How to Play

Egyptian Ratscrew is the fast reflex-based slapping game where players flip cards onto a shared pile and race to slap on doubles, sandwiches, and top-bottom matches; face cards trigger challenges and the first player to win all 52 cards wins.

Egyptian Ratscrew (often abbreviated ERS, and sometimes called Egyptian War) is a fast, loud, physical card-slapping game played with a standard 52-card deck. It is a reflex-based descendant of Beggar-My-Neighbour combined with the slap-pile tradition of Slapjack. Each player holds a face-down stack; on their turn they flip the top card onto a central pile and watch for specific slap-eligible patterns, most importantly doubles (two consecutive same-rank cards) and sandwiches (same rank separated by one middle card). The first player to slap the pile on a valid pattern takes the whole pile. Face cards and Aces trigger a challenge: the next player in turn must produce a face card within a limited number of flips or else the challenger wins the pile. The game continues until one player holds every card, and it is a staple of American dormitories, summer camps, and family game nights.

Players

2 to 6 players; plays best at 3 to 5. Every player plays for themselves. No partnerships. All players must be able to reach the central pile with one hand for a slap to count; larger groups need a wider table. Deal and turn order rotate clockwise.

Card Deck

One standard 52-card deck, no jokers (though jokers can be added as unbeatable wild slaps in house rules). Suits are irrelevant for play. Ranks are relevant only for triggering face-card challenges and matching for slap patterns. Card rank for challenges: Ace = 4 chances, King = 3, Queen = 2, Jack = 1 (see Gameplay). Number cards (2 through 10) trigger no challenges and only matter for slap patterns.

Objective

Win all 52 cards. Once a single player holds the entire deck, the game ends immediately and that player wins. Most games last 10 to 30 minutes depending on slap accuracy.

Setup and Deal

1. Shuffle the 52-card deck thoroughly.
2. Deal the entire deck face down, one card at a time clockwise, until every player has a roughly equal stack. If the deck does not divide evenly, some players receive one extra card.
3. Each player squares their stack face down in front of them. No peeking: players must not look at their own cards.
4. Clear a central area of the table for the central pile; all flipped cards go there face up.
5. Agree on house slap rules before starting (see Common Variations). At minimum, the group must agree whether doubles and sandwiches are the only valid slaps or whether optional patterns (tens, marriages, four-in-a-row, top-bottom) are active.
6. The player to the dealer's left takes the first turn.

Gameplay

1. Your turn: On your turn, take the top card of your own stack and flip it away from yourself onto the central pile. All players see the card at the same moment.
2. Non-face cards: If the flipped card is a 2 through 10 (and does not complete a slap-eligible pattern), play passes clockwise to the next player.
3. Face card challenge: If the flipped card is a face card or Ace, the next player in turn must flip cards one at a time until either (a) they produce another face card or Ace, passing the challenge to the player after them, or (b) they exhaust their 'chances': Ace gives 4 chances, King 3, Queen 2, Jack 1. If the challenger fails to produce a face card within those chances, the player who played the original face card takes the entire central pile face down onto the bottom of their stack and starts a fresh turn.
4. Chained face cards: If during a challenge a player produces their own face card or Ace, the challenge restarts with the number of chances matching the newly played card, passing to the next player.
5. Slap-eligible patterns (default set): Any player may slap the central pile to claim it when any of these patterns appear: Double (the new card matches the rank of the card directly beneath it, e.g., 7 on 7); Sandwich (the new card matches the rank of the card two below it with a different card between them, e.g., Q, 4, Q); Top-Bottom (the new card matches the rank of the very bottom card of the pile). Most house groups also permit Tens (two consecutive cards that sum to 10, e.g., 7 and 3) and Four-in-a-Row (four cards of consecutive rank regardless of suit).
6. Winning a slap: The first hand to touch the central pile on a valid pattern takes the entire pile face down onto the bottom of their stack, shuffles if desired, and begins the next turn.
7. Invalid slap penalty: A player who slaps on an invalid pattern must burn one card (place the top card of their stack face down on the bottom of the central pile) as a penalty. Repeated bad slaps cost additional burn cards per house rules.
8. Simultaneous slap: When two hands touch the pile together, the hand closest to the table (bottom-most) is usually ruled the winner; otherwise the group votes.
9. Running out of cards: A player with no cards is not yet eliminated; they remain in the game and may slap-back in on any valid pattern to claim the central pile and continue playing. A player with no cards skips their turn (cannot flip but can still slap).
10. End: The game ends the moment one player holds all 52 cards. That player wins.

Scoring

• Egyptian Ratscrew uses no numeric score; holding all 52 cards is the win condition.
• For multi-round matches, track wins over 3, 5, or 7 games; the best-of-series is the match winner.
• Some tournament groups track slap accuracy (valid slaps / total slap attempts) as a bragging-rights stat across sessions.

Winning

The game ends when one player holds all 52 cards. That player is the sole winner. If players agree to stop early (e.g., after a set time), the winner is the player holding the most cards at the call.

Common Variations

• Slap-set house rules: Groups typically pick from doubles, sandwiches, tens, top-bottom, four-in-a-row, same-suit flushes (3 consecutive same-suit cards), marriages (K on Q or Q on K), and jokers-as-instant-slap. Agree the complete slap list before the first flip.
• Three-strikes-out: A player who makes three invalid slaps loses all slap privileges for the remainder of the game (they can still play cards but cannot take the pile by slap).
• Burn one to the asker: On a challenge failure, the winning player also gets the right to flip the top card of the losing player's stack as a freebie (rare, competitive variant).
• Penalty-of-two: Invalid slaps cost 2 burn cards instead of 1; makes groups slower and more deliberate.
• Silent ERS: No verbal reactions allowed; only card play and slaps. Good for late-night play.
• Mississippi Rules: A variant adds 'pairs across the pile' (first and third cards of a 3-card sequence match) as an additional slap pattern.
• Two-deck Mega-ERS: Two decks shuffled together for 6 to 10 players; same rules scale up.

Tips and Strategy

• Keep your eyes on the pile, not your hand. Reflexive slap wins come from anticipating the last card; a player watching their own stack always loses the race.
• Memorise the bottom card of the pile. Top-bottom slaps are easy to miss because everyone is watching the newly flipped card; you get free pile wins when no one else is tracking the bottom.
• Flip briskly but not instantly. Give every player a fraction of a second to register the card; slapping your own play on a double is entirely legal and often wins.
• Save the burn cards. When you hold a large stack, the invalid-slap penalty costs you little relative to the pile you might win; consider speculative slaps when the pile is large.
• Memorise the chance counts. On a King (3 chances), watch the next 3 flips vigilantly; on a Jack, only the very next flip. Players who anticipate the fail point win face-card challenges most often.
• Position your stack low and close. The hand with the shortest distance to travel to the pile wins simultaneous slaps more often than not.

Glossary

• Central pile: The face-up shared stack in the middle of the table; won by slap or failed challenge.
• Double: Two consecutive same-rank cards on the top of the pile; slap-eligible.
• Sandwich: Two same-rank cards separated by exactly one other card on the pile; slap-eligible.
• Top-bottom: The just-played card matches the rank of the bottom card of the pile; slap-eligible.
• Tens slap (optional): The just-played card plus the card beneath sum to 10.
• Challenge: The process triggered by a face card or Ace; the next player must produce a face card within a limited number of flips.
• Chances: The number of cards a player may flip during a challenge: Ace 4, King 3, Queen 2, Jack 1.A♠K♠Q♠J♠
• Burn: A penalty card sent to the bottom of the central pile after an invalid slap.
• Slap-back-in: A player with no cards reclaiming the pile via a valid slap, re-entering the game.
• Ratscrew: The slang origin of the name; the 'screw' references the penalty of giving up your stack on a bad play.