YouHold » Beginners http://www.youhold.com A site for all bridge players, from beginner to world champion. Fri, 08 Dec 2006 20:23:09 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 en hourly 1 Learning the Game 3 – Introduction to card play http://www.youhold.com/2006/09/learning-the-game-3-introduction-to-card-play/ http://www.youhold.com/2006/09/learning-the-game-3-introduction-to-card-play/#comments Wed, 13 Sep 2006 01:51:34 +0000 admin http://www.youhold.com/learning-the-game-3-introduction-to-card-play/ Post from: YouHold

]]> There are many games which have similar card play to bridge.  Bridge is a member of the Whist family of games, or trick taking games.  Other well known examples are Hearts and Spades.

Every suit has an order or rank to the cards.  Ace is the highest card, followed by the King, Queen, Jack, then 10 down to 2.

Each player plays a single card in clockwise order, known as a trick.  The person “on lead” gets to choose any card in his hand; every player after that must play a card of the same suit if they can (“following suit”), otherwise they may play any card they wish (“discarding”).  The winner of the trick is the player who played the highest card of the suit led.  They get to be “on lead” for the following trick.

In some cases, the bidding will name a trump suit.  The trump suit assumes a special roll in the play of the hand.  If a player does not have to follow suit to the lead, they may discard a member of the trump suit or “trump” the trick.  If any player does this, the highest trump played to the trick wins.  All players must still play the original suit led if they can.

Scoring is based on a combination of bidding and play.  During the bidding, the declaring side states how many tricks they think they will win.  (For example, the bid 3 hearts says “I can take 3+6 tricks with hearts as my trump suit.)  If they acheive this goal (or better), they “make” their contract and earn points.  If they fail in their stated goal, the non-declaring or “defending” side get points.

One unique difference in the card play in bridge against other trick taking games: after the initial opening lead by the left hand opponent of the declarer, the next hand gets placed face up on the table for all to see.  The declarer gets to control both his own hand and this one, allowing that team to use their combined assets to greater effect.  Of course, the defenders get to see this hand as well, and try their best to stop declarer.
In the next installment of this series, we’ll explore a sample hand through the whole lifecycle, from bidding to play.

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]]> http://www.youhold.com/2006/09/learning-the-game-3-introduction-to-card-play/feed/ 0 Learning the Game 2 – What is Bidding? http://www.youhold.com/2006/04/learning-the-game-2-what-is-bidding/ http://www.youhold.com/2006/04/learning-the-game-2-what-is-bidding/#comments Wed, 19 Apr 2006 12:27:19 +0000 admin http://www.youhold.com/learning-the-game-2-what-is-bidding/ Post from: YouHold

]]> The life cycle of a bridge hand has 2 very distinct phases: bidding and play. The concept of bidding may be somewhat familiar to those of you who have played Spades or Pinochle. The idea is to try to determine how successful you and your partner can be in the card play as a team. In other words, to reach a good “contract”.

In Spades, the bidding phase is straightforward. The person on dealer’s left starts by naming how many tricks they think they can win. Proceeding clockwise, each player gets one turn to name how many tricks they can win, and the team totals become the goal. You play the cards with spades as “trump” and score the hand based on whether the stated goals were achieved or not.

Bidding in Bridge is similar in nature, but there are a couple of important differences:

  • You do not have to bid. At each player’s turn to bid, they may choose to “Pass” (or “No Bid”)
  • There can be more than one round of bidding. Bidding continues until 3 consecutive players have chose to Pass, so long as everyone has had at least one bid. The complete bidding, all the rounds taken together, is called the auction.
  • Bids consist of both a level and a strain. That is, a bid consists of two parts. The first is a number from 1 to 7 which says “I am going to win X+6 tricks.” The second part is one of the 4 suits (Clubs, Diamonds, Hearts or Spades) or “No Trump”. This indicates if there is a trump suit, and if so which suit. [If you don't know what trump is, don't worry. We'll get there later.]
  • Auctions are hierarchial. That is, there is a definite order to bidding from lowest to highest. Once any player has taken a bid, any subsequent bids by any player must be higher.

Because of the differences in the dynamics, Bridge auctions have more of a conversational nature to them than a similar auction in Spades. For example, a Spades player may have to decide whether a King in a side suit is worth a trick or not without any input from your partner. In Bridge, there are times when you have the opportunity to express that doubt about your trick and partner can help decide if it is worth a trick or not.

Key points to remember:

  • Bidding is a conversation. You are talking to your partner to try to get to the best contract.
  • Bidding sets the stage for card play. The strongest hand you can ever hold won’t mean much if your bidding is unsuccessful. Conversely, an otherwise weak hand might be made much more valuable that it seemingly should with good bidding.
  • Bidding is a hierarchy. You can only move up the ladder, not down.

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]]> http://www.youhold.com/2006/04/learning-the-game-2-what-is-bidding/feed/ 1 Learning the Game 1 – The Basics http://www.youhold.com/2006/03/learning-the-game-1-the-basics/ http://www.youhold.com/2006/03/learning-the-game-1-the-basics/#comments Sun, 26 Mar 2006 21:59:11 +0000 admin http://youhold.com/?p=14 Post from: YouHold

]]> Whenever the topic of bridge comes up with any of my acquaintances or co-workers, they inevitably say something similar to: “I’d like to learn how to play. But of course, between job and family – who has time for a card game?”

I can certainly understand why bridge may seem daunting to an outsider. Anyone who has read a bridge column in the newspaper knows that bridge has so many names or slang for different aspects of the game, it seems like a different language. All of that can make it very difficult for someone new to the game to learn – or even to want to learn. This is very unfortunate; bridge is a wonderful game, and in fact is probably not much different than many other games people already know such as Hearts, Spades or Pinochle.

In this series of articles, I’m going to try to go over the basics – the minimum you need to know to play the game. Stay tuned for Part 2, The bidding.

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