How many tricks will you make? Judge wisely, but watch out– sixes are high! This game is known in Bavaria as “Baure’-Britsch”.

Background

Farmers’ Bridge is played with a 36-card deck (6-A), and the aim of the game is to estimate exactly how many tricks you will make with the hand you’ve been dealt.

Number of Players

For an easy start, the game begins with a one-card hand for everyone. Each subsequent hand has one more card, up to a max of:

The max is dictated by the largest hand each player can be dealt with at least one card remaining to determine the trump.

Once the largest hand has been dealt, hands get successively smaller per round, until the final round of another one-card hand.

Determining Trump

After dealing each player a hand, the next card from the stack is turned over and placed underneath the deck face-up perpendicularly (if only one card remains, just set it aside). This card’s suit is trump for the round.

Only sixes

And there’s more!

• If a six is turned over instead of a particular suit, only the four sixes are trumps for that round (the first six played takes the trick).

Following suit

In farmers’ bridge you must follow suit if you can. If you cannot, you must play a trump (any trump). Thus there is:

• Farbzwang (requirement to following suit),
• Trumpfzwang (requirement to play a trump if you can’t follow suit),

but not:

• Stechzwang (requirement to use a higher card and try to take the trick).

Sixes

Sixes are the highest cards in the game and count as trumps (not as their nominal suit).

• When multiple sixes are played, the first one takes the trick.

Note that you are required to follow trump with a six just like any other trump.

Starting the Round: Bidding

Before each round, on the count of three, each player shows on one or two hands how many tricks they will take. This must be simultaneous to be fair.

Scoring

On a piece of paper, each bid is written in a column under the player’s name.

If they hit their target, this earns them 10 points plus the number they bid. E.G.

• Bid 3 and take 3 tricks: get 13 points.
• Bid 0 and take 0 tricks: get 10 points

If you miss your target, you get the difference in negative! E.G.

• Bid 3 and take 2 tricks: get -1 points.
• Bid 5 and take 2 tricks: get -3 points.
• Bid 1 and take 4 tricks: get -3 points.

Here is an example of a short round with three people:

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