The goal
In Pinochle you and the seat across from you are partners. The first side to a thousand points wins. You score twice each hand: once for the combinations in your hand, and again for the cards you take in tricks.
The deal
The deck is doubled: two of every card from nine up to ace, forty-eight in all. Each player gets twelve cards, and nothing is left over.
Bidding starts at forty and goes round until three seats have passed. Each bid must beat the last by at least five, and a jump is allowed. The winner names trump. There is no passing at that point. If nobody bids, the hand is thrown in and the next dealer deals again. A pass is final: that seat is out of the auction for the hand. The opening bid and the smallest raise are table options, forty and five unless changed.
A hand is worth about two hundred on this scale: your meld, plus your side's share of the 250 in tricks. So forty is only a floor. Count your meld, add what your aces and tens should win, and bid what the two together can reach.
The ten is the second-highest card, above the king. The nine is the lowest: worth nothing in tricks and no part of a run, so it is the card to lead or throw. That order holds in every suit, for tricks and for combinations alike.
The play
Once trump is named, each player lays down meld: combinations that score. Only what you lay down counts, and laying down nothing is allowed. The jack of diamonds with the queen of spades is a pinochle, worth forty. Two of them are worth three hundred. Cards that make no meld at all are refused. Some tables offer a button that gathers your meld for you; matchmade tables never do.
A trump run, ace to jack, is a hundred and fifty. Trump king and queen are a marriage, forty. Other marriages, twenty. A rank in every suit: aces a hundred, kings eighty, queens sixty, jacks forty. A card may count twice: this run's king and queen are also a marriage, so a full trump run is worth a hundred and ninety, not a hundred and fifty.
Hold two of a meld and it pays twice: two runs are 300, all eight aces 200, two royal marriages 80. The one exception is the double pinochle, both jacks of diamonds with both queens of spades: 300, not 80.
The seat left of the dealer leads the first trick, not the bid winner. Follow suit if you can. The highest trump wins the trick; if no trump was played, the highest card of the suit led wins, and the winner leads next. If two identical cards tie for highest, the one played first wins. If you cannot follow and hold trump, you must trump in, even when it cannot win. A table can switch that rule off.
Scoring
In tricks, aces are worth eleven, tens ten, kings four, queens three and jacks two. The last trick of the hand is worth an extra ten. These four cards and the last trick come to forty-six.
Nines are worth nothing. Every point in a trick goes to the side that wins it, so your partner's tricks count for you too. Every card gets played, so the tricks always add up to two hundred and forty. With the ten for the last trick, every hand holds two hundred and fifty trick points. Meld counts even if your side takes no tricks. But if the bidders' meld and tricks together fall short of the bid, they lose both.
The bidding side adds its meld to its trick points. Bid two hundred and fifty, reach three hundred and ten, and bank all of it. Fall short of the bid and you lose the whole bid instead, even below zero. The other side always banks its own meld and tricks.
Winning
Play hands until a side reaches a thousand points. Scores are compared only at the end of the hand. If both sides are at or past a thousand, whoever has more wins. An exact tie continues to another hand. A side at minus a thousand or lower is set out: the match ends after that hand, and the higher score wins.
