Shooting the Moon

Take everything, and everyone else pays. Miss by one heart and you have collected garbage.

Shooting the moon means taking every penalty card in a hand of Hearts — all thirteen hearts and the Queen of Spades. Instead of the 26 points landing on you, each of your three opponents takes 26 and you take none. It is the biggest swing in the game, and the reason a Hearts player can never simply relax while someone else collects points.

What it is worth

That second row is the whole risk. There is no partial credit — a moon attempt that fails is simply a disastrous hand, and it is the most expensive way to lose in Hearts.

The app applies the standard digital convention: if adding +26 to the other three would end the game with you still losing, the moon flips instead to −26 off your own score. You always get whichever result is better, so a successful moon can never backfire. Full detail in Hearts scoring.

When the hand is actually on

Most moons are not decided during the hand — they are visible at the deal. You need to be able to win every single trick that contains a point, which means control, not just high cards.

• Long, strong hearts. Five or more hearts headed by the ace and king. You will have to win all thirteen of them, and length is what stops someone else winning a heart trick late.
• Spade protection. You need the Q♠ yourself, or enough spades above it — the ace and king — that you can take it when it appears. A moon dies the moment someone else wins the Queen.
• No holes. A suit where you hold only low cards is where the moon breaks. If you hold ♣4 3 2 and someone leads clubs, you lose that trick — and if a heart is discarded on it, you are finished.
• A void helps enormously. Being void in a suit means you can trump in — well, there are no trumps in Hearts, but you can discard safely and, crucially, you cannot be forced to lose a trick in that suit.

How to play the attempt

• Pass to strengthen, not to unload. If you are going for it, pass away your low cards in short suits so you are void, and keep every heart.
• Win the early tricks quietly. Take them with your side-suit aces and kings before anyone realises what is happening. The longer nobody suspects, the fewer countermeasures you face.
• Take the Queen of Spades yourself, early. If you hold it, leading it out is often right — it removes the single card that can end the attempt.
• Do not lead hearts until you have to. Leading hearts announces the attempt. Draw the side suits first.
• Know when to abandon it. If a single heart goes to someone else, stop immediately and start playing normally. Continuing turns a bad hand into a catastrophic one.

How to spot one coming

Defending is the more useful skill, because you will defend against a moon far more often than you will attempt one. The tells are reliable:

• Someone starts winning tricks they were ducking. Hearts players duck by instinct. A player suddenly taking tricks with aces has a reason.
• The Queen of Spades has not appeared and one player is running a side suit.
• Hearts are being taken, not avoided. Look at the trick piles, not just your own hand.
• Nobody else has any points yet and the hand is half over. That is the alarm.

How to stop it

Somebody has to take one heart. That is the whole defence, and it is worth 26 points to be the one who does it — taking a single heart costs you 1 point and saves you 26.

• Take a heart the first moment you can. Do not wait for someone else to do it. Every player waiting for another player is how moons succeed.
• Play your highest heart, not your lowest, once you have decided to break it up.
• Give the Queen of Spades to the shooter's left. If you can force the Queen onto another defender rather than the shooter, the attempt dies.
• Do not hoard your aces. An ace you never played is 26 points you did not stop.
• If you cannot stop it, dump on the leader. When the moon is certain, make sure the damage lands where it costs the game leader most.

Variants worth knowing

Shooting the sun

Taking all thirteen tricks, not just all the points. Some tables score it at 52 or double the moon.

Old moon / new moon

Whether the shooter's score drops 26 or everyone else's rises 26. This app gives the shooter whichever is better.

No moon

Some house rules disallow it entirely — all 26 points always land on the takers.

Keep reading

• How to Play Hearts — the complete rules.
• Hearts Scoring — points, the Queen and worked examples.
• Hearts Strategy — passing, ducking and survival.
• Hearts for 3 Players — three-handed rules, 5 and 6 too.