I generally pass my high clubs or diamonds and don’t pass any spade or heart. The more spades I have allows me to have an alternative to playing and being forced to take the Queen. Having hearts gives me the flexibility to try to run them or else dump the high hearts on someone when I can’t follow suit.
Reasonable strategy?
Depends on my hand. If the only spades I have are the Ace and/or King, they are being passed. I won’t keep either unless I have plenty of low spades to protect against having to take the Queen. High clubs or diamonds depending on distribution. If I only have 2 low diamonds they are going so I can be out or close to out in one suit, although I don’t like to be void of clubs on the first trick so it doesn’t tip my hand. Hearts I don’t like to pass unless I keep enough to prevent anyone shooting the moon.
Same, though if I get enough low hearts, I’ll pass one to my neighbor to help prevent shooting.
Are these your same strategies for the “Jack of Diamonds” rule?
It depends on the hand, and which direction I’m passing. Sometimes I have a hand where it’s helpful to not have the queen, but to know where she is. If I have lots of spades, i know I can force the queen out, and if I know where she is, I likely won’t be screwed if someone hands me the Ace or King.
I might pass all high cards, or I might pass all or almost all of my clubs or diamonds if I have a small number. It all depends on what I’m looking at.
While I’m not all that experienced in “Omnibus Hearts” (i.e. the name for the variation where the Jack of Diamonds gets you negative 10 points), the general strategy is no matter what you’re dealt, you always pass it barring having enough diamonds to guarantee you can take a trick with it. Because typically the person who has it in their hand is not going to win it. Also, if you know you can get the JD, the strategy of play completely changes because you will willingly take hearts to get that -10.
So I doubt anyone plays Omnibus with the same strategy as regular hearts, because diamonds suddenly serve a purpose.
Then there’s “Cancellation Hearts”. it’s mostly played like normal Hearts, but with two decks. And two cards of the same suit and rank cancel each other out, so neither can win the trick. On the rare occasion every card in a trick gets cancelled, that trick gets set aside and will go to the winner of the next trick. Unless that trick, too, has every card cancelled, in which case that trick gets put with the previous trick and the winner of the third trick gets all three tricks. And so on… The really fun part is when a spade trick is led and both Queens come out, which means neither can win the trick. (Note, I’ve never seen this happen.)
Granted, Cancellation really only works if you have 5 or more people. Preferably you need at least 6 (You can play normal hearts with 5 people using a blind of two cards. You can also play with 3 using a blind of 1 card. But three is boring. You can also play normal hearts with 6 and a 4-card blind, but at 6 I find Cancellation works much better.)
Anyway, the OP’s strategy is largely sound. Though, I will try to clear myself of a suit if I can. I will completely pass hearts if I can get rid of all my hearts (provided at least one of them is 10 or lower). It’s easiest to shoot the moon if you actually don’t have any hearts. Being flush with clubs is the best chance. Unless you play with an idiot that passes you all the high hearts.
Also, don’t pass the Queen of Spades if you have support. It’s better to control it. The worst thing to do is to pass it to the left, where you have the least amount of control over taking it back as part of a trick. And if you do pass it, don’t lead spades. That’s a dick move. In fact, if you are at the point where you are considering passing the Queen, you probably are so low on spades you might as well just ditch the spades entirely. Unless the person you pass it to is a dick, they probably won’t punish you for passing them it. (I make it a point to generally try to give the Queen back to the person who passes it to me if I have plenty of cover for her. Unless that person passes me backup, in which case, I’ll sympathize and drop the queen at the first opportunity.)
I also tend to favor the rule where both the Queen and Hearts can be dropped on the first club trick which is how I first learned to play the game. It wasn’t until much later that I found out that the first trick is supposed to be “safe”.
Personally, I find the no safe tricks thing more interesting. Especially when someone passes me the two of clubs and I realize it was a good thing.
Speaking of, two of clubs is also a card I regularly pass. Being the opening lead is a weak position because you don’t control anything. You generally want to control the lead early so you can ditch yourself of cards that will be dangerous in the later stages of the round. Having the two of clubs (or three if the two happens to be in a blind; or the four if both are, etc.) forces you to a passive position in the opening. And the worst is having both the two and the ace of clubs in your hand.
The two of clubs becomes even worse when the opening trick is safe. It’s why I prefer the opening trick not being safe. It at least gives the two of clubs some strategic reason to exist other than to screw over the players.
When I was in a 4-player game (for small stakes), and sitting across from a friend - when there was a “cross pass”, I would attempt to pass him three hearts, and to me - three spades. It worked out well more often then it didn’t.
Left/right passing strategy for me was to void myself in Diamonds or Clubs if possible.
We had a few “house rules”, such as mandatory pitching the Q of Spades at the first opportunity (unless it was obvious you were going for “control” - i.e. taking the QS and all the Hearts). This prevented trying to hit the “low man”, and tended to allow for more skillful play. Hearts could be “broken” (played) at any time. We had no “keeper” hands, and the opening lead rotated with the dealer. Friends had a house rule in which you had to show “respect” when passing the QS - it had to be accompanied by at least one other Spade (if possible).
Uh oh … there’s unwritten rules of hearts now? In my group, nobody gave a damn. We were pretty competitive with each other. Perfectly fine to go queen fishing as soon as you want to.
I agree with keeping the queen if you have the suit support to do it. Then you can (hopefully) nail whoever is in the lead (if it’s not you) or whoever is most on your tail by throwing the queen to them.
Indeed, perfectly fine and actually expected.
Good to hear I’m not the only one. I’ve played in a number of groups, and don’t recall anybody raising a stink of spades being thrown out after the first trick was won. Hell, it was usually accompanied by some banter/trash talk about getting the queen out. Plus you might have other good reasons, like trying to void spades, to throw them out early so you can layoff any high cards in longer suits you have when then next round of spades comes around. If it were considered bad form, it should be made a house rule. The rules themselves have nothing against it, and they do explicitly forbid stuff like playing point cards on the first round, or playing hearts before hearts are broken, so if the game, as designed and modified over the years, didn’t like early spade plays, something would be said about that in the rules. (In regards to the first rule and choosing cards to pass, because no point cards can be thrown out on the first trick, I tend to keep an ace of clubs if I have it, so I can control the second trick. I say “tend,” but. it’s been about two decades since I’ve played with any regularity, though. I can see an exception, maybe, when I’m passing to the left, knowing that the person to the left of me will almost surely win the first trick, so when the second trick comes around, I will be the last to play and have full information as to what I am able to throw off on the board. So I think I have done that occasionally, based on the makeup of my hand. I guess it depends on whether I want control of the second trick or not.)
I guess overall my decision about what to throw out is based on a balance of voiding suits, throwing out possible problematic high cards (they are not always problematic), which way the passing is going, and the state of the game (like if I have to do my best to stick a specific someone with a queen. Many times, I have no problem with the queen in my hand, provided enough spades support cards and a near-void suit.) Playing long enough with the same people, there also may be the calculation of what types of cards are likely to be passed to me depending on the player.
This, IMO, is a terrible rule. If I’m in second place, I’m looking to dump the QS on the first-place player. But if I have to dump it on the last-place player, it might put her/him over 100 points, and would cost me any chance of winning the game.
I’m really unclear as to how this rule allows for ‘more skillful play.’
I missed that post. No way it leads to more skillful play – part of the strategy of hearts is dumping points skillfully on the players you want to get points. It could be the leader, if you’re behind, or it could be the hand(s) that could soon go over 100 if you’re the leader. That’s one of the essential game mechanics, IMHO. To me, that’s as bad as the “Free Parking” jackpot house rule in Monoply, but as long as everyone agrees to it and enjoys the game being played, go for it, of course.
Yeah, that would certainly take an important weapon out of your hands.
The people we played with did go back and forth on whether to allow dropping a point card on the first trick - typically that was disallowed under the usual rules, but in our family we allow a heart slough on a first trick, and in college we allowed anything including, obviously, the bad queen.
I’ve only played the Jack of diamonds rule a handful of times - do people generally like that?
We generally did not play the Omnibus variation with the jack of diamonds. I think we tried it a time or two for fun, but went back to the standard ruleset. 2 clubs to start. Pass, left, right , across, hold. No dumping of point cards on the first trick. No leading of hearts until hearts are broken (unless that’s all you have left in your hand – I don’t think we’ve ever had that situation.) Queen of spades does NOT break hearts. Shooting the moon counts as +26 for opponents unless shooting would cause someone go over 100 and you are not the leader, in which case you can choose to -26 your score (or you simply get a choice in any situation.)
Naw, that’s just good strategy, and it’s fun. If you think someone using that strategy is being a dick, you are taking the game way too seriously.
If you think I mean someone is a genuine jerk for doing it, then you’re taking my post way too seriously.
It’s like this: pass the queen and then lead spades, expect to be targeted. By not only the person you did it to as revenge, but possibly by the rest of the players in subsequent rounds because no one wants to be passed a bare queen by someone whose flush with spades. Sure, it can be good strategy situationally, but expect to pay for it over the long term of the game. And maybe in later games if someone wants to just to make sure you don’t do it to them again.
Granted, most people won’t do this if there’s a better strategy at the moment, but all things being equal, it replaces random sluffing of cards.
Good strategy is doing what’s necessary to not take points.
If I have the queen with 3 or more other spades, I probably won’t pass it. But if I have the queen with only 1 or 2 other spades, I will pass it. And I certainly won’t pass my other spades (unless I have the Ace or King), because I have to guard against receiving the A/K in the pass.
I’ve never played with people who wanted to make someone pay for using a legitimate strategy. It sounds like I would very much not enjoy playing with your group.
When I’ve used that strategy, we’ve all just thought it was funny. Someone might try to do it back, I suppose, which would also be funny, but the idea that everyone would target me for having done it sounds bizarre to me.
Maybe it’s just miscommunication, though, and I’m missing the tone or something.
This absolutely does not happen with the people I play with.
Me either, it’s just a card game, this ain’t the World Series of Poker