Church Minshull Bridge Club - Beginners Class - session 1 Welcome to bridge 1.1 Congratulations on deciding to learn to play bridge and joining over 100 million people all over the world who play the best card game ever invented! It is totally absorbing and stimulating, played by young and old alike, so this is a decision you will never regret. Playing bridge is a great social asset and whatever level you reach you can be sure of many enjoyable hours at the card table. 1.2 Bridge is played with a normal pack of cards without the jokers. There are four suits: ♠ - spades (black) ♥- hearts (red) ◊ - diamonds (red) ♣ - clubs (black) In each suit there are thirteen cards, from the two to the ace. The ace is high and there are no wild cards. Bridge is a member of the trick-taking family of card games that also includes whist. All the cards are dealt out so everyone has thirteen. Essentially, everyone plays a card and the person who plays the highest one wins the trick. However, before you get to play the cards you partner have to decided your have to decide how many tricks you think you can make in your combined hands 1.3 Points are scored for winning tricks and the object of the game is to win as many tricks and points as possible. For convenience, the four sides of the table are referred to as the cardinal points of the compass, North, East, South and West. One distinctive feature of bridge is that it is a team game. North and South are partners, as are East and West. Any tricks North wins counts for the North/South team's total, as do all the tricks won by South. This aspect of bridge is one of the many things that make it different from other card games - the ability to get the best out of your partner is very important. 1 Bridge is a complicated game - if it were not so, there would not be so much interest in it. You can tell someone how to play Snap in two minutes and in thirty minutes everyone is bored. Bridge is not like that. There is a lifetime of fascination in those fifty-two bits of stiffened paper and there is also a lifetime of learning more. Just when you think you know how to play, whole new areas open up before you so you never stop improving. The person who is teaching you will readily admit he/she is still learning. In addition, the theory of the game keeps developing so there are always new ideas to think about. For this reason, a good bridge player is an old bridge player! People just keep on improving until senility sets in - and there is good evidence to show that playing bridge delays that. 1.4 Playing with trumps Many deals are played with one suit as trumps. The trump suit ranks higher than the other three suits. This means a trump card beats any card of one of the other suits. You must follow suit if you can but if you have no cards left in a suit you may play a trump card. If more than one trump is played, the highest trump wins the trick. You do not have to trump just because you have run out of a suit. You can, if you judge it more sensible, discard a card in another suit instead. 1.5 How to Choose Trumps The ‘side’ which thinks it can win the most tricks becomes ‘Declarer’ and always has to make more tricks than the defenders and therefore need to control the play. To be able to do this declarer must have more trumps than the defenders. This means you need at least eight cards between your hand and dummy's to choose a suit as trumps - more would be better, seven will do at a pinch but never choose a suit with six cards or fewer as trumps. It is usually better to play in no trumps with no long suit. 2 1.6 Trumps and Scoring Points are scored only for the seventh and subsequent tricks. The points available depend on what has been chosen as trumps: NT no trumps 40 for the first & 30 for subsequent tricks ♠ spades 30 per trick ♥ hearts 30 per trick ◊ diamonds 20 per trick ♣ clubs 20 per trick Spades and Hearts are called the major suits because they score better and clubs and diamonds are called the minors. Game Bonus If you bid and achieve a contract where the number of points exceed 100 you earn a game bonus. The bonus points when non-vunerable is 300 and when vunerable 500. The stacking board indicates whether you are vunerable or not. In no-trumps the number of tricks you need to make to earn your bonus is 3 scoring tricks ( 9 tricks in total) In major suits ie Spades and Hearts you need to make 4 scoring tricks ( 10 in total) and in Minor suits ie Diamonds and Clubs you need to make 5 scoring tricks (11 in total) Even more generous bonuses apply if you achieve a small slam (12 total tricks ) or grand slam ( 13 total tricks) Penalty points You incur penalty points if you fail to reach your contract. 50 points per trick when non- vunerable and 100 points per trick when vunerable. A full scoring table is attached 3 1.7 Evaluating your Hand To determine which ‘side’ thinks it can make the most tricks, you go through a ‘bidding’ process, which is often called an ‘auction’ with the side prepared to bid to the highest level becoming declarer. Before you bid it is necessary to evaluate the strength of your hand. This is done by allocating points to the high cards in your hand. Ace = 4 King = 3 Queen = 2 Jack = 1 · Additionally a hand with long and short suits is stronger to play. · You need 12 High Card Points to open the Bidding · Determine whether you hand is balanced in which case you will want to Bid no- trumps · With one or two long suits you will want to be in a suit contract. With 25 high card points between your hand and partners you should think about bidding to the level of a ‘game’ contract which is a contract which if achieved will score 100 points or more. Remember a game bonus is important. Experience shows that with 25 high card points between declarer and dummy's hands there will usually be the potential to make a game, at least in no trumps or one of the majors. Playing with a minor suit as trumps, a few more points will usually be necessary - about 28 - as you have to make the extra tricks. Not every hand with 25 points will be able to make a game and sometimes it will be possible with fewer, but it is a good general guide. The points needed for game are not magic! Work it out. 40 points in the pack, 13 tricks on a deal, about 3 points needed for each trick. 1.8 Declarer and Defender As state above on each hand of Bridge one partnership i.e. North/South or East/West is Declarer and the other Defender. To determine which partnership is declarer a process of bidding takes place, which is called an Auction. The purpose of the bidding is for each person to describe his hand to his partner and together each partnership assesses how many tricks they can make with their combined hands. We will move on to the bidding process in lesson 4, but in order to understood the mechanics of the game we will first learn to play Mini Bridge 4 How to play MiniBridge This is a partnership game. Partners sit opposite each other at the table. The cards are dealt clockwise, one at a time until each player has thirteen cards. The players count their high card points on the scale, ace = 4, king = 3, queen = 2, jack = 1. Each player announces the points held, starting with the dealer. If the total is not 40, something has gone wrong already and a re-count is necessary! The partnership with the higher total wins the contract (re-deal if there are 20 points each) and the individual in the partnership with the higher total becomes declarer, ie the person playing the cards and there partners hand becomes dummy. The dummy's hand is put down on the table and declarer chooses the contract. Declarer chooses a game or a part-score and either no trumps or a specific trump suit. The required tricks for a part score is 7 tricks; and for game it is 9 tricks in no-trumps, 10 tricks if Hearts or Spades are trumps and 11 tricks in Clubs or Diamonds. After the level and denomination have been chosen, the opening lead is made by the player to the left of declarer. Play goes clockwise round the table. The highest card played in the suit wins the trick, but a trump outranks any card in another suit. The player winning the trick, leads to the next trick. Players must follow suit if they can, but may play a trump or discard another suit if they cannot do so. The cards are turned over and the winner of the trick leads to the next trick. Declarer controls the play of dummy's cards and. if the winning card comes from dummy, the first card for the next trick comes from dummy, but declarer says what it should be.