How Sweep is scored.
Sweep is the only one of the five games here that asks for math, and it’s where everyone gets stuck. Scoring has four rules and none of them is complicated, but you need to know all four.
Guide·updated ·4 min read
The four rules at a glance
Every ace, king, queen, jack and 10 among the cards you’ve taken is worth one point.
Two cards are the exception and are worth two points each: the 10♦ and the 2♣, the “little cows”.
Every sweep, the capture that clears the table completely, brings one extra point.
The cards left on the table at the end of the match go to the last player who took something.
What does NOT bring points
The number of cards. You can finish the match with half the deck in front of you and lose, if that half had no face cards.
This is what most often surprises someone coming from other games: in Sweep you don’t collect cards, you collect POINTS. A capture of five small cards is worth exactly zero.
The suit doesn’t matter either, with the sole exception of the two little cows.
How many points are in the whole deck
Let’s count: four aces, four kings, four queens, four jacks and four tens make twenty cards worth one point each.
Of those, the 10♦ is worth two instead of one, so it adds one more point. And the 2♣, which would otherwise be worth nothing, brings two.
Total: 23 points from the cards, plus one for each sweep made during the match.
So a match is usually played for 23–26 points. Most are decided by two or three points, and a single sweep can change the result.
Capture values are DIFFERENT
Here’s the confusion that trips everyone up, and it’s worth saying loud and clear: cards have two different numbers, one for capturing and one for scoring.
For CAPTURE, that is, for working out what you pick up from the table, the values are: numbered cards as printed, ace 11, jack 12, queen 13, king 14.
For SCORING, at the end, each of them is worth one point, whatever its capture number.
So a king is a 14 when you work out what you pick up, and a 1-point card when you count at the end.
Capture examples
On the table: 10♠, 4♥, 9♦, 3♣. You’re holding a king.
The king is worth 14. You can pick up 10♠ + 4♥, because 10 + 4 = 14. Could you also pick up 9♦ + 3♣ + ...? No, 9 + 3 = 12, which isn’t enough. So you have a single option.
If you hold a 9, you can pick up the 9♦ directly, a card of the same value, or nothing else, because no combination on the table makes 9.
If you hold a 7: 4♥ + 3♣ = 7. That works.
You take a SINGLE combination per move, even if two would fit. The table shows you all the possible options and you choose one.
The sweep, with an example
There’s a single 6♥ left on the table. You’re holding a 6♣.
You play it, pick up the 6♥, and the table is completely empty. That’s a sweep: one extra point, on top of the two cards taken, which, being sixes, aren’t worth anything themselves.
That’s why a sweep is worth setting up. If you could have put a card on the table the turn before and didn’t, you left the table thin precisely so you could clear it.
And the reverse: if you see your opponent can make a sweep, put something on the table to thicken it, even if that means you capture nothing yourself.
The last cards on the table
When the cards in the hands and the deck run out, what’s left on the table isn’t thrown away: it goes to the last player who captured something.
In a close match that can be worth three or four points, so it’s far from a detail. A capture made at the right moment near the end is worth more than it looks at the time.
Don’t take just because you can
The last piece of advice, and the hardest to follow: sometimes the best move is to capture nothing.
A small capture can leave exactly the card your opponent needs on the table, or thin the table to a point where they can make a sweep. So you play a card that combines with nothing, and you wait.
That’s the difference between playing Sweep and doing arithmetic. The math tells you what you CAN take; the game is deciding what’s worth taking.