How to Play 500 Bid
500 bid is another classic card game you can play with a regular deck of cards. This game involves bidding, trump, and taking tricks. It’s similar to Euchre, Bridge, Spades, or Pinochle. All these games involve bidding, leading, playing trump, and score keeping.
500 bid requires four players and a standard deck of cards with a joker. The 2’s, and 3’s of each suit are removed and one joker is added. Once the deck is setup, ten cards are dealt out to each player. The remaining 5 cards are placed face down in the middle. This is the kitty. The winning bid gets to pick up the kitty and discard 5 cards.
The Bid
The player to the left of the dealer starts the bidding. They can bid or pass. Bidding involves assessing your best suit and how many tricks you think you can take. For example, 6 diamonds.
Each suit is ranked. Spades are lowest, followed by clubs, diamonds, and hearts. No trump is higher than hearts. This means a bid of 7 spades is necessary to outbid 6 diamonds. The lowest bid is 6 spades and the highest bid possible is 10 no trump. Here is the bidding from lowest to highest:
- 6 Spades is worth 140 points
- 6 Clubs is worth 160 points
- 6 Diamonds is worth 180 points
- 6 Hearts is worth 200 points
- 6 No trump 220 points
- 7 Spades is worth 240 points
- 7 Clubs is worth 260 points
- 7 Diamonds is worth 280 points
- 7 Hearts is worth 300 points
- 7 No trump is worth 320 points
- 8 Spades is worth 340 points
- 8 Clubs is worth 360 points
- 8 Diamonds is worth 380 points
- 8 Hearts is worth 400 points
- 8 No trump is worth 420 points
- 9 Spades is worth 440 points
- 9 Clubs is worth 460 points
- 9 Diamonds is worth 480 points
- 9 Hearts is worth 500 points
- 9 No trump is worth 520 points
- 10 Spades is worth 540 points
- 10 Clubs is worth 560 points
- 10 Diamonds is worth 580 points
- 10 Hearts is worth 600 points
- 10 No trump is worth 620 points
Bids typically go between 6 and 8. I’ve seen 9 bids few times, and even a 10 bid once. But those are exceedingly rare. Players have to outbid the first bid or pass. The bidding keeps going until every player has passed.
Ranking the Cards
In 500 bid the joker is always the highest ranked card, even with no trump. The joker becomes the highest card for whatever suit was bid. Followed by the bowers. The right bower is the jack of the suit bid while the left bower is the jack of the other color of the suit called.
For example, if hearts was bid the rank of the cards would be the joker, jack of hearts, jack of diamonds, ace of hearts, king of hearts, queen of hearts, 10 of hearts, 9 of hearts, and on down.
For no trump the only trump card is technically the joker. The rest of the round depends on what suit is lead. Any ace is high, followed by the king, queen, jack, 10, 9, and on down. There aren’t any bowers in no trump. Only the joker can take a trick if the player doesn’t have to follow suit.
Playing the Round
The player that won the bidding gets to pick up the kitty and discard 5 cards. Short suiting, or discarding the lowest cards is the best practice.
That player also gets to lead. They can lead with trump, in fact leading with the joker is usually a good idea. Players all have to follow whatever suit was lead. The high card played wins that trick. The winner also gets to lead for the next trick.
The round ends when all 10 tricks are played. Each team counts their tricks to assess their score.
Scoring
The team that won the bid has to win an equal amount of tricks or greater in order to get points. They are awarded the amount of points for their bid even if they took more tricks than their bid. If they fall short of their bid they are set and lose the amount of points they bid.
The other team is only awarded 10 points for each trick won. There aren’t any bags in this game. Taking more than your bid is just leaving points on the table.
Strategy
Getting the lead and the kitty is usually an advantage. So this game tends to favor the people who are bold at bidding. However, reckless bidding results in being set frequently.
Bidding involves paying attention to the cards in your hand as well as what others are bidding. If everyone passes, the kitty may have some hidden gems. If one team is bidding red (hearts/diamonds), you and your partner usually are better off calling black (spades/clubs).
Having 6 or more trump, even low cards means the other players probably have little trump. It only takes one or two leads of trump to bleed everyone out of trump, making low end cards valuable. Having 7 or 8 trump plus an ace makes for a good hand, even without a joker or bower.
Usually what you should bid jumps out at you. Generally, having more trump is better than having higher trump. For example, having joker, left bower, plus several more trump is better than having joker, right bower, and only one more trump.
I also consider, what kind of shape I would be in for each suit if I didn’t get the bid. Maybe, a setting hand is better to pass with.
Summary
I like 500 bid because it seems to involve more skill than Euchre. Bidding alone involves a lot of skill assessing your hand, your partner’s skill, your opponents bids, and guessing what’s in the kitty.
It requires keeping track of what trump cards have been played and what trump cards have yet to be played. Plus watching what the other players are throwing informs you of how the last few tricks may go down.
Overall, 500 bid involves complicated bidding and scorekeeping, however, it’s still a lot of fun to play. A very rewarding game to play with friends or family.
How to Play 500 Bid brought to you by: David M.
I’m David M. I’ve been playing video games a long time, my pong game was fire. Now, my kids run circles around me but we always have a good time. We mostly play party and family games. Strategy and battle games are still among my favorites. I like writing about games almost as much as I do playing them. My favorite games are: Moving Out 2, Out of Space and Overcooked All You Can Eat.
