Should Klondike Prioritize the Column with the Most Hidden Cards?
Do not target the deepest column automatically. Prefer the reveal with the lowest cost and strongest follow-up, especially one that creates an empty lane.
Not automatically. A deep column contains more unknown cards, but the best target is the column whose next reveal costs the least and improves the rest of the board most. Hidden-card count is a priority signal, not a command.
If column 7 has six hidden cards but needs four difficult transfers before the next flip, while column 3 needs one move to reveal its card, opening column 3 first may produce the destination or empty lane needed for column 7.
Compare cost to the next reveal
Count the legal moves required to remove the current face-up tail. A column with 9♣–8♦ can open in one group move if 10♥ is available. A deeper column ending Q♠–J♥–10♣ may require several separate destinations.
The number of hidden cards behind the tail does not change that immediate cost.
Compare the follow-up, not only the flip
Suppose moving 6♣ from a short column exposes K♥ and empties the column after the King moves. That new lane can absorb K♠–Q♥–J♣ from the deepest column. The shallow reveal has multiplied your options.
By contrast, revealing one card in the deepest column may produce 4♦ with no black Five available. The information is useful, but the column remains blocked.
When the deepest column should win
Prioritize it when one legal move reveals the next card, when the face-up tail has a clean destination, or when delay risks burying the only parent needed for that tail. A low-cost reveal in a six-card column is especially valuable because it begins reducing the largest unknown stack.
A better priority score
- How many moves until the next hidden card turns?
- Are those moves reversible?
- Does the reveal also empty a column or expose a King?
- Is there a likely destination for the new card?
- Will another column become easier afterward?
Use those questions in Play Klondike Draw 1 or Play Klondike Draw 3.
Sources used
This guide distinguishes PlaySoli's current game rules from historical variants and marks disputed claims instead of presenting them as settled facts.