Pairs that add up

The two pair tables

In Volcano Eleven the target is 11: Ace and Re, 2 and Cavallo, 3 and Fante, 4 and 7, 5 and 6. No card goes alone.

In Pyramid Thirteen the target is 13: Ace and Queen, 2 and Jack, 3 and 10, 4 and 9, 5 and 8, 6 and 7. The King counts 13 and leaves alone.

Learn the table of the game you play until you no longer add up in your head. After a few deals your eye will jump from a 4 straight to the 7s.

Read the pyramid as a map

Each card rests on two cards of the row below and is free only when both are gone. So every pair you remove is also a question: which cards does it uncover?

Prefer pairs that free cards in the row above, and among those, pairs that free cards you already have a partner for. A pair taken from the edge of the bottom row may free nothing at all.

Locked pairs

Sometimes a card lies directly or further up the slope on top of its own partner: a 3 resting above the Fante it needs. Those two cards can never be removed together, because the lower one is free only after the upper one is gone.

Count the locked pairs before you start. Each locked card needs a partner from somewhere else – another card of the pyramid or the stock. Deals with many locked pairs need the stock passes more than others.

Count partners, not cards

Each value has four partners in the deck. If the pyramid holds three cards of one value and only one of their partners, the other partners are in the stock. You will need to meet them at the top of the waste at the right time.

This also tells you what to keep. A free card whose partners are all still hidden in the stock is not urgent; a free card whose last partner is about to leave the waste is.

Three passes, three jobs

Both games give you three passes through the stock. A useful rhythm: on the first pass, take every obvious pair and watch the order of the stock. On the second, wait for the specific partners you noted. Keep the third for the cards around the summit.

Turning the stock is not a move you regret – it is the order of the cards that matters. If you turn past a needed partner, you will see it again on the next pass, as long as passes are left.

Save a partner for the summit

The top card is the last one to become free. If all of its partners have been used by then, the deal cannot be finished. Before you spend the last partner of the summit's value, ask whether another one is still in the stock.

In Pyramid Thirteen a King at the top is the easy case: it leaves alone. In Volcano Eleven there is no such card, so the summit always needs a partner.

When you are stuck

Undo is unlimited and survives a reload. Go back to the start of the current pass and try another order. The hint button uses the solver in these small games, so when a win is still possible within its search, it shows you a move that leads there.