How to play Spades
Spades is a trick taking game for four players in two partnerships. You sit at the bottom of the table. Sam sits opposite and plays as your partner. Dee and Ray play against you.
Everyone gets thirteen cards
The whole deck is dealt, thirteen cards to each player. There are no cards left over and nothing is hidden.
You bid the number of tricks you expect to take
Bidding goes round once. Your bid and your partner's bid add up to your team's contract. Make the contract and you score ten points a trick. Miss it and you lose ten points a trick.
Bidding nil is a promise to take no tricks at all. It scores a hundred points if you take none and loses a hundred if you take even one.
You must follow the suit that was led
If a club is led and you hold clubs, you play a club. If you hold none, you can play anything, including a spade.
Spades are trumps and cannot be led until they are broken
Any spade beats any card of another suit. Nobody may lead a spade until a spade has been played on an earlier trick, unless spades are all they hold.
The highest card wins the trick
The highest spade takes it. If no spade was played, the highest card of the suit that was led takes it. Whoever wins leads the next trick.
Tricks over your bid become bags
Every trick past your contract scores one point and adds a bag. When your bags reach ten you lose a hundred points and ten bags come off the pile. This is why bidding low is expensive.
The first team to five hundred wins
Hands keep dealing until a team reaches five hundred points. The deal moves one seat to the left each hand.