Auction Bridge

Players and equipment

Four players, in two fixed partnerships of two, with a standard 52-card pack. Partners sit opposite each other at the table, so the two members of a side never sit side by side. Ranks run ace high down to two, and there is no joker. Auction Bridge is where bidding first entered the bridge family — the auction that names trumps is the whole first half of every hand, and the second half is thirteen tricks played out exactly as in Contract Bridge.

The deal

Deal the whole pack out one card at a time, clockwise, until everybody holds thirteen. The deal passes to the left after every hand, so each of the four players deals in turn. Look at your own thirteen cards and say nothing about them until the bidding starts.

Play

Starting with the dealer, each player in turn either passes or bids: a number of odd tricks (tricks beyond the first six) in a chosen suit, or at no trumps. Every bid after the first must outrank the one before it, by level or by naming a higher suit at the same level — no trumps outranks spades, which outranks hearts, diamonds, and clubs in turn. Instead of bidding, a player may double the last bid if an opponent made it, and the side that made it may then redouble; any later bid cancels a double or redouble. The auction ends when a bid, double or redouble is followed by three passes in a row; if all four players pass at the start, the hand is thrown in and the next dealer deals.

Whoever named the winning bid becomes the declarer, and that player's partner lays their whole hand face up on the table as the dummy — seen by everyone, played by nobody but the declarer. The opponent to the declarer's left leads the first card, and from there the highest card of the suit led wins the trick unless somebody plays a trump, in which case the highest trump wins. The declarer plays from both their own hand and the dummy's; the two defenders play only their own. Whoever wins a trick leads to the next, until all thirteen have been played.

The declaring side needs to win at least six tricks plus the number bid — a bid of three hearts needs nine tricks in all. Falling short goes down; making it or beating it is making the contract. But — and this is the one thing that still marks Auction Bridge apart from the Contract Bridge it gave rise to — a side that makes its contract scores every odd trick it won below the line, overtricks included, not only the ones it bid for. A side that bids one spade and takes ten tricks scores four tricks' worth toward game. A side that goes down scores nothing below the line, and the defenders score only the under-trick penalties above it.

Scoring

A hand's points are kept in two places on the paper score sheet: below the line, where the tricks that count toward the game are totted up, and above the line, where slams, honours, doubled overtricks and under-trick penalties sit as one-off bonuses that only add to the final tally and never bring a game nearer. SquareScores keeps the race below the line — the number that decides who wins the game and, two games later, the rubber — and leaves the above-the-line bonuses to the table's own pencil, because the sheet only ever carries one running number a side. Each side's running total is one shared column on the sheet, the partnership's own cell for the hand just played, and the host may correct it like any other cell.

No trumps

10

each trick won over six

Spades

9

each trick won over six

Hearts

8

each trick won over six

Diamonds

7

each trick won over six

Clubs

6

each trick won over six

Game

30

points below the line to win it

Rubber bonus

250

to the first side at two games, above the line

Under-trick

50

to the opponents, above the line, each short; doubled 100, redoubled 200

Small slam

50

twelve tricks to the declaring side, above the line

Grand slam

100

all thirteen tricks to the declaring side, above the line

Insult

50

to the side that made a doubled contract, above the line

Doubled overtrick

50

above the line, each trick past the contract

A double doubles the trick value of a made contract — every odd trick the declaring side won, overtricks included, scores double below the line, so a doubled heart contract scores 16 a trick, not 8 — and the declaring side adds the 50 for the insult and 50 for each overtrick above the line. A redouble doubles that again. Honours are the trump ace, king, queen, jack and ten — or, at no trumps, the four aces — and are counted above the line for the side that holds them, whichever side declared — the rule most tables play:

Four trump honours in one hand

80

not split

Five trump honours, or all four aces at no trumps, in one hand

100

not split

Honours split across the partnership

10

each honour, three or more between the two hands

A side wins the game the moment its own below-the-line total reaches 30 or more; a hand that crosses the line still counts in full, so a side on 24 that makes one diamond exactly banks the whole 31. Winning a game draws a line under both sides' below-the-line totals, and the next hand starts that race again from nothing. The first side to win two games wins the rubber and the 250-point bonus, whatever the other side's below-the-line total stood at when the second game was won.

A worked deal

Alex and Bo are 18 points into their game; Chris and Dana have 12. Alex and Bo bid four spades and make it exactly — ten tricks, four more than the six needed. At 9 points a trick, that is 36 points below the line, so Alex and Bo's total jumps from 18 straight past 30 to 54: their game is won. Bo was also dealt all five spade honours in one hand, so another 100 goes above the line for that alone, with the 250 rubber bonus still to come if they take a second game.

Chris and Dana's 12 points count for nothing now: the line is drawn under both sides at once, and neither side carries anything into the next game.

Ending

A match on the sheet is one game: play on, hand after hand, until a side's total reaches 30 or more below the line, then End match, which any member may tap, banks that game as a win for whichever side crossed the line. The next match opens by itself and both sides start it at nothing — nothing carries over from a finished game, which is the point of drawing the line. Play on through as many matches as the table likes; the rubber itself is won by whichever side wins two of them, and setting the Leaderboard to count matches won (the sheet's own default for a game like this) is how the table sees who is ahead in the rubber as they go.

Bid the highest-scoring strain you can support

No trumps pays 10 a trick and spades 9, where diamonds and clubs pay only 7 and 6 — so two sides with an identical number of tricks coming can be on very different paces to game depending only on which suit they named. A long club suit that would win a contract outright is still worth bidding higher into no trumps or spades if the hand can stand it, because the same ten tricks are worth half again as much below the line.

A double is a scoring move, not just a penalty

Doubling a contract you expect to beat is tempting purely for the under-trick money, but remember it also doubles every trick the declarer's side DOES make if they get there anyway — a double you lay on a tight contract that squeaks home can hand the opponents a whole game in one hand. Save the double for a contract you are genuinely confident of beating, not merely suspicious of.

Overtricks count, so bid only as high as you must

Because a made contract scores every odd trick the declarer wins, not only the ones bid, there is no extra reward below the line for bidding up to game: two spades made with ten tricks scores the same 36 as four spades. Bid only as high as it takes to win the auction, and keep the risk for when the opponents are bidding against you.

Keep the honours and the bonus column on paper

The sheet only tracks the race below the line, so honours, slams, doubled overtricks and under-tricks never show up in the app's running total. A table playing for anything beyond who wins the rubber — most clubs still settle a rubber by its full above-the-line margin — needs its own pencil and paper sheet alongside the phone for that half of the scoring.

American or British bidding

Early British tables ranked bids by the point value of the contract and only then by level, so a cheap high-level bid could not outrank a more valuable low-level one; American tables ranked by level first and suit second, exactly as Contract Bridge does today. The rules here use the American ranking, the one Contract Bridge kept, and it is the one tables play today.

Plafond

A French wartime refinement that tightened the contract idea further: only the tricks actually bid and made counted below the line toward game, with anything extra scored as a bonus above it instead — the shape Contract Bridge itself would later take whole. Plafond was popular in France and parts of Canada, mostly among expert pairs who valued precise bidding, but never took hold in New York; it is worth knowing as the missing link between Auction Bridge's looser scoring and Contract Bridge's stricter one, rather than as something to deal at an ordinary table.

Three-handed Auction Bridge

Auction Bridge may have started as a three-handed game, with a dummy hand standing in for the missing fourth player, but nobody agrees how that extra hand was dealt, bid for or played. Treat it as a four-player game: if you sit down three, find a fourth rather than inventing the missing seat.

How many cards does each player get in Auction Bridge?

Thirteen each from a standard 52-card pack, dealt one at a time, clockwise, with nothing left over. All four hands are used; there is no pool or widow to draw from.

What is the difference between Auction Bridge and Contract Bridge?

They differ only in the scoring, not in the bidding or the play: in Auction Bridge, a side that makes its contract scores every odd trick it won toward game, overtricks included, so a low bid that makes ten tricks counts the same as a high one. Contract Bridge counts only what was bid and made, with the rest as a bonus instead — the change Plafond had tried out first.

How do you win a rubber in Auction Bridge?

By winning two games before the other side does. A game is won the moment a side's below-the-line total reaches 30 points or more, which draws a line under both sides and starts a fresh game at zero. Winning the rubber itself is worth a 250-point bonus on top of whatever games and hands were played along the way.

What happens if the declaring side fails to make its contract?

They score nothing below the line for that hand, and their opponents score 50 points above the line for every trick they finished short — a contract that needed nine tricks and got only seven costs two under-tricks, 100 points, to the defence. None of that moves either side's race to 30, since under-trick penalties sit above the line.

Do defenders ever score points of their own?

Not below the line. Only the declaring side scores odd tricks toward game, and only when it makes its contract. The defenders' reward for beating a contract is 50 points above the line for each trick the declarer falls short, doubled if the contract was doubled.

Can you play Auction Bridge with fewer than four?

Not as the game is usually played. It is a fixed partnership game for four, two against two, and the dummy hand that makes up a table of three is part of the game's early history rather than a rule any modern table plays by.