Solavantage

10,000 Winnable Deals Now Available

Solavant players have identified over 10,000 winnable deals! That's a lot of wins, many more than I was expecting so soon. Thanks to everyone who has contributed by clicking the Sync Now button on the Winnable Deals tab.

If you're not playing the winnable deals feature, give it a try. It's a different feeling when you play a game that you know can be beaten. When you lose one, you may have the urge to select the Restart option – you can't let that game beat you! :)

Welcome Solavant Players!

As you can see, the Solavantage newsletter has been changed to a blog format. Many of the email newsletters weren't getting delivered because of aggressive spam blockers and other issues. I think this is going to be a nice improvement in many ways.

One new feature is the ability to add your comments to the articles. Beneath each article you'll find a link titled "Comments". Click on that to read other players' comments and to add your own. I'll be participating in the comments as well. If you have any subjects you'd like addressed in the Solavantage blog, please use the Contact link at the top of the page to let me know about it.

If you use RSS feeds, you can subscribe to the Solavantage feed in the upper-left corner. This will let you know when a new item has been posted here. If you don't know anything about RSS, just bookmark this page in your web browser and check back from time to time. I'll be adding information about how to use the Solavantage blog in the future, along with Solavant tips, strategies and news.

All of the old newsletter articles have been moved here for reference. There's also a new game strategy below. Be sure to check it out!

Please write me if you have any questions about the new format, I'm glad to help. :)

Askew Solitaire Strategy

Askew is an original Solavant game with influences from several types of solitaire. It's a good thinking game - the unusual rules keep your brain working to remember what goes where.

Eight cards are dealt to the tableau in two groups of four. Each group has its own unique building rules. This keeps the tableau unbalanced and "askew".

The group on the left is built downward in alternating color. This group is the looser of the two, allowing for lots of different cards to be built. Also, covered cards can be moved within this group.

The group on the right is stricter. With cards build downward in suit only, it's more difficult to build here. Plus, only the end cards can be moved.

The objective of Askew is a standard one: build all cards into four ascending, in-suit foundation piles from Ace to King.

Sync Winnable Deals

Use the Sync All button on the Winnable Deals tab every so often to upload your wins to the Solavant server. Even if you don't play Winnable Deals yourself, others that enjoy the feature will be able to play your wins.

Gaps Solitaire Strategy

Gaps, also known as "Montana", is a hard, older game that's fairly well known by solitaire fans. Its large layout is somewhat difficult to play with real cards, especially during the redeals, but playing on the Mac makes that part easy. It's still hard to win, though.

Gaps is a completely open game, with all cards in view. All cards are dealt into 4 rows then all Aces are removed from play, leaving 4 gaps in the layout which provide the game's name. (I don't know where the name Montana comes from. Do any of you?) A card may be moved into a gap if it is the same suit and one higher than the card to the left of the gap. Twos are played into the leftmost spaces and nothing is played to the right of a King.

The objective is to get the cards into suit sequences, one per row, from Twos to Kings. The gaps will then be the rightmost spaces in the layout.

Keep in My Favorites

Be sure to use the "Keep in My Favorites" checkbox as you try new games. Solavant has a lot of games to try, so you might forget one you like if you don't play it for a while. Always putting games that you enjoy into your favorites makes it easy to remember that it was fun. You can always remove a game from your favorites in the future if you change your mind.

Fourteen Out Solitaire Strategy

Fourteen Out is a pairing game similar to the popular game Pyramid. I prefer Fourteen Out because it is completely open, with all cards visible when the game starts. Pyramid has half of the cards hidden in the stock. Fourteen Out is therefore the more strategic — and more fun, at least to me. :)

Fourteen Out starts with all cards dealt into 12 tableau columns. End cards may be paired together so that their ranks total 14 (hence the name Fourteen Out). Pairs are automatically discarded. The game is won if all cards are discarded.

Navigating the Game Finder with the Keyboard

You can navigate the Game Finder's list using the keyboard. Type a letter and the first game in the alphabetical list that starts with that letter will be selected. The arrow keys will move the selection up and down the list. Hit the Return key to start the selected game.

Yukon Solitaire Strategy

Yukon is based on Klondike but with tableau rules from spider-type games. Yukon isn't as well known as Klondike, but many people prefer it to Klondike once they've played a few times.

The 4 foundations build upward in suit, the 7 tableau columns build downward in alternating color, with Kings played into empty spaces. Any face-up card may be picked up and built on another column.

How Does This Column Work?

Sometimes you might forget how a pile, column, or space works in a game. Move the mouse cursor over anything on the game screen and a short explanation of how it works will appear at the bottom of the window.