Little Forty keeps the Forty Thieves board, two decks dealt into ten columns of four, and then relaxes almost every rule that makes the classic game hard. Columns build down by rank regardless of suit, so any 9 fits any 10. Packed runs move as a unit. The stock turns three cards at a time and can be gone through four times in all, with three redeals. Thomas Warfield designed it for Pretty Good Solitaire as the gentle end of the family, and it plays that way. Free in your browser, no sign-up.
Goal: build all eight foundations from Ace to King by suit, using both decks.
The mercies are real, but three cards a turn means a third of the stock is hidden behind the card on top. That is the whole difficulty.
Little Forty is a Thomas Warfield design from Pretty Good Solitaire, and the Solitaire Central rulebook describes it exactly: the same as Forty Thieves except that sequences may be moved, columns build down regardless of suit, the stock deals three at a time, and there are three redeals. It is the family's only rank-building run-mover, which places it at the opposite pole from the original: every rule change gives the player more room.
Rule sources differ on two details, and this version follows the Goodsol original. PySol's port lets only a same-suit run move and fills an empty column from the waste by force; the Pretty Good Solitaire text and BVS both let any rank-packed run move and let any card take a space. One play site gives the game two redeals; the rulebook, BVS and PySol all say three.
For the same board with the strict rules, play Forty Thieves; for rank building without the moving runs, play Diplomat.
Four ways, all of them mercies. Columns build down by rank regardless of suit instead of by suit; packed runs move as a unit instead of one card at a time; the stock deals three cards a turn instead of one; and there are three redeals where Forty Thieves has none. The deal, the two decks and the eight foundations are the same.
Yes. Any sequence in descending order moves as a unit, regardless of suit or colour, because the build rule itself ignores suit. This is the Pretty Good Solitaire rule; PySol's port only lets same-suit runs move.
Each click on the stock turns three cards onto the waste, and only the top one can be played. Playing it exposes the one beneath. When the stock is empty the waste is turned over, in order, to form a new stock, so the groups of three repeat unless you have played cards out of them.
Three, giving four passes through the stock in all. After the fourth pass the stock is done.
Any single card or any packed run. Empty columns are free working space here; there is no rule forcing you to fill them from the waste.
Far more often than Forty Thieves: runs move, suits do not matter and there are three redeals. Pretty Good Solitaire rates it a balanced game. The game still detects a genuine dead end after the last redeal and tells you when no legal move remains.