Strategies

Selecting which card to play (phase 1)

The primary purpose of the first phase is to improve your hand with the intent of
winning as many tricks as possible in phase two. A good phase two hand will have a
fair number of trumps and high cards in the other suits. A strong long suit may also
be valuable if a number of trumps are played during the first phase and you have
enough high trumps to pull the remainder from the opponent before playing the long
suit

Improving your hand means striving to draw better cards into your hand from the
stock than those played, and drawing better cards from the stock than does the
opponent. Three considerations are therefore important before deciding to take or
lead a potential winner to a trick:
Whether the top stock card is likely to be better or worse than the second unseen stock
 card;
 Whether the top stock card is better or worse than the card you would be playing;
Whether the second unseen stock card is likely to be better or worse than the card you
 would be playing.

Selecting which card to play (phase 2)

When phase two commences, an experienced player good at "remembering the cards"
will know exactly which cards the opponent holds. If you are confident that you have
more trumps than the opponent, and if you have one or more strong other suits, lead
your trumps early to remove all those of the opponent. Even if you don't win all of
the trump tricks, at least the opponent won't be able to trump back once depleted.
Then you can play strong suit(s). However, be wary of a situation where the suits are
likely to be evenly sized between you and the opponent, particularly if the opponent
may have stronger cards in those suits. In such a case, the opponent may win a series
of tricks before you can regain the lead with a higher card or trump.