Diary of an intern, part I

(Reprinted from my post on Bridgeblogging.)

I had my first bridge lesson – sort of – last week, when Linda handed me a copy of her and Barbara Seagram’s book Beginning Bridge. I haven’t actually played a game yet. To help you follow my thinking when I finally do, let me outline the foundations I’ll be starting with.

To my mind, bridge seems most similar to a Parker Brothers card game my family used to play called Rook. Like bridge (at least, the way my family played it), Rook involves set partners (it doesn’t have to, but at its bridge-iest it does). It involves taking tricks in four colours/suits (red, green, yellow and blue). Also, like bridge, only four of each suit actually has value (the one, five, ten, and fourteen). This means the value of your hand can be calculated, and if it’s below a certain number, you pass. If you call trump, it means that you have at least the one and fourteen and two or three others of the same suit.

There are differences. Unlike bridge, Rook has fourteen cards in each suit. Also, scoring seems simpler. Each five and ten is worth five and ten points, each fourteen is worth ten, and each one is worth fifteen. Combined with twenty points for tricks (ten points each if both teams take seven tricks) and twenty points for the Rook card (more on that in a moment) each hand is worth 200 points. My family used to play until one team reached 500.

Like bridge, Rook involves bidding, but you bid based on the number of points you think you’re going to win, not the number of tricks you plan to take (and it certainly isn’t assumed you’ll take six!). Also, no suit is inherently stronger than any other, unless it’s called as trump.

Finally, Rook has the Rook. I’ll admit the Rook throws many of the bridge/Rook comparisons off, because it means an extra card is set aside once the hand is dealt. This card is picked up by whoever wins the bid, and said bidder then discards a non-point card, which adds an extra level of strategy. The Rook itself is the lowest trump, but worth the most points; whoever holds it is advised to get rid of it on a trick they or their teammate are guaranteed to take as soon as possible.

The Rook changes notrump hands, because it becomes a guaranteed trick, the only trump in the deck. Finally, Rook doesn’t have a dummy; the winning bidder’s partner plays under their own volition.

The fact remains, both Rook and bridge involve bidding; both involve trumps and taking tricks, and while Rook’s bidding strategies are simpler, I have no doubt an experienced bidder would have a much easier time learning bridge.

Unfortunately, I suck at bidding. In Rook, I never got a feel for recognizing the sort of hand my partner had, and rarely bid above 100 (half the tricks); if I did, it usually meant I was guaranteed to win.

Based on Beginning Bridge and the Aces on Bridge columns I edited for the next month, it looks like half the game’s strategy lies in bidding.

It’s going to be a long education…