Card Games: Commerce Group

Each player has a hand of cards and there are some face-up cards on the table. At your turn you can try to improve your hand by swapping one of your cards for a table card. This continues until someone is satisfied with their hand and brings the game to a close. These games are known in various countries; they include Thirty-one or Schnautz, Commerce, Stop the Bus and Whisky Poker.

• Schwimmen (31) is played with 3-card hands: the aim is to collect cards of one suit, ideally with the highest value 31. The page covers several variants including a 4-card variant named after the highest score 41 and a Russian version Tri Palki. and the British west country game Tupenny Ha'penny Loo.
• Petrangola and Mambassa are Italian relatives of Schwimmen that also feature sets of equal cards and sequences in suit.
• 51 is played in China and Japan with 5-card hands, so that the highest attainable score in a suit is 51.
• Kemps is played with 4-card hands: the aim is to collect four of a kind and signal to your partner that you have done so.
• Bastard Brag is an English game based on 3-card Brag hands.
• Whisky Poker is played with 5-card hands: the aim is to collect a good poker hand.
• James Bond is a two-player game in which each player has several 4-card hands in which they try to collect four of a kind.