Seahaven towers solitaire card games - Rules and Strategy

Seahaven towers is very similar to FreeCell, except that cards are built down in suit, and only a king or a sequence starting with a king may be placed on empty tableau spots. There are ten columns, instead of eight. In the initial deal five cards are dealt to each column, leaving two cards in hand.

Layout

Shuffle the deck and lay out fifty cards in ten tableau piles, face up and fanned down, so that there are five cards in each tableau. Above the tableaus, on the left, are four piles called the towers, and to their right are the four foundations. The two remaining cards are placed face-up in two of the towers; the remaining towers and the foundations begin the game empty.

Play

Tableaus build down in suit. Top cards of tableaus are available for play on other tableaus, on foundations, or on towers. Only Kings may be played to an empty tableau. An empty tower can hold any card, but each can hold only one card at a time; and of course such cards can be removed only by correctly playing them back onto tableaus or foundations.

Goal

The goal is to move all cards to the foundations.

Tips

As in all games of this type, empty piles are tremendously important. You have four towers to start with, but two are already filled at the start of the game. It’s best to fill a tower only when you already know how to get that card out of the tower again. Of course you won’t always be able to do that, and sometimes you’ll have to leave a card in a tower “until further notice.” When you have to do that, it’s a good time to take a snapshot of your position in case you never find a way to remove the card again.

A good player should be able to win 50% or more of all games, at least if you are willing to make patient use of snapshots. We recommend that this game be treated as a puzzle: feel free to back up and try a different approach whenever you get stuck.

As a shortcut Solitaire Till Dawn will let you move full or partial builds provided you have enough empty towers available to have accomplished the same move one card at a time.