Contents
Spades Basics
How to Play Spades
Basic Spades Strategy
Spades Variations
Scoring Variations in Spades
Bidding Variations in Spades
Three-Player Spades
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How to Play Spades
Number of Players
Spades is played by a total of four players divided into two teams. (For a three-player variation, see Spades Variations.)
Selecting the Teams
For four-player spades, you can select the teams yourself or use the deck to do it, as follows:
- Before play begins, each player chooses a card from the deck.
- The players who draw the two highest cards form one pair, and the players who draw the two lowest cards form the other.
Partners sit across from each other at the table and are typically referred to by their position at the table: North, South, East, or West. North partners South, and East
partners West.
Cards
Spades is played with a standard deck of 52 cards, ranked from highest to lowest within each suit:
Spades
The suit of spades is always trump, meaning that even the lowest spade ranks higher than any card of another suit.
The Deal
Before play begins in spades, the dealer for the first round must be determined. Then the cards are dealt.
Determining the Dealer
If cards were used to select partners, whoever drew the highest card then deals the first round. Otherwise, all the players draw a card from the deck to determine who will deal first—the player who draws the highest card deals in the first round. With each subsequent round, the deal passes clockwise around the table.
Dealing the Cards
The player to the dealer’s right cuts the cards. Beginning with the player to the dealer’s left, the dealer deals the cards face down, clockwise around the table, until each player has 13 cards.
Bidding
After the cards are dealt, the players examine their hands. Based on the cards they’re holding, each player, starting with the player to the dealer’s left, then bids on how many tricks he or she will take. A bid is a player’s best guess of how many tricks he or she will win out of a total of 13 tricks, and must be a number from 0–13. Players bid one at a time in clockwise order.
Unlike many other bidding games, spades does not require that a player’s bid be higher than the previous bid. There is only one round of bidding, and passing is not allowed. After the round of bidding is completed, each partnership adds its two bids together. This total is how many tricks the partnership must take in order to make its bid. For example, if West bids 4, North bids 3, East bids 5, and South bids 2, the West/East partnership must win a total of 4 + 5 = 9 tricks to make its bid, while the North/South partnership must win a total of 3 + 2 = 5 tricks to make its bid. Teams are rewarded for bidding accurately. In contrast, bidding too low can be costly, and bidding too high can be especially costly. Players should write down how many tricks were bid to avoid disputes at the end of the round.
Nil
A bid of 0, called bidding nil, is a special case. A player who bids nil must not win any tricks to make his or her bid. His or her partner, however, still tries to take the number of tricks that he or she has bid. A bid of nil is the only time partners’ bids are treated separately. For example, if North bids nil and South bids 4, North will make the nil bid by taking 0 tricks, and South will make his or her bid by taking 4 tricks. The two bids are treated and scored separately.
Since it’s generally difficult to do, succeeding in a nil bid earns a scoring bonus.
Blind Nil
If a team is behind by 100 points or more, a bid of blind nil is permitted. To make a blind nil bid, a player bids nil before looking at his or her cards. Succeeding in a bid of blind nil is worth even more points than a bid of nil but is even more difficult to do.
A common rule is that a player who bids blind nil is permitted to trade two cards with his or her partner after the bid has been made and both players have looked at their cards. The player who bids blind nil passes two cards face down to the partner, then the partner gives two different cards face down to the player who bid blind nil.
Spades Game Play
A game of spades is made up of a series of rounds. Each round includes 13 tricks and follows the same basic pattern:
- Lead
- After the lead
- Winning the trick
- Playing the next trick
- End of the round
Lead
A trick of spades begins when a player leads—the player places a card from his or her hand face up in the middle of the table. This first card played is called the led card. For the first trick only in that round, the player to the dealer’s left leads. Subsequent tricks are led by the winner of the previous trick. There is just one limitation on the cards that a player may lead—a player may lead a spade only if:
- The player has only spades left in his or her hand
- Someone else has played spades on a previous trick
If neither of these criteria is met, then a player may not lead spades. When a spade is played for the first time, it is known as breaking spades.
After the Lead
Play then proceeds clockwise around the table until every player has played a card. Each player places a card face up next to the led card, following these rules:
- If you have one or more cards of the same suit as the led card, you must play that suit.
- If you don’t have a card of the same suit as the led card, you may play any card (including a spade).
Winning the Trick
The winner of the trick is based on two simple rules:
- If a trick does not contain any spades: The player who played the highest card of the led suit wins the trick.
- If a trick contains one or more spades: The player who played the highest spade wins the trick.
Whoever wins takes all of the cards in the trick and places them face down at his or her side. Tricks that are won must be placed in such a manner that it’s clear how many tricks each player has won.
Playing the Next Trick
The winner of the trick then leads the next trick. Play once again proceeds clockwise until all players have played a card and a winner is determined. Then the cycle repeats.
End of a Round
A round of spades is complete after 13 tricks, when all cards have been played.
Scoring in Spades
At the end of each round, each team earns a score based on the accuracy of their bids.
Scoring a Round
The goal of spades is for each team to win as many tricks as were bid. Doing so is called making a bid, and failing to do so is called getting set.
Making a Bid
If a team makes its bid, it receives 10 points for every trick that it bid. For example, if a team’s total bid for a round is 8, the team would receive 8 × 10 = 80 points for making this bid. If a team wins more tricks than it bid, it receives 10 points for every trick bid, plus 1 additional point for every
excess trick won. These excess tricks are called bags. Though it might seem that every extra point you can get would be a positive, spades actually penalizes teams for winning too may bags (see “Sandbagging” later in this section).
Getting Set
If a team fails to make its bid, it loses 10 points for every trick that it bid. Whether a team falls short by just 1 trick or many tricks is irrelevant—the penalty is still 10 points for every trick that the team bid. For example, if a team bids 6 tricks but takes only 4, it would lose 6 × 10 = 60 points. If another team also bid 6 tricks while taking only 1, it would also lose 60 points.
Sandbagging
If a team wins 10 or more bags over the course of a game of spades, it is said to be sandbagged and is assessed a penalty of 100 points. Consequently, in addition to trying to make your own bids, an important part of spades strategy involves trying to force the other team to take excess tricks beyond their bids—a practice known as sandbagging.
It’s easy to keep track of how many bags a team has received—just look at the rightmost number in its score. For example, since a team earns 1 point for each bag it wins, a score of 78 indicates that the team has taken 8 bags.
If the same team takes 2 more bags, it will incur a
100-point penalty.
Nil and Blind Nil
If a player succeeds in a bid of nil, his or her team receives 50 points. A failed nil bid, though, results in a 50-point penalty. The other bid on the team is considered independently of the nil bid. For example:
- If West makes a nil bid and East makes a bid of 4 tricks, the team wins 50 points for the nil and 40 points for making bid. The total for the round is 90 points.
- If West makes a nil bid but East gets set on a bid of 4 tricks, the team wins 50 points for the nil but loses 40 points for getting set. The total for the round is 10 points.
A bid of blind nil is treated much like a bid of nil. But making the bid of blind nil is worth 100 points, while getting set on a bid of blind nil results in a 100-point penalty.
Winning the Game
Points are recorded for each round and accumulated over the course of the game. As soon as one team’s cumulative score from all rounds exceeds a predetermined value, the team with the higher score wins. A game of spades may be played to any score, but 500 is most common. A score of 300 is good for a short game, while 1,000 is good for an extended game.
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