I want to learn to count

[Fluffy]

I suppose that as soon as the dummy is open I should calculate the number of cards remaining in the two closed hands, and then whenever a spade is played by one of the closed hands, I subtract one from the number of outsstanding spades etc. If the distribution of one suit is known then I count that suit seperatly, keeping track of the number of cards holds and the number of cards declarer holds, rather than the sum of the two.

This is the way I do it.

 

When one player has show a 2-suiter, or a 7 card suit, it is then easy to try to count the remaining cards in his hand.

 

Also I relax myself when I have a yarborough or only 1 suit to cover, I know I shouldn't do this, but Ido.

[Finch]

It's an amusing idea that I've often heard but I don't think it is true. In fact, most mathematicians that I know can do arithmetics without a calculator much much better than most others. I bet this is also the case for cherdano and jchiu.

 

I think mathematicians often say that they can't add to make it clear that mathematics (as a science) has little to do with making calculations in your head. That is of course correct.

I used to be dreadful at arithmetic (I'm another mathematician by training). However scoring a few matchpointed pairs and Swiss Teams events by hand soon improved my adding up no end. Nowadays there's no need for TDs to lean to count.

[Finch]

Helene, don't feel badly about the way you count B) It's the way I count as well!

 

Yes, when I am considering a suit that either I will be attacking or that I am concerned the opps will be attacking, I do think of the various shapes that are possible, and I do try to construct the hidden hands in terms of shape. However, when it comes to tracking the cards played in a suit, and thus the remaining number of cards, I do it the old-fashioned, beginner's way of counting the cards played one card at a time.

 

I have read that, for example, when missing 5 cards in a suit, consciously hold in your head 5=0, 4=1 and 3=2 as patterns, both ways, and eliminate 5=0/0=5 when both follow and 4=1/1=4 when both follow to the second round, but that seems to me to be too much work :D

 

It may be that I am doing this pattern thing subconsciously... and that I've been playing for so long that the part of me that keeps track of these things is no longer something I think about or can even think about consciously...like riding a bicycle...if you have to think about what you are doing, you'll fall off. But it certainly seems to me that I count one card at a time while building pictures of hands.

I count that way as well. I also echo the rest of mikeh's post.

 

A couple of points to add:

i) on spot cards

It's particularly important to concentrate on the cards as they are played. I used to say each card mentally to myself as it was played to help fix it into my head, and I still do that to some extent when playing online, as I haven't played much on the computer and my brain finds it harder to remember what has been played than at f2f.

 

When I get to later in the play and I need to remember what was played earlier, I find I can visualise the card as it was played i.e. I can remember what it looked like and hence what the pip was. At least I can in f2f bridge.

 

As everyone else says, practice improves matters, but it has to be real, thinking, practice, not just playing hands without concentrating. The three exercises I used to get people to do in the days when I was teaching beginners and coaching the university B and C teams are, after a hand has been completed (and in ascending order of difficulty):

1. What was your hand?

2. What was dummy's hand?

3. What were the other two hands?

Initially just - what were the shapes, what were the high cards, but then move on to reproducing some, many, all of the pips.

 

At my local club it's not uncommon to hear declarer ask dummy, after the hand has been played, "how many points did you have?". I always wonder to myself "how can you not know?"

 

Playing online, or at a club, you don't really have time to do this after each hand although you might have time between rounds. But if you are dummy on the next hand, you could spend the time reconstructing all four of the hands from the previous one without looking at the movie.

 

ii) on counting

I seem to have two parallel processes going on at once - one is simply keeping track of what's been played, and how many of everything, the other is the reconstruction of the opponent's hands... I sort of come at it from two directions. I will also start with an hypothethis about the hand shapes from the auction and then develop it as a result of the lead, carding etc... one of my most frequent mistakes is to work out what I think the hand is, play on that basis, and then not adjust my line later when it transpires that I can also cope with some additional layouts I hadn't originally considered.

[helene_t]

Thanks Frances, this is interesting. I also find it more difficult to remember spot cards online. Since I play more online than IRL and have done so years, it's not a question of aclimatization for me, but more a question of taking the game less seriously (and being able to check emails or feed the cats while opps are tanking). Also the fact that the movie will be available means that there is no reason to paying attention to immaterial details out of curiosity, not sure if that reason really applies, it sounds a little backwards now that I read what I'm writing.

 

I was aware that I should pay more attention (in turn for playing less hands) if practice is to help me, but the idea of mentally naming the spots did not occur to me. Thanks for that.

 

Also the exercise of reconstructing the closed hands after the deal sounds useful.

[BonzoDogge]

The first thing to do when dummy goes down is to add your high card points to dummy's and establish how many points the opponents have between them. The information isn't always useful, but it takes just seconds to do and should become a habit.

 

Always count your winners/losers, depending on whether or not you're in a no-trump or a trump contract, and plan accordingly. Sometimes that's as far as you have to go, but this step is absolutely necessary.

 

As regards counting suits, I finally settled on the following procedure. When a suit is first played note how many cards you're missing in the suit. Let's say it's six. Missing six cards, 84% of the time the suit is going to split 3-3 or 4-2. Unless the bidding or subsequent plays tell you otherwise, simply assume the suit is splitting either 3-3 or 4-2 and go from there. So if the opening lead is the 10 of spades and you're holding the 9, I'd be thinking " that's probably a doubleton, the suit splitting 4-2 with my RHO holding four." Nothing is certain, but it's a start and helps place the information in context, making it easier to remember.

 

The bidding often gives big clues, such as an opening weak two. If you find yourself missing eight cards in that suit, you can rule out a 4-4 split. 5-3 is possible, but I'd assume 6-2 at the outset and work from that.

 

Note opponents discards like a hawk. Don't worry so much whether it's McKenney, revolving, or whatever, but rather ask yourself what the discard says about length and any possible honour holdings in that suit. For example, missing seven cards in a suit, if somebody makes their first discard in that suit as you play trumps it could be from a five card suit, remembering that missing seven cards 92% of the time they're splitting either 4-3 or 5-2.

 

In short, unless the bidding or play suggest otherwise, assume the two most likely splits in each of the four suits and work from that. For the record :

 

Missing 4 cards : suit will divide 3-1 or 2-2 90% of the time.

 

Missing 5 cards : suit will divide 3-2 or 4-1 95% of the time.

 

Missing 6 cards : suit will divide 4-2 or 3-3 84% of the time.

 

Missing 7 cards : suit will divide 4-3 or 5-2 92% of the time.

 

Missing 8 cards : suit will divide 5-3 or 4-4 79% of the time.

 

Observe that when missing an odd number of cards, you can almost mortgage the house on a "normal" split.

 

 

Practise by taking a book on bridge and simply trying to work out suit lengths on the info' given as you study the hand.

 

Hope that helps.

[FM75]

An interesting revival of an old thread.

 

I am curious whether helene_t's methods have changed much. I suspect that she is far more advanced today than when the question was first posted.

 

Whether counting cards in a suit, or tracking which ones have been played, it seems clear to me that what you really need to know is what is missing.

 

So counting remaining count in a suit, or the remaining cards in a given suit(s), seems to be the most efficient - because the amount that you need to remember decreases. Remembering the opposite increases what you have to track. (It is easier to remember Q85 is missing, than AKJT976432 have been played or I can see some of them.)

 

That said, perhaps if your memory is more "photographic", I am wrong.

[helene_t]

I am curious whether helene_t's methods have changed much. I suspect that she is far more advanced today than when the question was first posted.

As declarer I basically use the same method as before, but I have become better at it. I rarely miscount as declarer.

 

As defender I tend to do it differently. Usually the auction leaves declarer restricted to a limitied number of distributions, and I then use elimination as the play progresses until I have complete count. Living in the country of count signals (most partners give count even on partner's lead of an ace) sometimes helps. It doesn't always work, though. I am more likely to miss a discard when defending than when declaring, especially when declarer's hand is not very well-defined by the auction.

[PhantomSac]

I kinda just think how many have been played, I dunno. Like I played 2 rounds and everyone followed so thats 8. So I guess I do what you described in your OP, not sure why that's a bad way to count.

 

I didn't know this was an old thread, and when I read it I thought almost exactly the same thing I said in 2007...

 

Nothing wrong with this. I guess I don't know if I think "everyone followed to 2 rounds so they played 4" or "everyone followed to 2 rounds so 8 are gone," they are interchangeable... I think both ways I guess? But def the key is if I am losing it and forget what happened I can definitely re-create the play. Like, they led a spade, I cashed 2 diamonds to test something then played a heart blah blah blah. If you know why you have played something it is easy to re-create it from the beginning trick by trick. I am not really entirely sure how I count but if I need to know how many are left in a suit I just think about how many rounds were played (and if someone showed out...) or if I need to know their pattern I think about how many cards of their hand I know about. I don't keep a running track of someones shape based on if they showed out, but if I have 8 trumps and someone shows out on the second round I intuitively know they are 4-1 and then can think about how many rounds of trumps I've played to know how many remain. If I need to know their exact pattern in some endgame I just think about how many of each suit I know they have etc etc.

 

I guess all methods are good, it depends on what you need to know about the hand at the time. Trying to keep track of everything at once is inefficient, first think about what you need to know and then use the most efficient process possible to get that info. I don't agree with the whole thinking about their pattern/their possible patterns from trick one and adjusting based on every trick, that seems really hard and like guesswork... the first question is what do I need to know to solve the problem at hand, then think about that info. Sometimes that will be what possible shapes they have, and fine, think about it, use the auction use everything available, but if you just need to know how many trumps are out then just think about how many trumps you've played and how many you started with. Information overload from being inefficient in your thought process will cause dumb errors.

[Fluffy]

Nothing wrong with this. I guess I don't know if I think "everyone followed to 2 rounds so they played 4" or "everyone followed to 2 rounds so 8 are gone," they are interchangeable... I think both ways I guess? But def the key is if I am losing it and forget what happened I can definitely re-create the play. Like, they led a spade, I cashed 2 diamonds to test something then played a heart blah blah blah. If you know why you have played something it is easy to re-create it from the beginning trick by trick.

 

My problem with this is the "blind pitch" phenomena. Where I only gather the info of a player pitching from a suit, but not what card he actually pitches. This used to happen me a lot. Specially when it is a very unexpected break.

[beatrix45]

All of Mike Lawrence's materials are very good IMO and the Counting At Bridge is no exception. FWIW, a method I use (maybe others do) is basically this (assume you're declarer):

 

I can second this in spades. If you don't have Mike's DVD's or downloads, I really think you should get them.

 

The second thing is that remembering cards and probable suit distribution requires a different sort of mental skill/effort than what we normally do in school. As best I can explain it, it is like the difference between a digital and an analog computer. Acquiring it is somewhat like getting in shape physically. It takes practice and repetition. When you get there, it is very cool. You can recall played cards and probable suit distributions with very little effort when you need to. This leaves all of the rest of your overdeveloped, logical brain to do its usual work. You start to see inferences, tells, the whole deal.

[uday]

You can practice suit patterns with this simple page

 

http://www.bridgebase.com/tools/counting_game/game.html