How to Play Spades
Description
A trick-taking partnership game where you bid before you play. Spades are always trump, bids are always binding, and going ten tricks over across multiple hands costs you a hundred points.
Objective
Team up with the player across from you and outscore the other team across a full match.
Setup
Four players in fixed partnerships, seated opposite each other.
Everyone gets thirteen cards.
Rules
Each player bids individually — how many tricks you think you'll win — or bids Nil, a solo bet that you personally win zero tricks, for a big reward if you pull it off.
Your bid and your partner's combine into your team's target.
Play tricks in turn, following suit if you can.
You can't lead a Spade until one's been played earlier in the hand.
Spades always beat any other suit.
Winning
Meet your team's combined bid and you score ten points per trick bid, plus one point for every trick beyond it.
Those extra tricks are bags — collect ten of them and your team loses 100 points.
Fall short of your bid and you lose ten points per trick you were short.
A successful Nil earns 100 points; a failed one costs 100.
First team to 500 points wins the match.