Spider Solitaire - what do I do now?

[Guest]

I've been enjoying spider solitaire for years. I was just playing a game,
and ended up with only 6 cards face-up. I still had 2 sets of face-down
cards. However, every time I clicked on the face-down pile (to deal one set
of face-down cards), I got the "you are not allowed to deal while there are
any empty slots" popup message.

Is the game "stuck" at this point, or is there something I can do?

Jim

 

[RobertVA]

I've been enjoying spider solitaire for years. I was just playing a game,
and ended up with only 6 cards face-up. I still had 2 sets of face-down
cards. However, every time I clicked on the face-down pile (to deal one set
of face-down cards), I got the "you are not allowed to deal while there are
any empty slots" popup message.

Is the game "stuck" at this point, or is there something I can do?

Jim

That's one of the rules of the game. To complete the game you would have
to distribute the cards in the two face up piles into ALL the remaining
slots, accept the remaining cards from the deal pile, then reassemble
the face up cards into descending order from king to ace.

 

[Guest]

Yes, that would be the normal procedure. However, I guess I wasn't clear. I
had 6 face-up cards, and **NO** face-down cards in the upper tableau. I had
2 sets of face-down cards in the not-yet-dealt lower tableau. 6
upper-tableau cards cannot cover 10 upper-tableau slots. Thus, unless
there's a secret command to get Spider to deal in this situation, I'm stuck.

Jim

 

[RobertVA]

Yes, that would be the normal procedure. However, I guess I wasn't clear. I
had 6 face-up cards, and **NO** face-down cards in the upper tableau. I had
2 sets of face-down cards in the not-yet-dealt lower tableau. 6
upper-tableau cards cannot cover 10 upper-tableau slots. Thus, unless
there's a secret command to get Spider to deal in this situation, I'm stuck.

Jim

If you allow the quantity of face up cards to dwindle below the number
of columns while there's still undelt cards, you've gotten yourself into
an unwinable situation.