Pinochle cards from each player's discard pile are included in totals for a total of 240 counters per round, plus one counter for winning the final trick. One variation to make it more difficult for the bid-winning player, the discard pile created by drawing cards is used by the non-bidding player to score towards tricks. In Three-handed pinochle each player plays for him or herself. The dealer deals 15 cards to each player and three cards to the kitty—a separate pile in the middle. All players review their cards and silently determine their bids. The player to the dealer's left initiates
Pinochle be used in only one meld of each type. Thus, a queen can be used in one marriage with one king, regardless of if the player has the other king of the same suit. However, a queen can be used to score a marriage and a pinochle if the player also has the correct jack. After the melds are displayed, the points are counted and each player totals their individual meld scores. Because all of these values are multiples of ten, one can arrive at simplified values by removing the trailing zero from each point total. For instance, a pinochle