Trump Suit

Trump Suit

The Jokers are the highest trumps.
Origin U.S.
Alternative names Trumps
Type Trick-taking
Players 2-3 (single deck)
Skills required Card counting, Tactics
Cards 54
Deck French
Play Clockwise
Card rank (highest to lowest) "Big" Joker, "Little" Joker, A K Q J 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2
Random chance Moderate
Related games
Spades, Bid Whist, Contract Bridge, Tarneeb, Oh Hell

Trump Suit is a trick-taking card game played by two to three players.. It is played as a solo/”cutthroat” game. The object is to take at least the number of tricks (also known as books) that were bid before play of the hand began. Trump Suit is considered to be an alternative to the traditional card game of Spades, but without the need of four players. Trump Suit is a descendant of the Whist family of card games, which also includes Spades, Bid Whist, Tarneeb, and Oh Hell. Its major difference as compared to other Whist variants is that, instead of trump being decided by the highest bidder from cards in hand, random cards drawn from the leftover, draw deck determines the trump.

General overview

Object of the game

To score points (generally 500). Points are accrued by winning at least the number of tricks bid in each hand, and are lost by failing to take at least that many, or in some cases by taking too many.

Number of players

Two to three: the game is most commonly played with two to three players.

The deck

Standard 54-card deck. The game is played with both joker cards.

Rank of suit

The cards that are drawn from the leftover, draw deck determines the trump. Other suits have no intrinsic value during play, but a card of the suit led in the current trick will beat a card of any other suit except the trump suit.

Rank of cards

Highest to lowest: “Big” Joker, “Little” Joker, A K Q J 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2

The "Big" Joker often refers to the Guaranteed Joker.

Gameplay

The Deal

The first dealer is chosen by the draw of the highest ranking card. And thereafter the deal passes to the dealer’s left after each hand. The dealer shuffles, and the player to the right is given the opportunity to “cut” the cards to prevent the dealer stacking the deck. The entire deck is then dealt face-down one card at a time in clockwise order. Each player receives 13 cards. The players then pick up their cards, verify the correct count of the cards, and arrange them as desired (the most common arrangement is by suit, then rank). The rest of the remaining deck is laid face-down and the first card on top is flipped face-up. This card determines the starting trump suit to be played.

Misdeal

A misdeal is a deal in which all players have not received the same number of cards or a player has dealt out of turn. A misdeal may be discovered immediately by counting the cards after they are dealt, or it may be discovered during play of a hand. If a single card is misdealt and discovered before players in question have seen their cards the player that is short a card can pull a card at random from the player with an extra card. Otherwise a hand is misdealt, the hand is considered void and the hand must be re-dealt by the same dealer (unless the reason for the re-deal is the hand was dealt out of turn)

Bidding

Each player bids the number of tricks he expects to take. The player to the left of the dealer starts the bidding and bidding continues in a clockwise direction, ending with the dealer. A bid of "zero" is not allowed; the player must either bid at least one or two, or may bid "nil" (see below).

Blind and Nil Bidding

Two very common variants of bidding are for a player to bid "blind", without having looked at their cards, or to bid "nil", stating that they will not take a single trick during play of the hand. These bids give the player a bonus if the player exactly meets his bid, but penalizes him if the player takes more or fewer. A combined bid of "blind nil" is usually allowed, and is worth both the blind and nil bonuses or penalties. The common rule is no cards are swapped for a regular nil but one or two cards are swapped for blind nil (this is called "nil swapping").

Nil swapping

Players may agree that a certain number of cards may, or must, be swapped with the leftover, draw deck before or after making a bid. Passing generally allows players to attempt to "shorten" or "void" a suit, or get rid of "dangerous" cards such as upper pip cards or low face cards, which may win a trick the player didn't bid to take. Swapped cards are reshuffled into the leftover, draw deck for possible later use as trump designators.

Game play

The drawn trump suit from the draw deck is a ♣ card (2♣). South sloughs with a 3♥, West attempts to trump with a 4♣, North raises the trump with a K♣, and East plays a "Little" Joker for the win..

Each hand consists of a number of tricks (13 tricks using some, if not all, 54 cards). The player to the dealer's left makes the opening lead by either playing a single card that matches the suit of the existing flipped draw card from the leftover, draw deck, or by flipping a new card from the top of the draw deck to potentially change the trump suit(the trump suit only designates the suit to be played; the denomination has no effect on game play). Players in clockwise fashion then play a card of their choice; they must follow suit, if they can, otherwise they may play any card, including a trump Joker. Once a card has left the hand of a player, it stands and cannot be retrieved unless the player who threw the card makes an effort to correct his mistake before the next player lays down a card.

The trick is won or taken by the player who played the highest value card; if one or more trumps were played the highest trump card wins, otherwise the highest card of the suit led wins. The player who wins the trick gathers the cards up into a face-down arrangement that allows players to count the number of tricks taken. The contents of each trick cannot be viewed after this point, except to determine whether a player reneged (played an off-suit card including trumps when they could have and thus should have followed suit). The number of tricks a player has won cannot be disguised, if asked each player must count out their tricks until everyone has agreed on their "trick count". The player who wins any given trick leads the next.

The winner of a bag may flip a new draw card to potentially change the trump suit. A player must flip a new draw card if the player cannot play the suit already showing. If the next flipped trump suit cannot be played, then the player plays any card in hand. If no card matches the trump suit in the draw pile then the highest card wins. If the cards are of the same denomination, then the winner of the bag is determined by the suit (highest to lowest): spades, hearts, diamonds then clubs. Play continues until all players have exhausted their hands, which should occur on the same (last) trick. Otherwise, it is a misdeal.

Jokers

Joker cards are "wild cards" when drawn from the leftover, draw deck. If a Joker is pulled into the trump pile, the initiating player to lay down a card from in hand determines the trump of that trick. When in hand, the jokers are the highest trump cards with no particular suit; suit-less cards. The Guarantee joker is considered higher than its twin.

Reneging

A player reneges on their contract if they violate the rules of play; most often this happens when a player plays off-suit when he could have, and therefore should have, followed suit. The penalty for reneging varies; in most cases it nullifies that player's contract (the player cannot make his contract and his score is reduced by 10 points for each bid trick), while sometimes reneging results in a three-trick penalty, meaning the player may still make contract but must take three additional tricks to do so. It does not matter if the player reneges on purpose. The bags still count against the player, and will go against his points. On the other-hand if a player calls reneg and that player cannot prove or call out the hand that was a potential reneg, then the player that called out the false accusation is penalized the three-trick penalty.

Auctioning

A player may "auction" tricks if he doesn't want sandbags from the previous round in his score. Auctioning allows the player to rid of sandbags so as to not bag out and be penalized. Only up to 3 sandbags may be auctioned per round, and hence, only up to 3 extra tricks may be won by opposing player(s). The successfully bought bags are seen as extra books for a buyer - more points (+10 per book successfully bought).

Auctioning may be a special bid that is discussed among at least two players - the auctioneer and a "buyer". If no one wants to buy a player's bags then they become sandbags, permanently, to the player's score.

If a player has accrued extra books in a round, before the deal of the next round, that player may auction up to 3 of his sandbags. Only one player at a time may auction his cards. The precedent player for auctioning is the one with the most sandbags for auction. Or, if the same number bags is the same with another player, then the player with the most sandbags in his score is the auctioneer. If also the sandbag scores are the same, then the lowest scored player, overall, is the precedent auctioneer.

Another player, or multiple thereof, must be willing to buy the sandbags from the auctioneer to rid of them. Buyers of the bags may choose the amount they wish to have. The precedent buyer is the player with the lowest score, or if the scores are the same between buyers, then the buyer with the highest bid for the round is first to choose the amount to buy.

A player may only buy from an auctioneer if he is to win as many tricks as there are bags, if not more than. For example, a player may not buy 3 bags if he has only bid 2 tricks. He has to bid at least 3 tricks to potentially gain 3 bags.

If a buyer does not meet his quota of bags to buy, the leftover bags are added to the end of his score (they become sandbags). Otherwise, each successful bag gains an extra 10 points to the player. A player may not gain more bags than he intended to buy at the start of the round.

Bags may be helpful in obtaining the books needed as to not get "set" and be penalized.

Bags to be bought are singlet cards laid facedown before the deal in "bookkeeping stacks". When a buyer wins a trick, he may either buy a bag to keep as a book or play normally and initiate the next trick. If a bag is bought, then the player to his left starts the next trick.

Scoring

Once the final trick is played, the hand is then scored. Many variants for scoring exist; what follows is the basic method.

Contract score

Once a hand is completed, the players count the number of tricks they took. Each player's trick count is then compared to their contract. If the player or team made at least the number of tricks bid, 10 points for each bid trick are awarded (a bid of 5 would earn 50 points if made). If a player did not make their contract, they were "set", and 10 points for each bid trick are deducted from the team's score (e.g.: six bid and any number less than six taken results in minus 60 points). If a player took more tricks than they bid, a single point is scored for each overtrick, called an "overtrick", "bag" or "sandbag" (a bid of 5 tricks with 6 tricks taken results in a score of 51 points).

Bonuses or penalties

To this contract score, players add bonuses earned and subtract penalties assessed based on whether the player successfully did or failed to do any of the more specific things they said they would in the bidding phase. Many variants exist that award or penalize according to certain behaviors; they are covered below. For the basic Nil and blind bids, points are awarded as follows:

Bid made If bid met exactly If player took fewer If player took more
Nil 10-50 N/A -10-50
Blind ×2 bid -bid 0
Blind Nil 100-150 N/A −100-150

A player may choose the amount of points to wager for the nil bids in 10 point increments.

Sandbags or bagging out

An extremely common scoring variant is designed to penalize players for underestimating the number of tricks they will take, while at the same time not removing the possible strategy of intentionally taking overtricks, or "bags", in order to "set" the other players. This is accomplished by keeping track of bags in the ones place on the scorecard, and assessing a 100-point penalty when 10 bags are accumulated and the ones place rolls over. For example, if a player’s bid is 5 tricks and they take 8 tricks, the score for the hand is 53 points. If the player’s total score before this hand had a first digit of 7 or more, for instance 108, the player has "bagged out" or been "sandbagged"; the hand's score is added to the total and then 100 points are deducted. In the example, the score would be 61 points after the penalty. The 10 bags could be considered to make the penalty 90 points (the penalty can instead be 110 points to offset this, or the ones' place can simply not be carried when adding). Anything over 10 sandbags is retained in the first digit and count towards future overtricks; a player or team can bag out multiple times in a game.

Keeping score

One of the players is the scorer and has written the bids down, so that during the play and for the scoring afterward, this information will be available to all the players. When a hand is over, the scores should be recorded next to the bids. Alternatively, the scorer can turn the bid into the contract score by writing in the number of bags (zero if there were none) behind the bid, and a minus sign before it if the player was set, then add bonuses and subtract penalties beneath. A running score should be kept so that players can readily see each other's total points.

Winning

The most common condition is the first to reach 500 points, or forcing the opposing players to drop to −200 points. Alternatively, the game could be played for a fixed number of hands or a fixed time limit. If there is a tie, then all players participate in (at least) one more round of play until a winner is decided.

Nil

A player that has already looked at their cards can bid Nil. The object of the bidder is to take no tricks during the hand. If the Nil bidder takes no tricks, he receives the Nil bonus (10-50 points); if unsuccessful, the player subtracts that bonus (-10-15 points). More than one player (opponents) may bid Nil on a deal.

Blind Bidding

Virtually all games include a variant that may happen during bidding; one or more players, having not yet looked at their cards, may choose to bid on the number of tricks they will take. When bidding "blind", the player's bid, if made exactly by that player, is rewarded with bonus points (double the bid amount), while failing to make the bid results in the bonus being subtracted from the player's score. Blind bidding is capped at a bid of seven. Thus, bidding a blind 8 or higher is contrary to standard game play, and is not allowed. Quite commonly, blind bids are allowed only if the bidding player is at least 100 points behind, and in many cases, whether a minimum point spread is required, these risky bids are typically made by a player with a large deficit as a last-ditch effort; blind bids made in this situation are typically called "trailing blind bids".

Blind Nil

The most common blind bid, the player bids that they will not take a single trick during play of the hand (100-150 points). A failed nil bid, similar to a failed blind, results in the bonus being deducted from the score.

Step-by-step

  1. Need a pack of cards - standard 52 card pack with Jokers.
  2. The player that draws the highest card at random is the first dealer.
  3. The dealer shuffles the cards.
  4. The player to the dealer's right is given the option to "cut" the deck to prevent possible card stacking.
  5. Starting with the player to the dealer's left, 13 cards are dealt to each player, one facedown card at a time, in a clockwise motion
  6. Depending on the number of players (preferably 2-3), there should be leftover cards which are used for drawing new trumps and "nil swapping". This leftover deck may be called the "draw deck". These cards are placed facedown.
  7. The players may look at their cards and re-arrange as desired. Most commonly, the cards are ordered by suit then by denomination. These are the player's "in hand" cards.
    1. Each round players will determine the number of "books", or tricks, he will win. This number is given to the "score keeper". A successful bid will give the player 10 points per trick won.
      1. Obtaining fewer books than needed has the player "overbidding", and is penalized by having the books not won as the score, which is -10 points each.
      2. Obtaining more books than needed has the player "underbidding" and gains one point for each extra book to the end of his score (called "sandbags"). If 10 extra books are obtained over multiple rounds, -100 points are deducted from the player's score (called "bagging out"). Any extra bags after the reduction are still added to the players score. See "Auctioning" for a special bid to rid of sandbags.
      3. Any player at the start of a "round" may bid "blind", "nil" or "blind nil". If a player bids "blind", he is making a wager that he will obtain a predetermined amount of tricks without first viewing his cards. A successful blind will yield the player with an extra 100 points, or -100 points if unsuccessful. Nil swapping cards has each draw costing the player -10 points each. A cap could be established at up to 1 bags that may be swapped.
      4. If a player bids a nil, he is trying to obtain zero tricks for the round after viewing his cards. A successful nil has the player rewarded with 100 points; however, if unsuccessful the player is penalized -100 points. Nil swapping cards has each draw costing the player -10 points each. A cap could be established at up to 2 bags that may be swapped.
      5. A blind nil has the player wagering that he will not gain any tricks without viewing his cards first. A blind nil gains the player a nil plus a blind - 100+100, or 200 points, or -200 points if unsuccessful. Here a player has the option to "nil swap" up to two of his cards in hand with the draw deck to potentially better his hand. The top cards are taken from the facedown draw deck, and if replaced with in hand cards, the leftover cards (may only have 13 cards at the start of the round) are "burned" onto the bottom of the draw deck. Nil swapping cards has each draw costing the player -10 points each. A cap could be established at up to 3 bags that may be swapped.
    2. If at any time a player loses his nil bid, he may continue to play normally (with no bid) to accrue books and make up for the loss of points.
  8. The start of play has the top card of the draw deck flipped faceup by the dealer and placed adjacent to the draw deck. This may be called the "trump pile". The trump pile is used to determine the suit that is trump. The denomination of the trump suit card has no effect in gameplay. At the start of the game, the first flipped trump card must be played through - the first trick.
    1. If a Joker is pulled into the trump pile, the initiating player to lay down a card from in hand determines the trump of that trick, and possibly, subsequent tricks.
  9. The player to the dealer's immediate left plays the first card in hand that follows the suit in the trump pile. The player may play any card if void of that particular suit (called a "slough"); however, if found to have the correct suit later on, that player is to be penalized, and the player is said to have "reneged" (-10 points for each card in a book per reneg. So, if there are 3 players, that means 3 cards per trick are played, and -30 points to the player that reneged).
  10. The winner of the trick is the player that laid down the highest card of the given trump suit, or if no player laid a trump, then it's the highest valued card that wins. Rank of cards is as follows (highest to lowest): "Big" Joker, "Little" Joker, A K Q J 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2.
    1. A Joker card may only be played from in hand if a player is devoid of the given suit as trump for a trick.
    2. In a "draw", where two or more players have played the same-valued card, and no one has laid a suit that trumps, then the "youngest" (last) player to have laid the highest, same valued card is the winner of the trick. However, a player may "slough" his card underneath another player's same-valued card so to not take the trick.
  11. The winner of the last trick starts the next trick by either playing a single card that matches the current trump suit, or the player may flip a new trump from the draw deck to potentially change it, and then ensue by laying a card from in hand. If the player cannot play the current trump suit (the previously played trick's trump), he must flip from the draw deck into the trump pile, or will be penalized if the wrong suit is led (-10 points). However, if the next flipped trump card's suit cannot still be played, he may slough a card and not be penalized - see step 9 above).
  12. Game continues in this fashion until all tricks are played out (13 tricks). After multiple sessions of game rounds, a winner is determined by the first player to reach 500 points, or the player with the most points if an opposing player has reached -200 points. Sandbags do count as positive points throughput gameplay, and could determine a winner.

Auctioning

A player may "auction" tricks if he doesn't want sandbags from the previous round in his score. Auctioning allows the player to rid of sandbags so as to not bag out and be penalized. Only up to 3 sandbags may be auctioned per round by a single player, and hence, only up to 3 extra tricks may be won by opposing player(s). The successfully bought bags are seen as extra books for a buyer - more points (+10 per book successfully bought).

Auctioning may be a special bid that is discussed among at least two players - the auctioneer and a "buyer". If no one wants to buy a player's bags then they become sandbags, permanently, to the player's score.

If a player has accrued extra books in a round, before the deal of the next round, that player may auction up to 3 of his sandbags. Only one player at a time may auction his cards. The precedent player for auctioning is the one with the most sandbags for auction. Or, if the same number bags is the same with another player, then the player with the most sandbags in his score is the auctioneer. If also the sandbag scores are the same, then the lowest scored player, overall, is the precedent auctioneer.

Another player, or multiple thereof, must be willing to buy the sandbags from the auctioneer to rid of them. Buyers of the bags may choose the amount they wish to have. The precedent buyer is the player with the lowest score, or if the scores are the same between buyers, then the buyer with the highest bid for the round is first to choose the amount to buy.

A player may only buy from an auctioneer if he is to win as many tricks as there are bags, if not more than. For example, a player may not buy 3 bags if he has only bid 2 tricks. He has to bid at least 3 tricks to potentially gain 3 bags.

If a buyer does not meet his quota of bags to buy, the leftover bags are added to the end of his score (they become sandbags). Otherwise, each successful bag gains an extra 10 points to the player. A player may not gain more bags than he intended to buy at the start of the round.

Bags may be helpful in obtaining the books needed as to not get "set" and be penalized.

Bags to be bought are singlet cards laid facedown before the deal in "bookkeeping stacks". When a buyer wins a trick, he may either buy a bag to keep as a book or play normally and initiate the next trick. If a bag is bought, then the player to his left starts the next trick.

Terminology

See also

References

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