They're mostly trick taking games similar to spades or hearts and there's very few apps to get into them that aren't in Italian or French let alone any local groups to learn that aren't in France or Italy.

I've been trying to develop a solitaire game that uses the star chart of a chosen date-time/location as the board but I'm having difficulty working out the core mechanic of the 12 point solitaire game let alone the sign/house/planet modifiers.

~~And before you mention clock solitaire there's basically no actual choice in that game all of the moves are purely determined by the state dealt at the beginning.~~

Actually now I'm wondering if that's the best uncomplicated base mechanic and the other items will just modify it such that the game is consistently winnable.

If anyone has any good thoughts on game design my other thoughts were:

clock solitaire assigns piles by number, kings in the middle. A tarot deck also has a full set of trumps. So I'm thinking split the clock into signs and assign piles by the element of their sign. So for instance the cardinal sign's pile will build pips down from the five, the fixed's pile will build pips down from the ten and the mutable's pile will build courts down from the king. Trumps can go in the middle (and as a bonus your deck is sorted when you're done).

(Actually I haven't decided whether sign or house is the part that determines pile I'm leaning towards sign right now but I've flip flopped like three times in this comment so)

Other misc thoughts:

• as mentioned, pure clock solitaire is not consistently winnable due to the deterministic nature of it's play. All moves from beginning to end are purely a result of the original deal. It's the arrangement of the houses and planets in your chosen date -time/location that will add extra powers top make it winnable. This is similar to a Minecraft seed. The board arrangement will always be the same if you pick your birthday, the card locations will just change.

• what sign and planet show up in each house should affect gameplay. Haven't decided on what yet.

• I would also really like choosing a court or face trump as a signifier card for the player or players to mean something.