Contract bridge, or commonly referred to as simply bridge, is a card game involving skills and to a certain extent of chance, for four players, who join forces to form two sides. The partners sit opposite each other. The game contains two major parts namely bidding and play, afterwards the hand is totaled. Like any other casino game, the game of contract bridge has undergone major innovations and new variations have been developed.
The bidding is terminated with a contract, which is a statement of one side that their side will take an affirmed amount of tricks, with a particular suit as trump or no trump. The rules of the game are basic and the same as other trick-taking games.
Two partnerships consisting of two players are required in the game of bridge. The four players encircle a table with partners. The four players are referred to using the four points of the compass, corresponding to their seating arrangement. Thus, one side is formed by South and North and the other by East and West.
One bridge session is made up of many deals (also known as hands or boards) with individual game plays consisting of four phases: the deal, the proposal concluding in the contract, the card play and lastly, computing the total.
The aim is to get the highest possible numerical score with the shuffled cards. The number of tricks bid during the bidding as well as the number of tricks during the game. Generally, the incentive is given to players in order to exactly bid on the number of tricks that their hands can deliver, as the additional points increase with the level of the bid. Therefore, during the auction, the partnerships play to find out who suggests the maximum number of tricks, and the winning partnership must abide by that bargain by getting the contracted amount of tricks Contract refers to the number of tricks and the trump suit.
The trump suit or without the trump is called the denomination or strain. When the winner of the bid receives the contracted amount of tricks, a score is given for having fulfilled the contract; or else the score is awarded to the opponents for overcoming the contract. Learning the rules in contract bridge may be complicated in the early stages but once you have mastered the game rules, the game will turn out to be fun and exciting.
