Well, before you think 'what's the big deal in solitaire', I would urge you to try playing it once. Spider solitaire-> difficult-> 4 suites. Chances are that you probably would not be able to complete even one suit. It is a tough game and can be painstakingly slow. Few people will actually believe that I got addicted to this game.. A stupid game but fascinatingly overpowering. First I just wanted to win, which I somehow managed to if I played more than 20 games (a success rate of 5%), then I wanted to strive for consistency. Can I win every game? I must admit I have not been able to, but what I have achieved is a success rate of close to 50% (large sample size of course), that is a win every alternate game! A result developed over months and probably more than the number of ODIs Sachin has played. It all might look really very silly, but (Ripley's) believe it or not, I am actually quite serious! Am I the only seemingly jobless guy to even attempt this? Surely not, there must be quite a few souls out there who would have said 'the grapes must be sour' and walked away. This blog is sincerely dedicated to those souls :P
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Ok, what do you need to win in this game? Patience, time and iteration. And mind you it is a product of all three, so if you do not follow even one, you must depend on Lady luck. There are three diffrent levels Easy (single suit), medium level (two suits) and hard (four suits). Single suit you must be able to win hands down. I have finished it with a little over 100 moves or perhaps even lesser. The medium level (two suits) can be difficult at times but it is easy enough you can finish all games. Depending on other factors I can finish in about 150 moves or so. But I never got addicted to these two levels. The difficult is the hard nut to crack and following are some tricks of the trade.
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Terminologies
Stack - Any series of cards stacked one over another at least respecting the card order
Correct stack - A stack with cards of the same suit
Pack - the cards that are in the upper most row with face down. I believe there will be 10 packs.
Deal - The cards that are in the bottom right corner.
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Basic rules of the game
It is like any other solitaire game. You must form the combination KQJ1098765432A of 4 suits*2, that is 8 series in all. (Yes, there are two packs of cards out there). But when you stack cards, other than respecting the order there is no other restriction. That is you can stack a 2 spade over a 3 heart (or club or spade or diamond). As long as you respect the order KQJ1098765432A you can stack any suit over another. This was probably the first attraction to me towards this game. Other rules we can learn as play (There are no other big rules I believe).
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Step #1- Start simple. A game well begun is half done, but even if you begin well, there is no guarantee that you will able to finish this game. But beginning well is the easiest and the most basic step that we can take so that we find at least the initial part easy. What is beginning well? When you start the game, you will see a display of cards. Try to see if you can stack some of those correctly (at least 2 immediately) that is stacking with the same suit. Even though you can stack a 2 hearts over a 3 spade, stacking a 2 heart over a 3 heart will enable you to move the 3 and 2 together. That is, if a particular stack is correctly stacked (all of the same suit) you can lift them as one. So, when you start the game, at the first look, see if you can stack at least two cards correctly (same suit). If not press F2 to have a new game. Keep doing this till you can begin easily.
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Step #2 - Iterate. Once you begin well, chances are that you might have more than one move available to perform. Feel free to choose any move, but remember this point. Once you have taken a move and got stuck, press ctrl-Z (undo) and come back to the point where you have more than one feasible move. Now, try the other moves. See if it is any better. If yes, good. If not, bad luck. Go back to the original move (yes, you can press ctrl-z any number of times, at a small penalty. But, at this point let us concentrate on winning the game, efficiency can be dealt with once you have experience).
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Step #3 - Always have an eye on correct stacking (as it enables you to lift all of the stack together in one clean pick). For example let us say you had a stack of 4 and 3 diamond on one pack, a 3 club on another pack and a 2 spade on another pack. Now, you have two options. You can either put the 2 spade over the 3 club or the 3 diamond. Suppose you choose to put it over the 3 diamond and let us say a 5 diamond gets revealed. Now, the stack of 4 and 3 diamond could be put over the 5 diamond to create a bigger correct stack. But the 2 spade over the 3 diamond will prevent you from doing this. So iterate by putting the 2 spade over the 3 club and free the stack of 4 and 3 diamond. Now you have made a bigger correct stack.
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Step #4 - Try to reveal as much as possible (to get empty slots). Once you clear all the cards in a pack, you get an empty slot and this will be very handy. In the above example instead of a 5 diamond, lets say a 5 of hearts turned up. You still go ahead and do the above steps, because if you stack the 4 and 3 diamond over the 5 of hearts (even though incorrect) it will enable you to reveal one more card that is beneath the 4 and 3 diamond, thus getting you closer to an empty slot.
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Step #5 Respect the order. Say if you have two options, you can put a 10 of hearts over a Jack of spades or a 9 of clubs over the 10 of hearts. First, understand that both are incorrect stackings but you don't have a choice. Now putting first the 9 of clubs over the 10 of hearts will 'lock' the stack 10 and 9 as you cannot lift them together to put them over the Jack (they are of different suits). But of you first put the 10 of hearts over the Jack and then the 9 over 10, you have revealed two cards (one beneath the 10 of hearts and the other beneath the 9 club). But since you have incorrectly stacked, always keep an eye on a possibility of step 3. You should mostly prefer correct stacking to incorrect one (exception is talked about below), since a correct stacking enables you to lift togther.
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Step #6 - This is a follow-up of Step #2, Iteration. If you have two feasible moves, one that will result in correct stacking and the other with an incorrect stacking, try both and stick with the one that revealed many cards or was more useful. That is, not always do we go for correct stacking. It varies from situation to situation.
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Step #7 - Managing the empty slots.
Now you have an empty slot. How to best use it? Empty slot in Spider Solitaire is a definite achievement. Use the empty slot to rearrange cards into correct stackings. You will be amazed at how much one empty slot can help you achieve. For eg you have one stack of K hearts, Q and J of club, and another stack of K club, Q and J of hearts and an empty slot. Use the empty slot to correct these two stacks. That is, keep the Q and J of hearts in the empty slot and stack the K,Q and J of hearts together. Then stack the K,Q and J of clubs. It is crucial to get back the empty slot after this rearrangement like how we got it back in the above step. Now use the empty slot for further rearrangement.
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Swapping empty slots
You can forego an empty slot if you can get another by rearrangment (although two empty slots will be awesome. I have rarely lost after I get two empty slots). For eg K, Q, J of hearts stacked over a 10. Now, using the empty slot you can make it KQJ10. There are many more such possibilities. So be open and look out for them.
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Before you click deal for a new set of cards, make sure you don't clog the empty slot. Either keep just one card (after all your iterations) or keep a correct stack. This way you can again have an empty slot reasonably quickly. Of course, if you happen to a get a King in the deal in the empty slot then sorry mate, it is blocked!
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Step #8 - Before you click deal, press 'm' or 'h'. It is an hint for any available moves and you might have overlooked any move. It might appear as cheating and some may avoid doing this. I do it so that it saves my time. But, be careful though, the hints or the moves the computer shows are not the best ones. You should try to follow the above steps as and when possible.
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Major tips
#1 Try to create empty slots (that is clearing all the cards in one of the stack). More the empty slots the merrier. Empty slots can be used to iterate as you can keep cards in the slot, rearrange and then remove it again. Thus, empty slots can be a temporary place to keep the card to perform many of the above steps. So if you have an option of removing a card from a bigger stack and removing a card from a smaller stack, other things being the same, opt for removing from the smaller stack (you are closer to getting an empty slot)
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#2 Avoid keeping an Ace or a King in the empty slot. Because a King can lock the empty slot until you finish the series and an Ace also sort of locks the slot as you will not able to stack anything over an Ace.
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#3 Feel free to undo (Ctrl+Z) as there might be several steps possible at a given point of time and nobody is sure what is right. So you can try one combination and if it does not go well, press ctrl+z all the way down and try the other combination. In Windows xp you cannot undo the step where you completed one series and you cannot undo once you opened a new deal. But in windows 7 you can undo just anything. Some might think this is cheating. But if it is allowed, why not do it? Besides, I don't think, this game is designed for winning every time. It is still a random deal and hence you might be still unlucky and end up losing.
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And after typing all this, I just happened to google for 'winning spider solitaire' and actually found quite a few useful links myself :P .. So the biggest tip is to google perhaps!! And yes, why do you need patience? Because, on an average before I finish this game, it takes about 300 steps and some times even close to 500 steps. That many iterations may be needed. So if you lose the game with less than 100 moves, sorry you need to iterate a lot more than that!! Good luck!!
