By Dan Fletcher
Do you like Golf Solitaire or Corona Solitaire?
If so, then you may like to check out Wave Solitaire, which combines elements of both games. The aim of wave solitaire is to build 4 ascending suit sequences to the foundation stacks.
The game starts with 10 manoeuvre stacks, 4 foundation stacks, a talon, and a discard pile.
The cards in the manoeuvre zone are dealt out in a wave pattern, with 2 cards in the first stack, 5 in the next, then 2 again, etc. So the stacks are arranged like this:
2 5 2 5 2
5 2 5 2 5
Cards are moved to the manoeuvre zone as long as they are the same suit, and one less in rank(eg a 9 of diamonds can move onto a 10 of diamonds). This is similar to the rule used in corona solitaire. A card can be moved from the talon to the discard pile at any time. All cards in the discard pile are visible, but only the top card can be played.
Cards can be moved to the discard pile regardless of suit, as long as they are 1 less or 1 more than the current card. This is similar to the rule used in golf solitaire. When a manoeuvre column is empty, a card should be automatically moved from the discard pile. If the discard pile is empty, then a card is moved straight from the stock to fill the empty column.
The most important thing in regards to winning wave solitaire, is to look for any inversions. For example, suppose when the game is initially dealt, that one of the stacks looks like this:
- 5 of Diamonds
- 6 of Diamonds
This is an inversion. The 5 is needed to remove the 6, but the 5 can't be reached because the 6 is in the way. The game cannot be finished without moving the 6 first. To do this, the 6 must be moved to the discard pile at some time when a 5 or an 7 is on top. If you take notice of all inversions like this at the start of the game, and then work your way through them as you play, then you should have no problem winning wave solitaire.
Dan Fletcher is a developer at dogMelon. They make a pack of solitaire for mac games, includes many fun solitaire games, including Wave Solitaire and Spider Solitaire. [source]
