Nil in Spades

A hundred points either way. No other decision in the game swings so hard on so little.

Nil is a bid of zero: you promise to win no tricks at all. Make it and your side takes +100. Win a single trick and you take −100 instead, and the tricks you won become team bags on top. It is the biggest single swing available in a Spades hand, and the one most often bid badly.

This page is about playing nil. If you are still deciding whether to bid one, the bidding guide covers the count.

What a nil hand actually looks like

The single most common beginner error is bidding nil because a hand looks weak. Weak and safe are different things. A nil hand is defined by its shape:

• Spades decide it. Zero to two spades, both low, is nil territory. Three spades and you will eventually be forced to win a trump trick when everyone else is void. Any spade honour and the hand is not a nil, whatever else it holds.
• You need an exit in every suit. A low card in all four suits is worth more than any amount of general weakness. Being void in a suit is bad for nil — you must discard, and every discard is a card you can no longer duck with.
• High cards need escorts. K♥ with two small hearts is survivable: you duck twice and the king falls under an ace. A bare K♥ is a trick waiting to happen.
• The dangerous hand is the middling one. Queens and jacks with no small cards behind them are the classic nil killer. They are too high to duck reliably and too low to be worth anything.

The ducking technique

Playing a nil is a craft with one governing rule: on every trick, play the highest card that still loses. Not your lowest — your highest safe one.

New players hoard their small cards and dump them at the end. That is backwards. Your small cards are your escape hatches for the late tricks, when the aces and kings have gone and you are the only one left holding anything. Burn the dangerous middle cards early, under other people's winners, while it is still safe to do so.

• Count what beats each card you hold. A 10 is safe while the J, Q, K and A of that suit are still out. Once three of them have gone, that 10 is a live grenade.
• Get rid of your longest suit's high cards first. Length is what eventually forces you to win — you will still be following suit when everyone else has run out.
• Never lead if you can avoid it. Leading means playing without information. If you must lead, lead your lowest card in your shortest suit.
• Watch for the squeeze. Late in a hand, if you hold two cards and both can win, the nil is already broken. Plan three tricks ahead, not one.

Covering your partner's nil

When your partner bids nil, your job changes completely: you are no longer trying to make your own contract efficiently, you are a bodyguard. This is where most nils are won or lost, and most partners do it badly.

• Bid conservatively. Your winners are needed as cover, not as contract. Stretching your own bid opposite a nil is how a +100 turns into a set.
• Lead your aces early. Every ace you cash is a trick your partner can safely throw a dangerous card under. Cashing aces feels wasteful; opposite a nil it is the whole plan.
• Win in front of them. Sitting to your partner's left means you play after them — take the trick when their card is high.
• Never lead a suit they have shown weakness in. If they discarded hearts, they are void; leading hearts forces them to trump or win.
• Take the trick even at the cost of a bag. A bag is one point. A broken nil is a hundred.

Breaking an opponent's nil

Defence is the mirror image, and a broken nil is worth 100 points to you.

• Lead low, always. The nil bidder wants to duck under a high card. Lead a 3 and they may have nothing lower.
• Lead the suit they are longest in. You can usually tell by what they have not discarded.
• Do not cash your aces. Every ace you play is a free discard for them. Hold your winners and make them play first.
• Watch the covering partner. If the nil bidder's partner is taking every trick, force them to run out — once their cover is gone, the nil hand is exposed.
• Count their spades. If they have two and both are low, get the trumps out. A forced ruff breaks the nil through no skill of theirs and no fault of yours.

Blind nil

Blind nil is a nil bid made before you look at your cards, for double stakes: ±200. Traditionally it is only allowed when your team is behind by 100 points or more, and partners are usually permitted to swap two cards before play.

It is a desperation bid and should be treated as one. The arithmetic is roughly: a random hand makes blind nil perhaps one time in four, so it is worth bidding only when losing normally is close to certain. Blind nil is not yet available in this app — it arrives with the traditional trailing-team gate.

Five ways nils get broken

1. Bidding on weakness instead of shape — three spades and no aces is not a nil.
2. Saving small cards for the end instead of spending the dangerous middle cards early.
3. A partner who stretches their own bid instead of covering.
4. Being void in a suit and having to discard winners.
5. Getting forced to ruff late because nobody drew the trumps.

Keep reading

• How to Play Spades — the complete rules.
• Spades Bidding Guide — deciding what to bid in the first place.
• Spades Strategy — bag management and playing the hand.
• Spades for Beginners — the five rules that matter.
• Spades for 2 Players — two-hand rules and the draw deal.