Spades rules

A partnership game built on a promise. You say how many tricks you will take, and both halves of missing it hurt.

Getting ready

A 52-card deck, thirteen cards each for four players in two partnerships. Aces are high. Spades are always trump — there is no auction for it.

The bidding

After looking at your hand, each player in turn bids the number of tricks they expect to take. The partnership's contract is the two bids added together.

Nil is a bid of zero: a promise to take no tricks at all, scored separately and worth a large bonus if it holds and an equal penalty if it does not. Blind nil is the same bid made before looking at your cards, for double.

The play

The player to the dealer's left leads, and spades may not be led until a spade has been played on some earlier trick. Follow suit if you can, otherwise play anything. Highest spade wins, or the highest card of the suit led.

Scoring

Make the contract and score 10 per trick bid. Fall short and lose 10 per trick bid — the whole contract, not the difference.

Bags

Each trick above the contract scores 1 point and also counts as a bag. Accumulate ten bags and 100 points are deducted. That is what stops partnerships underbidding for safety, and it is the part new players forget until it costs them the game.

Game is 500 points.

Spades: an example game

One game of Spades followed from the deal to the finish, move by move, with the reason for each choice.

The seats and your hand

You and Bo are partners, sitting opposite each other; Ada and Cleo are the other partnership. Cleo deals, so the bidding and the first lead start with you, on her left. Your hand: ♠ A K 9 6 3, ♥ A 7 2, ♦ Q 8 4, ♣ K 5.

Count your tricks. A♠ and K♠ should win, A♥ should win once, and five spades usually take one more trick at the end when the others run out. The K♣ may or may not win. You bid 4.

The bidding

Ada bids 4. Bo bids 3, so your partnership has promised 7 tricks between you. Cleo bids nil: a promise to take no tricks at all, scored on its own, worth 100 if she keeps it and minus 100 if she does not. Her partnership's contract is Ada's 4.

A nil changes the whole hand. Ada will now try to protect Cleo by winning the tricks Cleo might otherwise be stuck with, and you and Bo can earn 100 points just by forcing Cleo to take one.

The first tricks

Spades cannot be led until one has been played, so you lead A♥. Ada plays 5♥, Bo 3♥, and Cleo throws K♥ under your ace — exactly what a nil bidder wants to do with high cards. You win the trick.

You lead 2♥. Ada plays 10♥. Bo has no hearts left, so he trumps with 5♠ and wins the trick for your side. Cleo plays 9♥. That spade breaks spades, and from now on anyone may lead them.

The middle of the hand

Over the next nine tricks your A♠ and K♠ win, you ruff a club once your K♣ and 5♣ are gone, and Bo takes two more. Ada wins four, using her high cards to take tricks that Cleo would otherwise have been forced to win.

By trick twelve your side has 7 tricks, Ada has 4, and Cleo has none. Cleo has two cards left: J♦ and 2♠.

Breaking the nil

You lead 4♦, a low diamond. Ada has no diamonds and no spades left, so she can only throw a club. Bo plays 2♦. Cleo must follow suit, and her only diamond is the jack, which wins the trick. Her nil is broken.

On the last trick Cleo leads 2♠, and your 9♠ wins it. The final count: your partnership 8 tricks, Ada 4, Cleo 1.

The score

Your side bid 7 and took 8: 70 points for the contract and 1 for the overtrick, which is also your first bag. Ada and Cleo bid 4 and took 5 between them, since Cleo's trick counts for the partnership: 40 plus 1 for a bag. But Cleo's nil failed, which costs 100, so they score minus 59.

After one hand it is 71 to minus 59. The first partnership to 500 wins, and every tenth bag costs a hundred along the way.