Spades Rules

These are the rules I use for Spades. I got them from John McLeod's pagat.com, which has rules for pretty much all card games. (C) John McLeod, 2011 - reprinted with permission.

The teams

The four players are in fixed partnerships, with partners sitting opposite each other. Deal and play are clockwise.

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Rank of Cards

A standard pack of 52 cards is used. The cards, in each suit, rank from highest to lowest: A, K, Q, J, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2.

The Deal

The first dealer is chosen at random, and the turn to deal rotates clockwise. The cards are shuffled and then dealt singly, in clockwise order beginning with the player on dealer's left, until all 52 cards have been dealt and everyone has 13.

The Bidding

In Spades, all four players bid a number of tricks. Each team adds together the bids of the two partners, and the total is the number of tricks that team must try to win in order to get a positive score. The bidding begins with the player to dealer's left and continues clockwise around the table. Everyone must bid a number, and in theory any number from 0 to 13 is allowed. Unlike other games with bidding, there is no requirement for each bid to be higher than the last one, and players are not allowed to pass. There is no second round of bidding - bids once made cannot be altered.

Example: South deals; West bids 3; North bids 1; East bids 4; South bids 4. The objective of North and South is to win at least 5 tricks (4+1), East and West try to win at least 7 (4+3).

A bid of 0 tricks is known as Nil. This is a declaration that that the player who bid Nil will not win any tricks during the play. There is an extra bonus for this if it succeeds and a penalty if it fails. The partnership also has the objective of winning the number of tricks bid by the Nil's partner. It is not possible to bid no tricks without bidding a Nil. If you don't want to go for the Nil bonus or penalty you must bid at least 1.

The Play of the Hand

The player to dealer's left leads any card except a spade to the first trick. Each player, in turn, clockwise, must follow suit if able; if unable to follow suit, the player may play any card.

A trick containing a spade is won by the highest spade played; if no spade is played, the trick is won by the highest card of the suit led. The winner of each trick leads to the next. Spades may not be led until either some player has played a spade (on the lead of another suit, of course), or the leader has nothing but spades left in hand.

Playing the first spade is known as 'breaking' spades.

A Boston is when one team gets all 13 tricks in a round.

Scoring

A side that takes at least as many tricks as its bid calls for receives a score equal to 10 times its bid. Additional tricks (overtricks) are worth an extra one point each.

Sandbagging rule: Overtricks are colloquially known as bags. A side which (over several deals) accumulates ten or more bags has 100 points deducted from its score. Any bags beyond ten are carried over to the next cycle of ten overtricks - that is if they reached twenty overtricks they would lose another 100 points and so on.

Example: Suppose a team whose score is 337 bids 5 tricks and they have 7 bags carried over from the previous rounds. If they win 7 tricks they score 52, taking their score to 389 (and their bags to 9). If they win 8 tricks they score 53, but lose 100 because they now have 10 bags, and their score becomes 290 (337 + 53 - 100). If they win 9 tricks they score 54 and lose 100, bringing their score to 291.

If a side does not make its bid, they lose 10 points for each trick they bid.

If a bid of nil is successful, the nil bidder's side receives 100 points. This is in addition to the score won (or lost) by the partner of the nil bidder for tricks made. If a bid of nil fails - that is, the bidder takes at least one trick - the bidder's side loses 100 points, but still receives any amount scored for the partner's bid.

When a nil fails, the tricks won by the nil bidder do not count towards making the partner's bid, but do count as bags for the team.

The side which reaches 500 points first wins the game. If both sides reach 500 points in a single deal, the side with the higher score wins.

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How to Play Spades

Players

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In a typical game, there are four players and two team. You are on the same team as the person across from you and the same goes for the other two.

The Goal of Spades

The goal is to accumulate points, and the first to 500 points wins.

Dealing

The dealer will deal out all of the cards so each player will end up with 13 to start.

Bidding

Bidding is simply guessing how many 'tricks' you can take. Before each round of Spades begins, each player will bid (or guess) how many tricks they will take.

The teams then add together the total number of bids. This is the number of tricks that team has to win in order to get a positive score.

The first player to bid is the person to the left of the dealer. Bidding then continues clockwise around the table.

You may bid on any number from 0 to 13. But be smart and remember that it's very difficult to get all or even half of the tricks. A bid of zero or 'nil' is another strategy we'll talk about shortly.

Here's an example: Sarah deals. Beyonce who is to her left bids 3. Billy then bids 1. Terrance bids 4. And finally Sarah bids 4. Billy and Sarah's goal is to win at least 5 tricks based on their bids (4+1), Terrance and Beyonce will attempt to win at least 7 (4+3).

As mentioned previously, a bid of zero is also called a nil bid. This is basically a player trying NOT to win any tricks. Why would anyone do that though? Well, there's a huge bonus if you can bid nil and succeed. There's also a penalty for bidding nil and getting 1 or more tricks. We'll talking about scoring shortly.

Playing Spades

After all of the bidding is done, the player to the dealers left begins by playing any card EXCEPT for a spade. It can be any heart, diamond or club, but no spades.

Then, again in clockwise, each player lays down a card (trick) face up. The card must be of the same suit as the person who started (in this case, the person to the left of the dealer). If you do not have the same suit, you can play any card of any suit!

If someone plays a spade, that spade trumps all other cards EXCEPT for higher spades. So even if someone plays the Ace of diamonds, and I play the 2 of spades, I win that trick if no other spades are played. If no spades are played, the highest card wins of the suit that was played first. The winner of each trick leads on the next.

After the first spade has been played, then spades are 'broken.'

Scoring

So we've already talked about how the goal is to get the number of tricks that you and your partner bid. If you bid 5, you want to get at least 5. If you get exactly 5, you win 10x your bid, so 50 points. Additional tricks (overtricks) are only worth one point apiece.

This means if my partner and I bid 5, then get 7 tricks, our total score for that round will come to 52.

However, if we don't get 5 tricks, we're in trouble. This means we lose 10 points for each bid. So if we bid 5, then get 4 tricks - we lose 50 points! Eek!

Sandbagging: Each trick we win that is over the bid is known as a bag. Back to the example: if we bid 5 and get 7, then we get 2 bags.

Bags can also be bad. Each round you keep track of the number of bags you get, and if you reach a total of 10 bags, you lose 100 points on that round. Your bag count then starts back at zero.

Remember the nil (or zero) bid? If you can pull of a nil bid and get no tricks, you receive 100 points! This will be in addition the number that your partner wins or loses. If you bid nil and don't pull it off, you lose 100 points so it can be very detrimental as well. Again, your partner's score is still factored into the round as well.

If a nil bid fails, the tricks won by the nil bidder don't count towards the partner's bid, but would count as bags for the team if the total goes over your partner's bid.

The side that reaches 500 points first wins the game. If both sides reach 500 points in a single deal, the side with the higher score wins. Got it? Then get back up there and play some Spades!!!

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Terminology

Trick:

When all four cards are layed out, the trick is what you call the winner of that particular throw down.

Book:

This is pretty much the same thing as a trick. Treat it as such.

Hand:

The series of books or tricks where all 13 cards that is player is dealt are played.

Bid:

This is the number of tricks/books that you think you will get in any given hand. You combine the number you think you will get with the number your teammate estimates

Contract:

This is the number of tricks/books that you and your partner must get for the hand in order to not be docked.

Under trick:

It is just like it sounds: not getting quite the number of tricks that you wanted for a hand. This usually results in loss of points.

Bag:

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This is also referred to as an overtrick. This is when you get more books than you estimated before the hand. Ten bags incur a penalty of 100 docked points.

Void:

When you don't have any of the cards of the suit that is being played.

Trump:

Having a better card to lay down than the others that have been played. Spades trump all in this game of course!

Sluff:

This is when you don't have the suit being played but you also don't have a trump card. This is sometimes a good thing early on when you are trying to get rid of some of the less desireable cards.

Nil:

When you declare that you will get no books/tricks you are declaring nil. If you accomplish this, you get a lot more points!!