Midshipman is the deeper, narrower cousin of Indian Patience. Two decks are dealt into nine columns of four, and the bottom two cards of every column are dealt face down, so eighteen cards are unknown when play begins. The building rule is the one that gives the pair their character: a card may go on a column whose top is one rank higher and of any suit except its own. One card moves at a time, an empty column takes any card, and the 68-card stock is turned once with no redeal. Free in your browser, no sign-up.
Goal: build all eight foundations from Ace to King by suit, using both decks.
Eighteen hidden cards and a long stock make this a game of information. Reveal early, and reveal cheaply.
Midshipman is a Thomas Warfield design from Pretty Good Solitaire, built on the same any-suit-but-own rule as Indian Patience, which in turn descends from Napoleon's Folly. The PySol collection expresses the relationship directly: Midshipman is Indian with a deal of two hidden rows and two open ones across nine columns, where Indian deals ten columns of three with one row hidden. The two games make a matched pair for feeling what hidden cards are worth: Indian hides ten, Midshipman eighteen, and the narrower board leaves fewer exposed tops to work with.
The naval name follows Warfield's habit of grouping variants by theme; the rules themselves are the Forty Thieves engine with the suit restriction inverted, so that a card is welcome anywhere except among its own kind.
For the same building rule with fewer hidden cards, play Indian Patience; for the family's strict suit-building original, play Forty Thieves.
Both build down by any suit except the same suit and move one card at a time. Indian Patience deals ten columns of three with the bottom card hidden; Midshipman deals nine columns of four with the bottom two hidden, so eighteen cards are unknown instead of ten and the board is one column narrower.
A card may be placed on a column whose top card is one rank higher and of a different suit. The 7 of hearts can go on the 8 of spades, the 8 of clubs or the 8 of diamonds, but not on the 8 of hearts. Colour does not matter, only that the suits differ.
As soon as the card covering one is moved away. A face-down card that becomes the top of its column is turned face up and can then be played.
No. Only the top card of a column moves, one card per move.
No. The 68-card stock is turned one card at a time and only once, so it pays to uncover the hidden cards and open the foundations before you go through it.
It is rated a balanced game by PySol. The hidden cards add luck that the open Forty Thieves games do not have, but the generous building rule gives every card three possible hosts. The game detects a genuine dead end and tells you when no legal move remains.