Cover your partner in Spades

By Marya · Updated by Holger in September 2026

If the total bid is high (12 or 13), Spades players usually try to set their opponents. Sometimes, though, players will duck tricks to avoid taking bags. The hand below, from a game of Spades, shows how that can go wrong.

Whatever the total bid is, keep an eye on making your team's bid. It's not so serious to get set if each partner has bid 1. You'll only lose 20 points. As your team's bid goes up, getting set does more damage to your team's score.

Here's a video clip of a player who turns down several chances to take an extra club trick, even when there's a sign that their partner might not make their bid. The total bid is 12, so there will be 1 bag. Both sides should be looking for chances to set the other team.

In the video, you can see West (Johnny) duck club tricks again and again. Instead, West should have been looking to take extra tricks, because East's King of Hearts was taken early in the hand. East was probably counting on that trick for two reasons:

• Kings are often counted on to take a trick.
• Only one heart trick had been played. Usually the first and second tricks in a suit aren't trumped. East (Box) was probably unpleasantly surprised to see South take the trick.

West should have looked for chances to take an extra trick to support his partner. Instead, he avoided taking tricks that could have helped. His team was set. A loss of 60 points can be hard to make up!

The opponents, North and South, collected 2 extra bags. That may hurt their score later, but the game may end before it does. So getting set hurts your team's score right away, while bags only hurt in the long run.