How to Play · Lesson 5 of 10

Basic Bidding In First Round

Learn why weak, scattered hands should usually pass.

What Calling Trump Commits You To

When your team calls trump, you must win at least 3 of 5 tricks. Failing to do so means the opponents score 2 points — called a euchre — which can swing a close game in an instant.

The fundamental question before calling: does this hand give your team a realistic path to three tricks?

Signs of a Callable Hand

Strong hands typically have two or more of these factors:

• Top trump — holding the right bower, left bower, or Ace of the potential trump suit. These are needed to bleed trump from opponents while taking tricks towards your 3 that are needed.
• Trump depth — 3 or more trump cards means opponents will struggle to exhaust your trump.
• 2 or Maybe 3 Suits — The fewer suits in your hand the better when you have trump because if the suits you are missing are led, you can trump in on them. 2 suited hands are great candidates for calling trump, sometimes 3 suited as well if you have some off-suit aces. Rarely are 4 suited hands good candidates to call trump unless you have aces in most of the suits. This is because you will always be following suit and need power in those suits to take the tricks.
• Off-suit aces — an Ace in a non-trump suit is often a winner, especially early before everyone runs out of that suit.
• In the first round of bidding, keep in mind who the dealer is because that player gets the card you ordered up. The dealer has an advantage in this case - they get a trump card added to their hand and they also get to discard an unwanted card which could short suit themselves (void a suit) to make it possible to trump in on that suit. You need to take that into account whether you are helping yourself or your partner vs helping the opponents with the upcard.

Signs You Should Pass

• No top trump — calling without a bower or the Ace of the suit is risky unless you have off-suit aces to make up for it.
• Only two trump — two moderate trump cards rarely guarantee enough tricks, especially if opponents hold the bowers. If you have high ones with off-suit aces, it could be possible however.
• Scattered hand — having too many different suits without aces means you'll follow each lead and rarely find a short suit to trump into.

Round 2 Bidding - See Next Lesson

After the upcard is turned down, you may name any other suit. Apply the same logic — you need real strength in whatever you name.

• The turned-down suit is off the table. Your best second-round call is often the suit you're strongest in besides that one.
• If all players pass on the second round, cards are all thrown in and deal passes to the next player.
• Stick the Dealer (if variation enabled): the dealer cannot pass in Round 2 and must name a suit. In that case, name your best available option even if the hand is marginal.