Officers' Skat Skat ("Räuberskat") or Coachmen's Skat ("Kutscherskat") There are several local variations of the card game, which differ mainly in the number of cards revealed or hidden and the calculation of points. The game is played between two players, each of whom has two rows of cards placed face down and two rows of cards placed face up on top of them. Thus each player has his 16 cards laid out in two rows of cards facing him, each row containing four pairs of cards, the top cards being face up. The players then play for 16 tricks. Players may agree
History of Skat Altenburg suit bidding ("Altenburger Farbenreizen") and the point bidding system used today was that the suit bidding offered only the basic values of the games. Except in special cases, a player could not be overbid by an unfavourable Unter/Jack in the Skat, since the position of the Unters was not taken into account when bidding. "Matadors" ("Spitzen") were not taken into account until after the game. In addition, the game types differed from today's: Little is known about the early history and origins of point bidding. The first Skat Congress failed in its attempt to found an all-German Skat Association