The middle step in Spider
Two-suit Spider uses spades and hearts, four copies of each. A card can still go on any card one rank higher, but now you can create mixed stacks that cannot be moved as a unit, so every placement is a decision. It is the best place to learn the thinking that 4-suit Spider requires, without as much punishment for mistakes.
What changes from 1 suit
- You must decide which suit to build in each column.
- A 6 of hearts on a 7 of spades is legal, but the pair cannot be moved together. It is a temporary parking move, and you will have to pay for it later.
- Rearranging usually needs an empty column to unmix suits.
Strategy
- Put a card on the same suit whenever possible. That is how a movable run grows.
- Treat off-suit placements as loans. Use one to reveal a hidden card, then plan to fix it.
- Keep one suit ahead. Concentrating on completing a single suit first often leaves the other suit with enough room to sort out later.
- Protect your empty columns. Do not fill a gap with a single card unless it helps you create a longer run.
New to Spider? The rules guide covers the details. Prefer something easier? Try 1 suit.
Thinking in two suits
Treat the two suits as a primary suit and a secondary one. Build your primary suit's runs first, and let the other suit fill in around it. When the secondary suit lands on a primary card of the wrong suit, keep the stack small, because mixed stacks are what you will be separating later.
A typical mid-game problem
You have a column ending 8♠ 7♥ and another ending 8♥ 7♠. The two 7s look interchangeable, but they are not: moving the 7♠ onto the 8♠, and the 7♥ onto the 8♥, would create two same-suit pairs. Swapping them is only possible if you have a third column or an empty one to park a card in, which is why spare columns are worth far more than they first appear.
When to deal
In two-suit games, dealing early is most costly when you hold long same-suit runs in progress, because a new card of the wrong suit on top of a run makes it temporarily unmovable. Make sure each column's last card is something you are happy to bury before you click the stock.
Verified deals
Deals in this mode are drawn from a library that a solver confirmed can be won, with each winning line replayed through the game's rules. See winnable Solitaire for details and limits.