Sorry, can't get image share to work. I think it's move #275.

I like how meticulous you are with the rules. It keeps us all honest :-)

"In Canasta, the final discard is generally not needed to go out (your mileage may vary, but see above).
Players can either go out by discarding the last card in their hand, or melding all cards in hand.
So, 'discarding is always the last action' is definitely wrong."

Well... yes and no. Discarding is *optional* in the sense that you can go out and have no cards left to discard, but discarding is required if you have at least one card left in your hand. (Unless....see below)

"Bicycle rules page describes:
- A set of three or four black threes (without wild cards) may be melded only when a player goes out.

This does not include when you leave a single card in hand, because you didn't go out at that point."

If you HAVE to discard if you have a card to discard with, then melding all your cards but one is in fact "going out".

That is *unless* you allow a player to get down to one card and not be required to discard at all. And yes, I have seen that version used online.

Requiring the melding of the Black 3s to be the absolute last thing done is different from my experience but is actually kind of an interesting twist

Now that I know what the rules are its no big deal to me either way.

I see your explanation above and I can see how this is a "house rule", but I have never played in person or online where you can't meld 3 x Black threes and then discard a single to end the round. Maybe add it as an option??

Hello, would it be ok to update the rules list to specify the number of black 3s needed? I didn't click onto the bicycle rules page so I only saw the following under the 'how to play' tab:

Black 3s
Black 3s may only be melded when you go out. The black 3 meld cannot include any wild cards, and it must be your final action - no final discard is permitted. Each black 3 is worth 5 points.

So I didn't realise I couldn't do it with only 2 black 3s (I had assumed I could meld onto the red three that was already there) and then was wondering why it wasn't working 😅

>Bicycle rules page describes:
>- A set of three or four black threes (without wild cards) may be melded only when a player goes out.
>
>This does not include when you leave a single card in hand, because you didn't go out at that point.

I have checked every set of rules I can find online and offline and I can't find anywhere where this is explicitly stated.

Furthermore the bicycle rules say:

A player goes out when they get rid of the last card in their hand by discarding or melding it, provided that their side has melded at least one canasta or they complete a canasta while going out.

So the process of going out allows for discarding or just melding. I see "going out" as: You meld to your hearts content. You meld Black threes if you have 3 or 4. You either have used your last card or you discard it.

The official Waddington rules which I guess have been used in the UK since 1950's (I can't yet find some of the 1951 USA rules.) include rules for what happens on mistakes and misplays etc. They therefore have been considered and are fairly thought out. I have only got poor scans of them so I haven't added them to boardgamegeek yet.

The first rule in the Going out section is "A player *goes out* (Italics) when he (legally) gets rid of the last card of his hand , either by discard or meld.

This therefore seems the priority rule.

Curiously Black Threes only seem to get a mention on rule 18:

18. A meld is valid if it contains at least two *natural* (Not wild) cards of the same rank, and not more than three wild cards. But black treys may not be melded unless the player *goes out* in the same turn. Jokers and deuces may never be melded separately from natural cards.

So by my reading of that you could play 2 black threes and joker and go out. I wasn't aware of that if it is the case. But equally I thought you could never have more wild cards than natural card in a meld and from that it appears you can.

Does the current BGA implementation meet the spirit of the rules? In my view it doesn't. Here is why:

For going out concealed (extra) 100 are awarded.

To go out concealed you will have very few melds. In a 5000 point game 100 points in not that significant therefore it would seem wrong (or being extremely limiting) to stop people going out conceals without one discard.

If you are playing the two card draw variant (Waddington rules never allowed that but I assume some do somewhere) you are always going to gain a card each go. Therefore until you have a lot of different melds you just have to be lucky and not skilful to go out with black threes in your hand.

In short making melding black threes the absolute final move of going out makes the game more about luck than skill, lengthens the game play and increases the chances of the deck being exhausted rather than players ending a round. To me that is not Canasta and while it makes little difference to Robarkson I think it makes a lot of difference and therefore this is a bug or should at least be an option for people that play Canasta for real.

It is fantastic that Canasta has been added to BGA because it is my main gaming site and with all my other games inspired by BGA I don't often get chance to play it for real. I therefore appreciate having online opponents and being able to play games at my pace.

Thank you for you time and efforts once again. I am aware Canasta was South American and then some formal rules were developed by something called the Regency Club. I assume the UK rules came from a committee (5 people are listed as the Canasta Rules Analysis Committee) looking at those rules but I haven't managed to find them yet. I am sad enough I would enjoy reading them :-) Especially as the UK rules people decided ACABA was a good rule that needed added.