Card rules · 2026-11-02

A Score Target May Require an Exact Finish

Reaching a target and finishing exactly on it are different scoring conditions. An exact-finish exercise also needs to explain what happens when a score would go beyond the target.

Reaching a target and finishing exactly on it are different scoring conditions. An exact-finish exercise also needs to explain what happens when a score would go beyond the target.

Use a non-cash card exercise with a target of twenty. Its rule says that an overshooting award is not added; the player's score stays unchanged. A player on eighteen receives an award of three. The proposed total is twenty-one, so the score remains eighteen under that rule. A later award of two would reach twenty exactly.

Do not silently cap twenty-one at twenty. A cap would make the first award finish the exercise, whereas the stated rule rejects that addition. Likewise, subtracting the excess or restarting at zero would introduce different procedures.

Write the current score, the proposed addition and the accepted result separately. This makes an unchanged score understandable: a card event occurred, but its award was not added because it failed the exact-finish condition. The next card event starts from the accepted score, not the rejected proposed total.