The Cost of Each Bridge Hand
Bridge is a game enjoyed by casual players who just want to have fun and the scientists who wants to ponder on the intricacies of bidding and card combinations. '…That probably makes it one of the widely played cards game, anyone can play it…' Joshua Paige reasoned on why a lot of people play this game. It has been years now when he first learned it and each game is of great delight.
The Bridge game that is known today is derived from an English card game called Whist. The Bridge name was known in 1894. For a card game, contact bridge is relatively young. 'Contact Bridge was invented on November 1, 1925 by Harold Vanderbilt', Joshua shares a bit of history on the game.
Joshua Paige is not anywhere of a Bridge expert but his experience and readings have built upon him a knowledge base often relied on by his guest players in their home. And that is what he plans to share to today.
He advises that one should be aware of the values of the cards in one's hand. It would be needed in order to properly bid. The true value of each hand of cards depends on high cards and long and short suits. One should also consider how these cards fit with what the partner has and how well the opposing partners fair against one's group.
To know the value of one's hand, most players use the 4-3-2-1 point count. Such system is enough for a beginner and it is also a good basis for experienced player. For high cards, each ace is assigned four points; kings value at three points, queens at two points and each jack means a point.
For short suits, each void suit (no cards in a suit) values at three points, each singleton or once card in a suit means two points and each doubleton or two cards in a suit gets one point. Joshua reminds us not o count short-suits points in valuing a hand for notrump.
For example for the spade suit, one has a king, jack, eight and three, the value of that is four. For hearts, one has an ace, queen, nine and four that totals to six. For clubs, one has a queen, jack, seven and six that is three points. And the diamonds are declared trumps and one happens to have one that equals to two points. All in all the value of one's hand is 15 but disregarding the trump it is only at 13.
Joshua's last message on this system it comes handy in future games. It worked for him. Now, why don't we give it a try.