Keith Devens .com

Funny. I've never seen anyone upload a Spider Solitaire game to a blog. Could be I just don't get around enough.

Ha, no, I think it means I don't get out enough.

Seriously though, I won that game through sheer force of will. I refused to be beaten and I triumphed

Spider's a really good game.

spider solidaire can be beat w/o undo. and in less than 25 games.

Of course it can be beat without undo. Undo just brings you back to a position you've already been at. "... less than 25 games"? What are you talking about?

Have you kept track of your winning percentage? I'm curious to know how others do. I've been at 6% for quite a while.

I haven't kept track of my winning percentage. I don't play the game very much.

How 'bout:

Wins: 84
Losses: 166
Win Rate: 33%

MINIMUM use of undo! I'm taking 4 suite spider (Actually there's no other kind worth playing)

i can win spider solitare in 103 moves

I always use undo to the best advantage, and I have a present win percentage of 80% ( I think its approx. 56 wins/ 14 loss). I'm playing the most difficult level and I never abandon a game.
I'd like to find out if anyone else is playing this way and what there win % is.

Like you, Tony, I've been very interested in other people's winning percentages for some time. I've become more intellectually curious about the game as I play more and get better at it.

I play with unlimited undos. I've recently found http://www.solitaire-ranking.de.vu/. It is an interesting site but they don't seem to really condone the use of the undo feature. Their reason for this is that undoing will cost you a move...and that means less points. That site seems entirely too concerned with High Scores. I care little for high scores, because sure someone will randomly get a perfect draw once in a while and get a huge score. The challenge for me at least is trying to win every single game and to judge myself based on this percentage which would then eliminate any error from the aforementioned anomalously easy games.

Anyhoo...I'm not at my home computer, but my winning percentage is rounded to %53 right now. My win total is somewhere around 570. This is on difficult, 4 suit. I didn't bother clearing the stats even after I started to learn and lost probably 9 out of 10 for a month. I started winning but it took a long time to bring that average up. I've been playing much better recently and my longest winning streak is 12 games.

Please link any site that might make reference to winning percentage, as it would be nice to have some sort of "ranking" as they do on that german solitaire site I linked. I'm curious to see what else is out there.

Adam
el_burro_@hotmail.com

Won spider solitaire in 88 moves-no undos

just played your saved game and scored 1070 with 230 moves on 1st attempt, did not find it particularly difficult.

play spider solitaire, 4 suit, use the version with XP. It allows undo within the current deal, once a new batch of 10 cards is played, you cant undo past it.

A two years ago I would be at about 15%, last year was consistently about 25%, am now running in the 30%+ range.

Dont use undo much, usually only to test whats under two possible options.

Kent

December 14, 2006

Keith how do I get my original Spider Solitaire back. When I upgraded to Windows 2000 my Spider was deleted. HELP HELP
I miss it

I am right with Keith... I got a new computer that doesn't have any games on it and no matter how many web sites i search i can't find my beloved 4 suit spider... 1 suit... 2 suit, easy - but no 4 suit. where do I go - how do i get it?

I can't imagine being good enough at Spider to give a damn how many moves it takes to win.

Don't you hate a game so easy you just can't lose and you have to stack all the easy cards just to play another game? Sort of a hollow victory.

I've been playing two years on two suites and average 29%. How yall doin'?

Moving stuff around on my desktop, I moused Spider and it's vanished from desktop, files and everywhere...Help!

I'm on 4 suits and am at 34% win average. I've been playing for years though.

I use undo to pick between 2 choices most of the time. I don't undo a whole game to get back to a point where i can basically start over, but that's why my winning percentage is only 35% (2 suits) and 20% (4 suits). i just started playing but have been hooked on it and now it seems my girlfriend is too.

The last time I played I got 87 moves!
Stick that in your pipe and smoke it!!!!!

"Minimum use" of "undo" is ambiguous. Either don't use it at all - or give yourself over to using it completely - as I do. Only one option or another allows you to compare win percentage.

My average is 52% (with 4 suits). Would be higher - except for awhile i was around 30% - and then I started getting better. I guess to compare - I need to start over.

I used to have this on my old computer but on my new one I can't get it. Can you help me?

i have 1747 wins
804 loses
68% win rate
most wins in a row 17
most loses in a row5

I have been playing medium level spider now for a while and have a pretty good record of 206 wins and 143 losses. Highest one game score is 1,151 so far but I have won games with far less points and a whole lot of moves that include the undo feature. My win loss Percentage overall just made it back up to 59%. I play for wins instead of score. I believe there is more pride in winning than just playing for individual game score. Right now my goal is to make it to 60%! I have never been there before. I usually play games one at a time but I have won 3 and a row and the most losses I have is 4 in a row. One of these days here I will sit and play and play until I lose and see how many I can win in a row. I love this game. I never get burnt out on it because I try not play to much. I taught my Mom a little how to play for wins the other night but I think she likes to play for indvidual game score. That is fine but I like having all those wins!

Nice forum Keith. Keep dealing good scores!

Greg

Using the undo to me is cheating... Woulds you look under the cards face down while playing on the table? I sure don't call that a win if you use the undo a lot just so you can win...

You all are full of it!!! There is no way 1st time player did it in 100 moves prove it!!! There is no way anyone does it less than 100 moves PROVE IT!!!!!

My question is. Is every single game theoretically winable??? if so where do you get your facts from??

Ok, I've come here to find out if undo is considered a valid move in Spider Solitaire. I have been using 1 undo at a time not even realizing that I could undo further (although I fail to see the point in that)
Anyway, my point here is that if this were indeed a competition solitaire game, your final score WOULD, in turn, reflect your undo moves and reduce your scores. Therefore, while I suggest that is not in any way "illegal" for you to UNDO, you will pay the price to that person which can clear the board with as few undos as possible.
Next subject.....is anybody interested in starting an actual spider solitaire competition? I think it would be very cool (if not very dorky) I vote for Chicago as Spider Central. (A) Becuase it's in the middle of the country and will reduce travel time for SS geeks everywhere, and (B) Because I live there.

I think the situation is quite clear,(as in black and white). there are two ways to play spider: a) for points & b) for wins.

let me define them (and yes I'm sure many already know this)

In the case of points the highest score comes from the lowest number of moves. using the undo feature is this case will always reduce your score. Most people who play this way are relying on the card fall, and will abandon most games as soon as they don't work rather then use the undo feature.

In the case of wins, the situation is the total opposite! Your primary aim is to win every time, the score is very secondary to that. The use of the undo button is very much required if the game is to be almost entirely of skill, otherwise you are dependant on the card fall to a huge degree.

Therefore, if you want the most skillful game which has the least factor of luck, its black and white:- full use of the undo function is correct.

If you only partly use the undo option then you are working in shades of gray and the scores etc become meaningless!

As to previous discussion about what win percentage is possible:
I don't believe it can be 100% because its impossible to totally eliminate luck since the card fall will always be random and its mathematically possible for certain combinations to give no opportunity of play, regular player will have all seen them, the ones where you can't move after a deal and have to go straight onto the next deal.
When that happens on the last deal..game over

Some mathematical genius out there would be able to work out the exact possible maximum over x number of games, however it will always have a variance due the the dealt luck factor. My guess would be the low to mid 90's

For those interested my percentage for hard(4 suites) floats around the 84%, I have seem 87%

On a last note, yes you can play for most wins without using the undo option at all(as you would in using real cards) but just like in regular patience/solitaire you would simply be playing against the odds and average score can't have too much meaning.

I rarely pay attention to the score, and use undo regularly. With this, middle level has been almost always beatable, but does require a lot of strategy.

My quest in spider solitaire, though, became to find out what happens when you have more cards in the pile, you also have empty spaces on the board, and not enough cards on the board to fill the empty spaces.

I finally did it. The game locked up.
see screen shot at:
www.pattcom.com/spider/spiderlockdown.jpg

I'm glad to find some spider fanatics. I hope someone can appreciate my efforts. My family just thinks I'm wierd (well, they know that).

Very interesting spiderlockdown, now if you could just do that in hard mode...

yes, the possible win percentage on medium would be much higher, something like 98%

Rockdweller you supposition is flawed! Even accounting for a random deal of cards, every game can be won! Using the formula

{52(3)/16} squared plus 10 - the number of cards moved you will always get zero (if you win the game) thus every game can be won resulting in a 100% win percentage. I have not been able to replicate this but I am currently designing a computer model.

You people must not be game designers, or must not have considered the possibility that both score and win percentage could be considered significant at the same time (or both.) Using a simple formula (current win percentage x average score would work) would seem to yield a number that could directly rank players based on ability.

Smart guys ready to pull out computer models and sit through 1000 or more Spider Solitaire games, but not ready to use your noggins enough to be able to figure the simple stuff out. BTW...when hanging toilet paper, the side that hangs down goes TOWARD the wall, not away from it.

How do i get it back since I accidently deleted the entire game section?

"e=mc2 wrote:Rockdweller you supposition is flawed!"

Really !!! Well in that case If I get dealt for example something like 4 kings, 4 five's & say a couple of aces on the last hand, could you please tell me how I could win?......

..There are so many combinations of dealt cards that prevent further play that it can't be 100%

Lisa if you have deleted your windows games, you will need to go Start>Control Panel>Add/Remove programs, then select add new programs (insert your windows CD) find the games and checkmark the boxes for installation.

Yes I agree with 69.205.89.192 that you could make a formula to merge the two results, however thats still a grey area since its not an absolute! which particular formula would you use and how much weight/bias to games won vs points etc.... I understand what you are saying, but its too loose to base a result on I would have thought.

if you're dealt 8 kings 4 fives 2 aces on the last hand, undo, then stack up king queen jack ---> all the way to 2 of the same suit as the ace to be dealt, and put it in the spot where the ace will land. on the deal, you'll complete a suit, and it will be taken off the board. if you can't do that, queen jack 10 --> to six of a single suit and put it where the five will land, then move the queen onto the king.

i've done that to win games that were going well but happened to result in no moves on the last hand.

eh?..... I thought I was a reasonably good player, but I don't understand any of what you've written. How do you undo a deal? ....where'd the queen etc come from?

Hi,
I used to play the original Spider made by Troy Miller in ca. 1992, but since he sold out to MS I've found this version quite irritating. Not being able to back up normally, save and restore games easily, always having to fill empty spaces before dealing a new hand.
Lots of things actualy, so I wrote my own version of the program which I play at home. Anybody interested ?
RaBur

Hello everybody,
I'm with undoer, I play the white kind of the game. I currently have 51% with 200+ wins.
I definitely agree with Rockdwelle when he says that there are games that cannot be won. Perhaps in a game with different rules where you could undo every move. Me guess is that for 4-suites you could win between 75% - 85% of the matches. The think that mostly limits this percent is that you cannot undo a draw or when a pile is removed.

I'm interested to see what win % everyone is getting in difficult 4-suit play when NOT using undo at all.

I've been sitting at about 26%, but has been better recently (maybe as much as 1/3). I don't keep track of the number of moves, but it's a high number since you always have to plan ahead and shift cards frequently. Without having undo available, it also takes a while to play, because you can't make mistakes (maybe 1.5 hours per game). The version of the game I've been playing doesn't even have undo available, which is fine since I don't want to use it, but would be nice to have available in case of an accidental click.

You can improve your results by following these spider solitaire strategy tips.

STR wrote:"The version of the game I've been playing doesn't even have undo available, which is fine since I don't want to use it, but would be nice to have available in case of an accidental click".

What version is that? - all windows versions allow undo that I've seen. (Ctrl+Z)

Once you use undo for an "accidental click", you will start using it for lots of 'mistakes'.....human nature and we're back to shades of gray again.

I have played the game around 2 years and my winning rate for most difficult 4 suite is 37%. Can any one tell me it is above average or below the average.

Thanks.

Connie

Can every game of spider be won?

When I first started playing 'spider difficult' years ago, I lost 839 games in a row. I must be a slow learner because my win percent now is only about 20% - so my question is: How do you determine whether or not to play a game? Number of visible moves?

my version of windows xp does not allow you to undo a draw, so comparing numbers is pointless...

Hello,
I'm a SS newbie, and I have a two-suit game that I cannot beat. Is there anyway I can upload the game and have some suggestions? I've read all the basic strategies and have applied them. The kings come out very late and you can't undo after the deal in my version. Please help, I'm losing a lot of sleep ^_^'''