Card rules · 2026-10-29
Cards in a Preview Are Different From a Locked Public Meld
In a card exercise with public melding, submitting a group can change which edits remain permitted.
In a card exercise with public melding, submitting a group can change which edits remain permitted.
Where the boundary lies
Before submission, a player may be arranging a proposed group inside the hand. After an accepted public meld, the same cards may have a different status. If the teaching rules lock published melds, they cannot be pulled back merely because the player has found a more attractive arrangement.
Take a natural group 4♥, 5♥, 6♥. While it is only a local preview, moving 6♥ elsewhere changes a proposal. After the group has been formally placed and locked, removing 6♥ would attempt to alter an accepted table state. The card faces are identical; the permission is not.
Avoid mixing variants
Some rule systems allow defined extensions or rearrangements of exposed groups. Others do not use public melding at all. A permitted extension should not be expanded into unlimited permission to dismantle a group.
Visibility does not tell us whether the group is locked. The same face-up cards can be an editable preview or an accepted meld. The acceptance event changes their editing rights in this exercise.
Adding a card and removing one are different permissions
A clause allowing 7♥ to extend a locked 4♥, 5♥, 6♥ sequence permits the larger sequence. It does not necessarily permit taking 4♥ back into the hand. Test each proposed movement against the clause's direction: adding to the table and withdrawing from it are opposite operations, even when both are described casually as editing a group.