Accordion
Accordion Rulebook
Table of Contents
Layout
Begin with the complete deck in your hand. Make piles by dealing out cards face up in a row, one card to a pile. You can lay out as few or as many cards as you like; keep the rest in your hand to be dealt out later.
(To fit on the screen, we've had to wrap the row of cards into several lines, but you should pretend that they're all in a single line, left to right.)
Play
Any pile can be picked up and moved onto the pile to its left, or the pile third to its left, provided the top cards of the piles match in either suit or rank.
You must move entire piles, never partial piles.
When you move a pile in the middle of the row, leaving an empty space, just shift all the other piles in to fill it. (Solitaire Till Dawn will do that for you automatically.)
Dealing
Deal by playing any number of cards onto the end of the row, one to a pile, any time you like.
Goal
The goal is to finish the game with all the cards in one pile.
Example
From the Bicycle "Learn to Play: Accordion" page.
The standard 52-card pack is used. The player deals out the cards one by one face up, in a row from left to right, as many at a time as space allows. (Dealing may be interrupted at any time if the player wishes to make a move. After making a move, the deal is then resumed.)
Any card may be placed on top of the next card at its left, or the third card at its left, if the cards are of the same suit or of the same rank.
Four cards, from left to right, are: 6 hearts, J hearts, 9 clubs, 9 hearts. The 9 hearts may be placed either on the 9 clubs or on the 6 hearts. It may not be played on the jack of the same suit because the jack is not to the immediate left, or third from the left.
When the movement of one or more cards has formed a pile, the entire pile is moved with the top card.
In the example above, when the 9 hearts is put on the 9 clubs, the two may be put on the J hearts and then all of these cards on the 6 clubs. However, it is not obligatory to make a particular move if the player prefers not to do so.
Tips
It's best to lay out all 52 cards at once, before beginning play. (Solitaire Till Dawn provides a special button so you can do this easily.)
Now look for several cards of the same rank near the end of the layout. Three is good; four is better but doesn't happen often. Sometimes you have to make do with two.
All four cards of your selected rank are called sweepers. Never move any other card onto a sweeper (until the very end of the game). Instead, do your best to get your sweepers together at the end of the layout, then move them toward the beginning, "sweeping up" other cards as you go. This isn't always as easy as it may sound, but it's crucial to winning.
Eventually you want to wind up with only four piles left, each with a sweeper on top. Since all sweepers have the same rank, you can then easily pile them onto each other for the win.
Often the end of the game can't be managed so smoothly. If not, abandon the sweeper technique when it no longer works, and use your creativity!