I have played Cribbage Sqaures Solitaire on the iphone for nearly 3 years now and I am still unsure what the highest score that can be attained is. The highest score I have achieved is 152 (using 2 reserve piles). After laying cards out on a table and choosing which cards to use I managed to get the total highest score to 161 but I am still unsure if this is the highest possible score.
To play cribbage squares solitaire, you deal out cards from a shuffled pack one at a time, placing them into a 4x4 grid. Your aim is to make the maximum score from each of the rows and columns. Once you have dealt out the 16 cards, turn one further card up as the starter. Each row and column in the grid is scored as a cribbage hand, using the normal cribbage scoring rules. To ‘win’ you need to score more than 61 points for all the hands combined. But a far more interesting and challenging variation on standard Cribbage Squares is to use one or two 'reserve piles: allowing you to place up to 5 cards in each reserve If you are not sure where to place the current card, you can add it face-up to a reserve pile. The top card from each reserve pile may be played at any time. To ‘win’ you need to score over 100.
Cribbage Squares strategy is not easy at first. You need to use a strategy which makes the maximum score from each hand given the likely Starter/Turnover Card.
My Strategy revolves around the starter card being a five but before I divulge how I got a total of 161 as the highest possible score you ought to try it because I feel it has to be one of the most strategically challenging solitaires ever.