Sheepshead is most commonly played in Wisconsin, where it is sometimes called the "unofficial" state card game.

[3] It is also common among German counties in Southern Indiana, which has large German-American populations, and on the Internet.

National 3-Hand Sheepshead Tournament has been held annually in Wisconsin since 1970 in the month of March.

[4] However, some sources argue that the term was probably derived and translated incorrectly from Middle High German and referred to playing cards on a barrel head (from kopf, meaning head, and Schaff, meaning a barrel).

(Notice how both aces and tens outrank kings; arguably the most confusing aspect of card strength).

In most standard five and six-handed games, two cards are also dealt to a separate pile called the "blind."

One of the more intriguing aspects of sheepshead is that the picker and partner change each hand, and a good deal of the game's strategy is in determining which player is the partner, as his identity is usually not revealed until after the game has begun.

The game is usually played to 21 or 42 points and whichever team reaches the number wins.

Variants may change how partners are chosen, scoring, the suits considered fail, or what occurs when the blind is not picked.

If he succeeds he receives twice the number of points for a trickless game, but if he misses a single trick (even one lacking points), he must pay twice the value his opponents would have paid him for a trickless hand.

This automatically doubles the point values determining the score when the game ends.

This variant allows players to double the point value of the game by revealing that they have the two black or red queens.

Alternatively, in some groups, the strengths of the various queens and jacks differ from standard rules.

A variant popular in some areas of Minnesota and Wisconsin is to change the order of strength of the trump cards.

Thus, in a five-player game, the affected player loses four points and the opponents get one each, unless the score is doubled by other means (cracking, etc.).

This game is also known as “Michigan Mediocre,” named by the Ann Arbor Sheepshead Society (AASS) that created this variant.

Typically occurring with a leaster (and during cash games), one point is placed into a pot for the next hand.

Then, if the picker wins the hand, he splits the pot with the partner (in a five handed game, the extra point goes to the picker such that he receives three and the partner receives a single point).

All players reveal their cards after everyone has passed a dealt hand to discover the loser who pays the table 1 point each.

The purpose of a Schwanzer, also known as a showdown, is to catch maurers without playing a leaster or another variant of a “no pick” situation.

4) In this variation popular in southern Indiana (typically known by as "Sheephead"), jacks are higher than queens (still clubs-spades-hearts-diamonds), and hearts (rather than diamonds) are trump.

In wilky, play begins with the player left of the dealer as normal with the goal to get as few points as possible.

The Dealer may go "nuclear" giving all 4 of his cards to the other team's bury and taking the entire blind, the person behind him/her is still a partner.

The number rolled correlates to the partner by counting players clockwise of the picker.

Mauering is considered to be in very poor taste and in some cases players who do it often enough can be asked to leave a game.

Opponent 1 is guaranteed to win the trick as the queen of clubs is the highest card.

A player "reneges" means to fail to follow suit when able and required by the rules to do so.

In some circles, the player simply lays down the granny hand and the opponents conceding by acclamation.

Even if not completely a granny hand, some circles permit a player to state that he believes he will take all of the remaining tricks (possibly requiring an explanation, say, "I have all of the remaining trump"), giving opponents an opportunity to object (say, if the calling player miscounted trump) -- forestalling the players from needing to play out the remainder of the hand.

This involves 2 players creating a word or phrase which tells their partner in crime what to lead.