How to play Dhumbal
Dhumbal, also called Jhyap, is the Nepali least-count game. Draw one card, throw one or more away, and keep the total in your hand coming down. When you believe nobody else is as light as you are, you call, everybody shows, and the smallest number takes the round.
- Players
- 2 to 6
- What you need
- One pack of 52 cards
- How long
- Three rounds, a few minutes each
What the game is
Dhumbal is a least-count game, so points are bad. Every card you are holding is worth something. An ace is 1, a king is 10, and everything you do for the rest of the round is aimed at bringing that total down.
On your turn you take one card and throw at least one away. A throw can be several cards at once, so your hand shrinks as the round goes on. Five cards can be down to two, and nothing fills them back up.
There is no going out by emptying your hand and no prize for reaching zero. Nearly every round ends because somebody calls, which is a claim that no other hand at the table is as light as theirs. Being right takes the round. Being wrong costs a good deal more than the round is worth.
The deal
- Shuffle one pack of 52 cards. Two printed jokers join it only if the table has turned jokers on.
- Deal five cards to each player, one at a time, starting with the seat on the dealer's left.
- Turn the next card face up beside the pack. That single card is the pile, and whether it is lighter than a blind draw is the first decision of the round.
- What is left of the pack is the stock, face down. Four players at five cards each leaves 31 cards in it.
- The seat on the dealer's left plays first.
The deal moves one seat to the left every round. Against the bots here the first deal comes from the last seat, which is arranged so that you lead the opening round of the match.
What the cards are worth
An ace is worth 1. Every card from 2 to 10 is worth its own number. A jack, a queen and a king are worth 10 each, which is how most tables in Kathmandu play it. A printed joker is worth 0 at the tables that play with them.
Your hand total is those numbers added up, and that is all it is. An ace, a two and a king come to 13. No card beats any other card here. There are no trumps and no tricks, and the only number in the game is the one you are holding.
One house rule moves this. Set the court cards to eleven, twelve and thirteen and a king turns into the worst card you can be caught with. The ace is 1 either way, which is why it is the best card in the game.
A turn
- Before you touch anything, you may call, but only if your hand already adds up to the table limit or less. Calling ends the round there and then.
- If you are not calling, take exactly one card. Either the top of the face-down stock, which nobody has seen, or the top card of the face-up pile, which everybody has.
- Throw at least one card onto the pile. There is no passing and no keeping the extra card. Throwing ends your turn.
The call comes before the draw and nowhere else. Once you have drawn you owe the pile a card, so you throw and the turn passes even if what you threw has left you well under the limit. The call waits for your next turn, and by then somebody else may have made it.
Taking from the pile is public. The whole table watches which card you lifted, and the bots write it down. Drawing blind from the stock tells nobody anything. That is half of what you are choosing between.
If the stock runs out, everything under the pile's top card is shuffled into a new stock, and the top card stays where it is to carry on from. That happens often in this game, so a round can circle for a while.
At the table on this site a tap marks a card rather than throwing it, because a throw may be several cards. Tap again to unmark. The Throw button carries what the marked cards are worth, and the line above your hand says the same number. With nothing marked, dragging a card onto the pile throws that card on its own. Sort hand puts your cards in order, lightest first and jokers last.
What you may throw together
One card is always allowed. So is any two or more cards of the same rank. A set is the only way a heavy hand gets light in a hurry, and it is why a player hangs on to a pair of kings they would otherwise have thrown two turns ago.
Part of a set counts as well. Holding three sevens, you may throw only two of them. That is nearly always the wrong move, but the rules allow it.
Runs are off unless the table turns them on. When they are on, three or more cards of consecutive rank in one suit go together, and consecutive means the order of the pack: ace, two, three, on up to king. Point order has nothing to do with it.
Jokers are off here too, unless the table adds them. A joker is worth nothing and stands in for a rank inside a set, beside at least one real card. It can never fill a gap in a run. Two jokers may be thrown together as a pair of nothings.
The card you have just taken off the pile cannot go straight back this turn. Hiding it inside a pair or a run does not get round that, because the whole group is barred along with it. A card drawn from the stock carries no such restriction.
A group lands on the pile in order, so the last card of it becomes the new top. Throw three sevens and the next player can take exactly one of them, and only the last one.
Calling
Calling is a bet on everybody else's hand. It says that nobody at the table is as light as you are. You may only make it before you draw, and only with a hand at or below the table limit, which is 5 as standard. The button appears reading Call on 4, so you can see exactly what you are claiming before you press it.
Every hand goes face up at once and the totals are compared. If all of them are strictly heavier than yours, the call was right, you take the round and you are charged nothing.
If anybody matches you or beats you, you are caught. You are charged the penalty instead of your hand, 25 as standard, and the round goes to whoever really did hold the lightest hand. Equal is enough to catch you, which is why calling on exactly 5 at a table whose limit is 5 is the classic beginner's mistake.
A round can be over before a single card has been drawn. A hand dealt at or under the limit may call as the very first action of the round, and sometimes it should.
How a round ends
There are three endings and no others. Somebody called and was lightest. Somebody called and was caught. Or nobody called at all and the round ran out of turns.
That last one is a real ending, not a formality. The limit is 200 throws in one deal, counted across the whole table rather than per player, and it starts again at zero with every deal. Careful players really can circle that long, because the pile keeps going back under as a fresh stock. When the limit fires, every hand is shown as it stands, the lightest one takes the round, and nobody is penalised.
If two seats that did not call are tied for lightest, the tie is walked round the table from the dealer's left, where the deal started. It is not a shared result. The seat that takes the tie is charged nothing, and the seat that lost it is charged its hand in full.
A match is three rounds as standard. Between rounds the score dialog waits for Next round, so nothing moves on until you have finished reading it.
Keeping score
At the show, every seat is charged the cards left in its hand. The seat that took the round is charged nothing. A caller who was caught is charged the penalty in place of their hand, so their real total still appears in the Hand row while the Took row shows 25 instead.
Those points are then settled. The winner collects everything the others were charged, and everybody else pays what they were charged. That is the Paid row, and it always adds up to nothing.
Four seats holding 4, 12, 19 and 7, with nobody caught: the Took row reads 0, 12, 19 and 7, and the Paid row reads +38, -12, -19 and -7.
Two seats both holding 4, and the one who called is caught: the Hand row still reads 4 and 4, the Took row reads 25 and 0, and the Paid row reads -25 and +25. The penalty is what the catcher collects. That is what makes catching a caller worth the wait.
The running Total is the match score, and it is the right way up. Higher is better, a positive score is printed with a plus sign in front of it, and the whole table always sums to nothing. The match goes to the highest Total, not to whoever won the most rounds.
Things worth knowing
- Count your hand every turn. The line under the status reads Holding, and next to it is the limit the Call button is waiting for.
- Watch how many cards people are holding. The count under each seat is public, and somebody down to two cards is the clearest warning you will get that a call is coming.
- Keep a pair. Two kings are twenty points that can leave in one throw, which a single king can never do. That is worth more than it looks the moment your hand is heavy.
- Call one under the limit rather than on it, because a tie catches you. The medium bots wait until they are 1 under, and the hard ones wait until they are 2 under.
- If a throw empties your hand, call on your next turn. Nothing is lighter than nothing, so there is no reason at all to draw another card.
- Taking off the pile hands the table a fact about your hand. If the blind card from the stock is only a point or two worse, take the blind one.
The settings
Every table plays it a little differently, so the game's own page lets you set yours up before you start. These are the ones that change the game rather than the speed of it.
| Setting | Standard | What it changes |
|---|---|---|
| Players | 4 | Seats at the table. With fewer hands that could be lighter than yours, a call gets a good deal safer. |
| Cards | 5 cards | Deal seven instead and the opening hand is heavy, so the first call of the round comes much later. |
| Rounds | 3 | Deals in the match. The settlement runs across all of them without resetting. |
| Call at or below | 5 | The total you have to be at or under before a call is legal at all. At 3 calls are rare and nearly safe. At 10 they come early and get caught often. |
| A wrong call costs | 25 | What a caught caller is charged in place of their hand, and what the seat that catches them collects. |
| Court cards | Ten each | What a jack, queen and king are worth. The harsher setting makes them eleven, twelve and thirteen, and a king becomes a card you simply have to get rid of. |
| Runs | Only same-rank groups | Turn it on and three or more consecutive cards of one suit may go as one group. Nothing on the table mentions runs even then, so you have to remember you turned it on. |
| Jokers | Off | Adds two printed jokers, making 54 cards. Each is worth nothing and is wild inside a set, never inside a run. |
| Difficulty | Medium | How much the bots remember, how carefully they throw, and how far under the limit they insist on being before they call. An easy bot calls on the limit itself and collects the penalty for it. |
The words
- Dhumbal (धुम्बल)
- The game. A least-count game, so the smallest hand is the one that wins.
- Jhyap (झ्याप)
- The other name it goes by. Same game, same rules.
- Call (कल)
- To say that nobody is lighter than you, which turns every hand at the table face up. Only before you draw.
- Caught
- What happens to a caller who is matched or beaten. Equal is enough, and the penalty follows.
- Light and heavy (हलुका, भारी)
- A hand worth few points is light and one worth many is heavy. Light is the one you want.
- Thupro (थुप्रो)
- The face-down stock, drawn blind.
- Phaleko patti (फालेको पत्ती)
- The face-up pile. Only its top card can be taken.
- Throw (फाल्नु)
- To put cards on the pile. Throw rather than discard, because here it may be several at once.
- Set
- Two or more cards of the same rank, thrown as one group.
- Run (सिक्वेन्स)
- Three or more consecutive ranks in one suit. Off unless the table turns it on.
- Penalty (जरिवाना)
- The flat charge a caught caller takes in place of their hand. 25 as standard.
- Took and Paid
- The two score rows. Took is points, where low is good. Paid is the settlement, where high is good and the row adds up to nothing.
Every rule on this page is the one the app plays by. Change any of them on the game's own page before you start.