Bidding

The auction decides who plays alone as declarer, and a bid is a promise: my hand is worth at least this much. Knowing when to pass, and when a marginal hand is still worth taking, is half the game before a single card falls.

Read the official bidding rules.

Knowing when to pass

When nothing in your hand comes close to covering even the lowest bid, pass immediately. It costs nothing; chasing a bid your hand can't make costs double if you lose it.

Too many forced wins for Ramsch

Everyone else has passed, and whoever faces the opening 18 next can still take the game instead of letting the round fall to Ramsch — not just Forehand's last-chance Vorhandrecht anymore, Middlehand's and the dealer's very first bid count too. It's worth taking when your hand is trapped: high cards you're forced to win with (Aces, unguarded Tens, a lone high Jack) outnumber the low cards and short suits that would let you duck away.

Accepting a Null bid

A hand that's genuinely safe for Null doesn't need to hedge. Bid straight to what it's actually worth, no need to see the Skat first before committing. What safe means at card level is an old German rhyme: "Sieben, Acht, Unter, da geht keiner drunter." Seven, Eight, Unter, and nobody gets under that. Unter is the German-suited deck's name for the Jack. A suit in which you hold the Seven, the Eight and the Jack can never force a trick on you: whatever is led, you stay below it, the Seven or the Eight under a Nine or a Ten, the Jack under Queen, King and Ace.

A speculative Null

Sometimes a Null hand looks promising but isn't quite safe enough to commit to outright. Bidding low (18, well under the hand's real value) buys a look at the Skat first: if it helps, you're still playing Null; if it doesn't, you've risked less finding out.