Australian Patience
Screen shot of the game Australian Patience from Pretty Good Solitaire.
Australian Patience is a solitaire game that combines elements from the popular games Klondike, also known as the standard Windows solitaire game, and Yukon.
To begin the game, 28 cards are dealt out to the tableau, 4 cards each to 7 piles. All of the cards are face up. The remainder of the cards form a stock, which will be turned over 1 card at a time to a waste pile. The 28 card layout is the same number of cards as Klondike, although the fact that all the piles have the same number of cards is different from Klondike.
There are 4 foundation piles, each pile built up in suit from Ace to King, as in both Klondike and Yukon. The object of the game is to move all of the cards to these piles.
The 7 tableau piles are built down by suit. Empty spaces in the tableau may only be filled by a King or a group of cards headed by a King. Among the 7 tableau piles you can move groups of cards regardless of any sequence. This means that any face up card, no matter how deeply buried, can be moved by picking it and all the cards on top of it up together. This is like Yukon.
When you have no moves, you can turn over the top card of the stock to the waste pile. The top card of the waste pile is available for play on the foundations or on a tableau pile. You can play only once through the stock, there is no redeal.
Australian Patience is harder than Yukon primarily because of the stock and waste piles. Needed cards are often buried in the waste pile and unavailable. A low ranked card that gets buried deep in the waste pile will usually spell doom for the game. To win, you need to get as many cards out of the waste pile as possible. Average players can win Australian Patience only about 20% of the time, while very good players can get their winning percentage up to around 33%.
It's origin is in Australia, hence it's name.
Australian Patience is one of the 725 games in Pretty Good Solitaire and one of the 101 games in Goodsol Solitaire 101.
