How to play Kaali Ni Teeri
4-10 Players · Bid, Collect, Hide Your Partner
Goal
A points game, not a tricks game. There are 250 points in the pack and you bid how many of them your side will collect. Win the auction and you name the trump suit — and you name a card, whose holder is on your side and does not say so.
The pack
| Card | Worth | In the pack |
|---|---|---|
| Ace, King, Queen, Jack, 10 | 10 each | 200 |
| Every 5 | 5 each | 20 |
| 3♠ — the kaali teeri | 30 | 30 |
| Everything else | nothing | — |
4 to 10 players. Up to six play with one pack — 250 points. Seven and above use two packs, so 500 points and two kaali teeris. The only cards ever taken out are 2s, and only as many as it takes to deal everyone the same number of cards. A 2 is worth nothing, so the total never moves.
The bid
Bidding opens at 150 and climbs in tens. Pass and you are out of the auction for that hand. The last bidder standing buys the contract.
The bid is a floor, not a ceiling — you are promising your side will take at least that many. So there is a real reason to bid high on a hand you cannot make: to push the player after you up to a number they will choke on. The catch is the one every table learns the hard way — sometimes nobody outbids you.
Trump & the called card
The bidder names the trump suit and names a card — at six players and up, two cards; at ten, three. Whoever is holding a named card is on the bidder's side, and says nothing.
You find out who your partner is at the moment that card is played, and not before. Until then everybody is guessing, including the partner, who does not know the other players are not also partners.
Two things follow from that, and both are legal. The bidder may name a card from their own hand — so the partner the table is waiting for may never have existed. And a bid of the whole pack calls no card at all: that is playing alone, one against everyone, and the table knows it from the bidding.
Scoring
Play is ordinary trick play: follow the led suit if you can, otherwise throw anything. Ranking is normal — A K Q J 10 9 8… — and trump only beats a card of a different suit. The kaali teeri is a 3: it wins nothing on its own, which is exactly why thirty points ride on who ends up taking it.
When the last card is played, add up the points your side collected.
Bid made — the bidder scores twice the bid, each partner scores the bid, and the opposition scores nothing.
Bid missed — the bidder scores minus the bid, each partner scores nothing, and every opponent scores the bid. Missing a big bid at a big table is the most expensive thing in the game.
Play Kaali Ni Teeri free →Free, no gambling, no real money. Play solo against bots or with your family group.