Standard playing cards are … boring? In fact, if you take the time to look at them, you may find that they have properties that make them very versatile.

A playing card is easily recognized by the two symbols on the face of the card in the upper left and lower right corners: a ‘suit’ and an ‘identifier’.

A deck of 52 cards is divided evenly into four “suits”: clubs, diamonds, hearts, and spades. This allows you to have flush, suited cards (Cribbage, Poker). This also allows for trick games that use a trump suit and that require playing a card “in the suit that was ahead” (Bridge, Euchre, Five-Hundred, Pinochle, Whist). This also allows games where you have to play a card with the suit that was last played (Crazy Eights).

Each of the four suits has 13 cards that are marked with the same 13 ‘identifiers’ or ids: 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, J, Q, K, A. So, for each id, there are exactly four cards, one for each suit. This allows you to have two matching cards (Concentration, Crazy Eights, Old Maid, War), two or more of a type (Cribbage, Go Fish, Poker), three or more of a kind (Canasta, Gin Rummy, Rummy) and special matching card combinations, such as full-house, a pair and three of a kind (Poker).

Four of the identifiers are ‘letters’ that represent special cards: three face cards (‘J’ = Jack, ‘Q’ = Queen and ‘K’ = King) and an Ace (‘A’ = Ace). This allows you to have a special score for these special cards (Hearts, Michigan, Pinochle, Tripoli). Each figure has a double image of the king, queen, or jack, so there is always an image from the right side up in the upper half of the card. The Ace has a suit in the center.

Nine of the identifiers are ‘numbers’. This allows you to add the numerical value of the cards. Face cards and aces can be included by assigning a value such as 10 for face cards and 1 or 11 for aces (Blackjack, Cribbage). In addition to the two-suit symbols, several suit symbols equal to the identification number are printed on each number card.

Suits have two ‘colors’ that divide a deck of cards evenly into two: black (clubs, spades) and red (diamonds, hearts). This allows you to link cards of two suits with the same color, such as using the jacks of one color as high trump cards (Euchre, Five Hundred).

Each of the 13 identifiers is part of a ‘sequence’ of identifiers, generally ‘A’ (high) to ‘2’ (low). This allows you to have a straight, five cards in sequence (Poker), or a run, three or more cards in sequence (Cribbage). If these cards also have the same suit, you can have a straight flush (Poker) or a single-suit race (Gin Rummy, Rummy). You can also place the cards of a certain suit in sequence (Fan Tan, Michigan).

Identifiers are also called ‘ranges’ because each identifier has a rank compared to any other identifier; again, the highest identifier is usually ‘A’ and the lowest is ‘2’. This allows you to make the high card do a trick (Bridge, Euchre, Five Hundred, Hearts, Pinochle, Whist). This also allows you to have comparison games in which a high-ranking card takes a low-ranking card, and cards of equal rank lead to war (War), and a high-ranking pair beats a low-ranking pair. (Poker).

In addition to normal cards, a deck of cards can also contain two jokers. These cards have the word “Joker” in the upper left and lower right corners. This allows you to add one or two wilds to games (Canasta, Five Hundred, Poker).

All the cards in a deck of cards have identical backs that contain anything from a solid color to a complex design. This allows you to see the value of your own cards but not your opponent’s (most games). This also allows you to play games where you try to remember the location of the face-down cards (Concentration). And this allows you to play games in which one participant can look at the cards and then place them face down so that others cannot see them (Texas Holdum ‘Poker).

And the suits, the badges, the images of the faces and the reverse are printed on cardstock with a plastic layer or on plastic. This makes the cards durable and allows you to play many card games, alone or with friends (Blackjack, Bridge, Canasta, Concentration, Crazy Eights, Cribbage, Euchre, Fan Tan, Five-Hundred, Gin Rummy, Go Fish, Hearts , Michigan, Old Maid, Pinochle, Poker, Tripoli, War, Whist).

Did I miss something? I’m sure I did.

So a standard deck of cards is very versatile.