Building Tricks

Longer suits offer more potential winners
Consider your quick winners and winners which can be developed
Establishment Race: Consider your stopper versus your opponents stoppers
Tend to prefer a suit with more winners which can be developed if timing permits

An Ace is a non-positional honor. It takes a trick no matter where the other honors are
A King is a positional honor. If the Ace is behind the King, the King will not score a trick unless the Ace is led or under led.

Leading towards a protected King offers a 50% chance of success (a lobbing finesse)
Leading towards AQ offers a 50% chance of taking 2 tricks (a direct finesse)
If the defender behind the King leads the suit, the King has a 100% chance to win
Similarly Qxx opposite Jxx has a 50% chance of taking a trick if you lead the suit. If your opponents lead the suit, you will always win a trick

Leading a suit often helps your opponents turn their positional honors into winners
Sometimes it is better to defend passively. Let declarer break suits
This can be costly if declarer has a source of tricks to discard potential losers.
In this case, an active defense is needed to promote and take your winners before declarer has a chance to develop their winners and discard their losers.

Eliminate their exits cards and throw your opponent on lead, they must lead your suit
Suit contract: eliminate your cards in the side suits, throw an opponents on lead, they must lead your suit or give you a ruff and sluff
Sometimes when you run a suit, your opponents are forced to discard their exit cards in order to protect another suit. They can then be end played (Squeeze End Play)

The “Dangerous Opponent” is the one who has winners to cash or can lead through your positional honors
Try to keep the dangerous opponent off lead
If you have a 2 way finesse or a choice of finesses, choose the one which keeps the dangerous opponent off lead
When the safe opponent leads an honor, consider whether ducking helps keep the dangerous opponent off lead

To protect your honors, try to declare notrump contract with positional honors in side suits with non-positional honors Axx or Akx, give partner a chance to declare

Vacant Spaces Principle: a player is more likely to have a particular card if they have more spaces which could hold the card
When guessing a 2-way finesse for the Queen, consider vacant spaces
8 Ever – 9 Never
- 8-card fit missing the Queen: finesse, if you can handle a 4-1 break, cash a high honor first as a safety play against a singleton Queen
- 9-card fit missing the Queen: Play for drop (58%), finesse if someone shows out
- Vacant Spaces affects the decision to play for the drop. If someone has more vacant spaces, the odds shift to cashing an honor and then finessing against Queen
10-card fit missing the King: finesse, 11-card fit missing the King play for a drop
AKQT opposite 3 small: playing for the Jack to drop offers a 61% chance. Finesse if a defender has a void or singleton
AT987 opposite K654 depends on the number of tricks needed
- If needing 4 tricks, finesse on the 1st round to guard against a 4-0 break
- If needing 5 tricks, cash a high honor. If the hand behind the other honor drops the Queen or Jack, finesse (Restricted Choice). Otherwise, play for a 2-2 split.
Restricted Choice: if a player has QJ doubleton, they have a choice of what to play under your Ace or King. If holding a singleton Queen or Jack, they have no choice. This makes finessing against the remaining honor the percentage play.
AJT9 opposite 4-small: double finessing offers a 75% chance to hold losers to 1 trick

To prevent a defender from running a suit, hold up your stopper to cut communication
Don’t hold up if you are more concerned about a shift to a different suit
If a defender on your left leads the King from Kqxx and your hold AJx, play small. Your LHO cannot continue the suit without give you an extra trick. (Bath Coup)
Ducking: With Axx opposite Kxxxx, duck a round to preserve communication
Don’t duck a trick into the Dangerous opponent
Unblocking: KQ Axxxx, plan to unblock the suit & use a side entry

Try to avoid ruffing in the long hand. Ruffing in the long hand decreases trump control
Generally, you want to draw trump. Here are some reasons to delay drawing trump:
Need to discard a loser in a side suit
- Need to establish winners in a side suit
- Need to ruff losers in the short hand
- Need trumps to act as a stopper
- Want to lead trump from the right side
Ruffing in the short hand creates extra tricks
If ruffing in the long hand, you will need more ruffs to create extra tricks
Ruffing in the long hand for extra tricks is called a dummy reversal (rarely used)

Learning the opponent’s distribution helps you take more tricks, use count signals
Whenever an opponent shows out, don’t play a card until you count the distribution