How to Play PySol

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How to Play PySol

Mouse Usage

In Options -> Mouse select:
- Drag and Drop
- Point and Click or
- Sticky Mouse
Left mouse button:
- Drag cards around
- Click on the Talon to deal new cards
Right mouse button (or double-click the left button):
- Drop cards to the Foundations
- If quick play is enabled,
- drop card to first playable row
Middle mouse button (or Ctrl-click the right button):
- View partially overlapped cards
Ctrl-click the left mouse button: (1)
- Highlight all matching cards on the table
Shift-click the left mouse button: (1)
- Highlight all cards with the same rank.
Shift-click the right mouse button: (1)
- Highlight all cards with the same suit.
Ctrl-click the middle mouse button:
- View face down card if enabled.

Two-handed play

Using the qwerty keyboard:

With the left hand:
'A' (auto drop), 'S' (undo) and 'D' (deal).
You can also reach 'R' (redo) from there.
With the right hand:
'L' (auto drop), 'K' (undo) and 'J' (deal).

Using the Dvorak keyboard:

Select Options -> Player options -> Use Dvorak keys
With the left hand:
'A' (auto drop), 'O' (undo) and 'E' (deal) or
With the right hand:
'S' (auto drop), 'N' (undo) and 'T' (deal)

Selecting card images

Any set of playing card images that has at least the number of suits and ranks as the game requires will be accepted when changing games. If the new game requires more suits or more ranks per suit and the option has not been set, the "Select new cardset" dialog will be displayed. User preference will override the requirements with the result that duplicate images will be used for missing images if any. This may make the play more interesting, it will make it more confusing.

Automatic play

Note that automatic play can spoil the gameplay, so purists should not enable any option but maybe Auto face up. Also, some games disable certain features as the game would be trivial otherwise.

Auto face up
- Automatically flip all cards face up where appropriate.
Auto drop
- Automatically drop cards to the Foundations.
Auto deal
- Automatically deal cards to the Waste stack if it is empty.
Quick play
- Use the right mouse button to move piles around quickly.
- The logic involved is not too clever on purpose
- (i.e. it does not consult the hint system).
The player option:
- Options -> Player options -> Always allow autodrop
  - as stated above tends to trivialize some games.
  - But it's your choice, play as you will.

Documentation viewer

The Pysol III documentation viewer can be started as a separate application by starting pysol -browse or nukuadocs. The game can then be started by clicking the center button at the bottom of the viewer with the last game played or with the selected game as indicated.

Some notes about grades and scores

Grading only begins after you make your first move.
The elapsed time however, starts when the game is loaded.
Using reset (CTRL-z) will clear the current game and start another.
You will lose a game if you consume a hint or start demo mode.
You can restart (CTRL-g) at any time to get another chance to win this game.
If you don't want to count a lost game use reset or change the player options.
Loaded games won't be counted.
Using Undo, Highlight or any other assist function will reduce the grade.
See About Scores for information on the the accumulated score for all games.
De-selecting Options -> Show accumulated score will hide the accumulation.
And finally always remember that this is a Patience game. Relax and enjoy.

The reason for playing solitaire is to entertain yourself so if you find it entertaining, how can it be cheating? The behavior called "cheating at solitaire" is actually just playing by a different set of rules. One unusual rule for Pysol III games is that they allow "peeking" at face down cards. This option is set to off, but it can be turned on in the player options dialog. When the option "Permit viewing face down cards" is set, a control-middleclick will show the card face. This option adds a number of uncounted games to Pysol III, "Klondike" is one game and "Klondike Can Peek" is another. Since this is actually a rule change, "peeking" isn't counted as an assist. This latest major revision of PySol has over sixteen hundred different solitaire games so if you don't like the game you're playing, change the rules. It's all about you.

(1) If used, game can be won but not with a perfect grade.

Contents
Key Bindings
Menu Bar Tree
Glossary
Index

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