The goal is to merge these combinations in order to produce a winning hand by eventually lowering the total value of the unmerged cards in the hand. The game can be played by tworummgold or more players, and usually a dealer distributes a certain number of cards to each player after shuffling the deck. The draw pile is made up of the remaining cards, and the discard pile is started with the top card face-up. In order to make legitimate melds & get rid of unwanted cards, players alternately draw from the draw pile and the discard pile.