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I play a game where the game play is much like hearts/spades/etc. Standard 52-card deck. Players play one card each "trick" and the highest card gets the trick. (Highest based on lead suit vs trump)

In this variant each player starts with 7 cards, and before the round begins, players must bid on the exact number of tricks the expect to take.

The next round you start with 6 cards, etc. down to 1 card.

I have played this game for a while and would like to look up the official scoring/rules, but cant remember the name of it. Anyone know the name of this game?

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  • This sounds very similar to "Wizard", in which you bid on the exact number of trickts you expect to take, but you start at 1 card hands and work your way up to dealing out the entire deck
    – bengoesboom
    Commented Mar 18, 2015 at 19:29
  • What you describe, is a game that I've always called spades, except it was played with an arbitrary number of people (10 people got a bit silly). Number of cards / hand went from Max Possible, down to 1, then up to max possible. Which is very different from how Wikipedia describes spades.
    – John
    Commented Mar 18, 2015 at 20:57
  • When I was a child it was known as German Whist and had rules for being 'on a dog' or 'on a blind' if you won't no tricks in a round.
    – StartPlayer
    Commented Aug 6 at 13:28

3 Answers 3

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Oh Hell!

The games goes by many names but Oh Hell! is its most famous name. See rules at pagat.

Its original name Oh Hell! evidently offended some people and has been bowdlerised in many books to Oh Pshaw! or Oh Well!, while others have preferred more robust alternatives such as Oh Shit! Some call it Blob or Blackout... has given rise to the names Elevator (l'Ascenseur in France), Up and Down the River (in Australia and New Zealand) and 10 op en neer in the Netherlands. In Britain it is often known as Nomination Whist... Other names include Bust (in Australia and New Zealand), Boerenbridge (in the Netherlands), Kachuful (in India) and German Bridge (in Hong Kong)

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  • Note that this is also called "Up and Down the River."
    – GendoIkari
    Commented Mar 18, 2015 at 23:03
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    Quote from the link: Its original name Oh Hell! evidently offended some people and has been bowdlerised in many books to Oh Pshaw! or Oh Well!, while others have preferred more robust alternatives such as Oh Shit! Some call it Blob or Blackout... has given rise to the names Elevator (l'Ascenseur in France), Up and Down the River (in Australia and New Zealand) and 10 op en neer in the Netherlands. In Britain it is often known as Nomination Whist... Other names include Bust (in Australia and New Zealand), Boerenbridge (in the Netherlands), Kachuful (in India) and German Bridge (in Hong Kong).
    – Task
    Commented Jan 12, 2016 at 17:56
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When being polite, we call it "Prediction". We go from maximum cards down to one, then back up to the maximum. We do "simultaneous bidding" as explained at Pagat. However if the total is the same as the number of cards dealt, then the dealer must change their bid by one.

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    Same here... The idea being that at least a player must be wrong...
    – beewee
    Commented Jan 12, 2016 at 7:35
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The game you are referring to is called DIMINISHING BRIDGE. You start with seven cards for the first round and you bid to see how many tricks you can make. Second round is six cards dealt to everybody, third round is five cards and so on until you get to having one final card left for the last round. OH HELL has 13 rounds and it starts with dealing one card to each player for the first round to see who can win the first trick. Second round everybody gets two cards dealt, third round is three cards and so on up to seven and then you go backwards from 6 cards to 1 card again.

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  • The accepted answer posted a link to rules for oh hell that disagrees with what you say.
    – Joe W
    Commented Aug 4 at 15:55

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