If play passes all the way back to the player who laid the top cards, they win the trick, clears the cards, and can lead the next one. When it's your turn, you may either beat the current top card combination - single card, pair of cards, sequence of pairs, full house, etc. The deck is a standard 52-card pack with four special cards added: dog, phoenix, dragon and Mah Jong (1).

It is a partnership climbing card game, and the object of play is to rid yourself of your hand, preferably while scoring points in the process.

Tichu took much of its rules and mechanics from Zheng Fen.