Play Some BishStrategy · Chapter 2
Calling when forced
Everyone passed. You're the dealer and you have to name trump. You can't pass. You can still pick the suit.
Count all four suits. Name the highest.
Use the count from When to call: 5 for every trump card, +10 the Jack, +6 the 9, +3 the Ace, +6 King and Queen together, +4 for every Ace in the other suits.
If two suits tie, or are close, it doesn't matter. Pick either. Expect it to go bait about 30 times in 100.
Picking blind goes bait 48% of the time. That is 18 percentage points thrown away.
Pick your six cards
Tap the six cards you were dealt. It counts every suit and tells you which to name.
The suit is the whole decision
We took forced hands and named the suit five different ways. Any sensible rule lands close together. Naming blind does not.
| How you pick the suit | It goes bait | Avg points |
|---|---|---|
| Highest count | 30% | −10 |
| Longest suit | 31% | −12 |
| The suit with the Jack | 31% | −12 |
| A suit picked blind | 48% | −58 |
| Lowest count | 62% | −93 |
Highest count, longest suit and the suit with the Jack all go bait about equally often (30–31%). The mistake is not looking. A blind pick goes bait 48% of the time. The worst suit in the hand goes bait 62%.
Ties and near-ties don't matter
In 11% of forced hands two suits tie for the top count. Picking the longer suit, the suit with the Jack, or one at random all go bait about 44% of the time. When the top two suits are within 2 points (24% of hands), the higher count goes bait 41% and the other 42%. Don't spend long on it.
About seven in ten
Name the highest-count suit and it goes bait 30.2% of the time. On average your team ends the hand about 10 points behind the other team.
- Your countGoes baitAvg pointsHow often
- 14 or less53%−716%
- 15–1943%−4719%
- 20–2236%−2823%
- 23–2429%−915%
- 25–2625%+412%
- 27–2920%+1911%
- 30–3214%+408%
- 33 or more6%+727%
About 26% of forced hands count 27 or more. You would have called those anyway. About 25% count 19 or less. Those go bait 46% of the time, and cost the most when they do.
Average points is how far ahead (+) or behind (−) the other team your team ends the hand, averaged over hands at that count. How often is the share of your forced hands that land there.
Three passes don't change your odds
You might think a table full of passes means the opponents are weak, so your hand has a better shot. The numbers say no. The same count goes bait just as often, whether you were forced or dealt it any other way.
| Your count | When forced | Any seat |
|---|---|---|
| 20–22 | 35.9% | 36.3% |
| 23–24 | 28.7% | 29.0% |
| 25–26 | 24.7% | 25.1% |
| 27–29 | 19.6% | 19.6% |
| 30–32 | 13.5% | 14.0% |
Counts that appear in both tables. Forced hands are the simulated ones where the three seats before the dealer passed.
What real games show
On this site, 1,050 forced calls were logged in solo and online games, about 37% of all hands. 34.4% of them went bait.
That is a little higher than the 30.2% in our test. Real tables are less predictable than a test, and most of these hands were played before a game update on Oct 14. We will check again once there are more hands since.
The score. It doesn't change your odds. Forced calls went bait 30–39% of the time whether your team was far ahead or far behind (135–280 hands in each group). It changes what a bait costs you, not how likely one is.
Under 20
About one forced hand in four is here. It still goes bait only 46% of the time. There is no suit that rescues it. What helps is how you play it, and we don't have tested play advice yet. A leading and defending chapter will follow.
Three forced hands
Gold outline is the suit to name. Every suit is counted.
The 9 and two Aces
Hearts 12 · Diamonds 18 · Clubs 12 · Spades 24
No Jack, no long suit. Spades has the 9, and the Aces count wherever you name trump.
Don't chase the Jack
Hearts 19 · Diamonds 8 · Clubs 25 · Spades 9
The Jack is alone in hearts. Clubs has length and the 9. Name clubs.
Nothing there
Hearts 10 · Diamonds 10 · Clubs 11 · Spades 5
No good suit. Name the best of a poor lot and play it out.
How we know
We dealt hands by computer and kept the ones where the three players before the dealer would sensibly have passed. That left 80,000 forced hands. About a third of deals reach the dealer this way, and 37% of real hands on this site did. Each forced hand was then played out four times, once with each suit as trump, so every suit choice could be compared on the same cards.
Two caveats. Every hand in the test was played by the same careful, consistent player, and real people are messier. And the count is the one from the first chapter, built from the same test.
Updated 2026-10-14. We will rerun this as more real hands are logged.