HAND PREPARATION AND EVALUATION:

When you get your hand, the first thing you should do is count the cards. While this is not essential, it is a good habit for when you play at clubs or at tournaments, where many people will play the same hands as one another. If another group accidentally moves a card from one hand to another before you get the hand, you can sort out the mess with a Tournament Director before anyone looks at the cards he is holding.

Next, sort your hand into suits, ideally alternating black and red colors to avoid any confusion. Many people also sort the suits by rank. While this is not essential for the bidding, it will speed up play marginally if you become the dummy. For this reason, if you do sort your suits by rank (Ace down to Two), place the higher ranking cards behind the lower ranking cards. When you are dummy, you will need to lay your cards on the table in sorted suits with the highest ranking card closest to you and all lower cards visible. Furthermore, if you are dummy in a trump contract, you must place your holdings in the trump suit to your right. Sorting your hand as described here will allow you to do this in the least possible time.

Look at all of your cards and add up your high card points (HCP), counting 4 for each Ace, 3 for each King, 2 for each Queen, and 1 for each Jack. Note that this means that each deck of cards has 40 HCP; this fact will become important in understanding the bidding. After playing for a little while, you'll find yourself happy to get 18+ HCP, so don't expect hands that are too crazy too often.