, Queen.

All Played Out

We hope that you have enjoyed learning how to play Conquian. It is a fast playing game that is a good alternative to Rummy when you have a smaller amount of time.

You can shop Spanish card decks here. Canadians can shop here. For more fun games check out our card games and check the Family Game Shelf Shop.