Pilotta strategy: when to declare, count and defend

Most rounds of pilotta are won by habits, not lucky cards: price your hand honestly before you bid, plan before the first card, keep control of the trumps, read your partner's bids and cards, and count. This guide takes each moment of a round in turn, with worked examples. These are the usual habits of strong players, not fixed laws.

Practise against the computer

What wins over a long game

A round holds 162 points. Trumps carry 62; the other three suits and the last trick carry 100, so trumps alone can never make a contract of 80 or more. Card values: rules page.

Over a match to 301 (the usual target; a table can agree another) you have three aims: make your own contracts, make theirs fail, and take as many points as you can in every round, bought or not. One point can make or break a contract.

Sizing up your hand and the auction

• Count your losers, not only your winners: which tricks the hand is likely to lose sets how high you can go.
• Trump quality beats trump count. Overrating an ordinary hand is one of the commonest traps.
• The Jack is a far better base than the Nine. Experienced players open on the Nine as little as they can, unless the hand is very strong.

The openings are the ones on our bidding page; nothing here changes them:

• A useful bar: do not open a hand you could not raise alone from 80 to at least 100–110. If you cannot bid again over an opponent, they buy cheaply and usually make it.
• Always bid the Nine of partner's suit, even when it is your only trump: it tells him how high to go and how to play.

Worked example: a declaration lowers your real contract

You buy at 120 in ♥ holding the King, Queen and Jack ♥: a tierce (20) and the pilotta, the trump King and Queen (20). If both count, your cards need only 120 − 20 − 20 = 80. If an opponent shows a bigger declaration, the tierce no longer counts but the pilotta does: you need 120 − 20 = 100. Either way they count only if your side wins a trick.

When to declare, and when to stay quiet

A declaration does two things at once: it lowers the contract you really have to make, and it shows the table some of your cards. So you face two separate questions. How far should it push your bidding? And do you want to announce it at all?

• Before you bid on it, ask who can beat it. Only the team with the highest declaration scores its declarations, so a contract priced on a beaten one can fail even if you win every trick. Your cards and the bids so far help answer that.
• A carré usually opens low; a long run in trumps does not. With four Jacks, four Nines or another carré, find the trumps and the Aces with your partner first, then climb. A quarte or quinte in trumps is opened with its value. Judging how high to go takes experience; until you have it, keep these contracts low. Bidding far above what the hand can make is how a big declaration turns into a big loss.
• Take care with four Tens, Kings or Queens. They have no typical opening, and without a sure trick the round can end with the opponents taking everything.
• You may keep a run or a carré quiet. A player can choose not to call one, so the opponents do not get to see those cards. It costs the points and can let a smaller declaration of theirs score, so do it only when hiding the cards serves your plan for the round. The pilotta is different: on Pilotta.io it is called for you.

Worked example: is my quinte safe?

You hold King, Queen, Jack, Ten and Nine ♥, a quinte worth 100, and no Ace. What could beat it? Four Jacks, four Nines, four Kings, four Queens and four Tens are all impossible, because one of each is in your hand. That leaves four Aces and a quinte headed by an Ace in another suit, both rare. A second quinte headed by a King matters too: in trumps it beats yours, yours wins if ♥ are trumps, and if neither is in trumps both are void. Hold just one Ace and four Aces disappears from the list. That makes your 100 a strong declaration, so you can count it when you price the hand, while still leaving room for the bad case.

The plan before the first card, and the first lead

Before the first card, the bidders ask: how will we control the trumps, and which tricks are we likely to lose? Picture the bad cases too, and keep the worst in mind. A big contract is most at risk on the first trick; a small one usually on the last.

When they bought it and you lead

• An Ace, to bank a trick before they run their hand, above all when they might take every trick (capot). But do not cash every Ace.
• Never lead from a Ten with one small card while an opponent may hold the Ace.
• Lead the suit of the Ace they showed. If an opponent bid an Ace on his partner's suit, lead that suit: if the bidder has only one card there, he cannot come back to it. Only while trumps are still out.

When your side bought it, usually lead a trump; not when you hold all the top trumps, suspect partner lacks the Jack, or want your trumps for cutting.

Worked example: one trick takes their Jack and Nine

The opponents opened a single and found each other: one holds the trump Jack, the other the Nine. Spades are trumps; you lead with the Ace and Eight ♠ and suspect the Nine is on your right, the next to play. Lead the Eight ♠. He holds the Nine and Seven, and in pilotta you must play a higher trump when you can, so out comes the Nine. Partner plays his King. On your left, holding Jack, Queen and Ten, the last player must beat the Nine with the Jack, though his partner is winning. They take 0 + 14 + 4 + 20 = 38, but both their top trumps are gone and your Ace is now the highest trump: it will win a trick, so no capot.

Playing the contract

• Usually start by drawing trumps: it takes their trumps, clears the way for your other tricks and keeps control. Losing control is perhaps the main reason contracts fail.
• A weak bidder does not lead the Jack at once; it would only collect small trumps. Lead another suit, ideally the one partner showed an Ace in, so he wins and leads a strong trump through.
• Do not waste the Jack. With Jack-Ace or Jack-Ten, almost never lead it while the Nine is out: your Ace or Ten would be left bare.

Worked example: wrapping the Nine

Partner opened 80 in ♥ and you think he holds the Jack. Before any trump has been played you lead your strongest, the Ace ♥, from Ace, Ten and Seven. The opponent on your right holds the Nine and Eight; he must beat the Ace, and only the Nine can. Partner's Jack covers, the last player plays the Queen, and you take 11 + 14 + 20 + 3 = 48 points in one trick.

Defending

• Run them out of trumps: once you find the suit they cut in, keep leading it.
• Return the suit partner led, usually not the one the opponents led: each was led for a reason.
• Giving up a trick means letting go a trick you could win, to win more later, usually the Ten. Do it without hesitating: a pause can give it away.

Worked example: hunting the Ten

Trumps are gone. You hold the Ace and Nine ♣ and place the Ten and Eight ♣ on your left, the player just before you. Partner leads the Queen ♣ from Queen and Seven; your left-hand opponent plays the Eight, keeping his Ten while the Ace is out; the player on your right has no clubs and throws worthless cards. Take it with the Ace and you win 3 + 0 + 11 + 0 = 14, but the Ten is then the top club and later wins 10 for them. Play the Nine instead: partner's Queen wins 3, he leads the Seven, the Ten is forced out, and your Ace takes 0 + 10 + 11 + 0 = 21. You end with 24 instead of 14, and they lose 10.

Playing against a declaration

• Redo the sum. A declaration shown by the bidders lowers what they need from the tricks, so your target moves too.
• Keep the shown cards in your head for the whole round. You saw them; play as if they were still face up.
• Check your own hand on the first trick. Declarations are called and compared there. A higher one on your side wipes out theirs, and their target jumps straight back up. Only the pilotta survives it.

Worked example: beating a contract with a quarte in it

The opponents bought at 110 and call a quarte, worth 50, on the first trick. If your partner calls a quinte on that same trick, it outranks theirs: their 50 is gone, their cards stay hidden, they need the full 110, and your side needs only 162 − 109 = 53, with partner's 100 on top. If nobody on your side beats it, they show King, Queen, Jack and Ten ♠ on the second trick, with spades not trumps. Now they need only 110 − 50 = 60 from the tricks, so your side must hold them to 59 and take 162 − 59 = 103. The shown cards help you do it. Holding the Ace and Eight ♠, you know only the Nine and Seven ♠ are elsewhere, and that your Ace is the one spade above their Ten.

The language of the cards

Your cards talk to your partner, and the opponents read them too. Partnerships agree their own conventions; these meanings are usual, not certain. Signals outside the cards (a word, a look, a pause) are not allowed.

• Discards. Out of trumps while partner draws them, discard from a suit with no Ace: the first discard usually says “no Ace here”. Discards from two suits ask for the third.
• Loading. An Ace thrown on partner's trick almost always says “I hold the Ten there too”, unless it was saved from a cut or its 11 points break their contract at once.
• The Queen before the King. With the pilotta and another trump in your side's contract, play the Queen first: “I hold another trump besides these two”.

Worked example: load the right card

The opponents bought at 90 with no declarations. Your side breaks it with 73, leaving them 162 − 73 = 89. Partner is winning a trick and you have neither the suit led nor a trump. Counting, your side ends on 72 if you throw the Queen (3) and on 73 with the King (4). Throw the King: one point, and their 90 fails.

Counting, and the last trick

• Count the trumps on every trick, and who holds them: from the auction first, from the play above all. You hold four, lead the Jack, all three others follow: 8 − 4 − 3 = 1 is still out.
• The last trick is worth 10 and often decides the round. Plan your discards so you hold the best card left in the suit that will be led.

Worked example: counting trumps, trick by trick

Spades are trumps and you hold Jack, Nine, Ace and Seven ♠. Eight trumps exist, so 8 − 4 = 4 are out: King, Queen, Ten and Eight. You lead the Jack and the others play the Eight, Queen and Ten. Three more gone, one left, and you know it is the King. The player who dropped the Queen said nothing about a pilotta, so he does not hold that King. Lead the Nine: whoever has the King must play it. Now the only trumps left in the game are your Ace and Seven, so you no longer need to draw trumps and can keep those two for cutting. Had someone thrown another suit on the Jack, you would know that player is out of trumps, and that the missing ones sit with the other two.

Worked example: let trick seven go

Two cards each are left, trumps are gone, and you lead holding the Ace and Seven ♥. You know the opponent on your right holds the Ten and Eight ♥; the others have no hearts and throw cards worth nothing. Cash the Ace and he drops the Eight; his Ten then beats your Seven and takes 10 + 10 for the last trick = 20. Lead the Seven instead: whichever heart he wins with, he must lead the other into your Ace, and you take the last trick with 11 + 10 + 10 = 31, or 21 if he played the Ten first. Careful: if someone else could win trick seven and switch suit, your Ace would be stranded.

Going for capot

• With a strong hand, think of capot from the start, but never at the risk of the contract. In a close round, experienced players make the contract first.
• Declare it in the auction only when sure of all eight tricks. A declared capot pays a lot, and the opponents may close the game. As a rule the opener, with most trumps and control, declares it.

Worked example: what is at stake

You buy at 100, no declarations. Make it with 130 in tricks: 100 + 130 = 230, written 23, and they get 32, written 3. All eight tricks: 100 + 250 = 350, written 35, and they get nothing. Fail chasing it, and they take 100 + 162 = 262, written 26. The extra 12 on the score sheet is worth playing for only when the contract is safe.

Common mistakes

• Bidding too high and losing the contract, often by overrating an ordinary hand.
• Opening weak hands, so the opponents buy cheap contracts and make them.
• Closing the game too often.
• Cashing Aces and tricks early, then dropping out of the round.
• Losing count of the trumps, and not watching discards, partner's and the opponents'.
• Never giving up a trick, or giving one up all the time.
• Counting on a declaration without first asking who could beat it.
• Forgetting the cards the opponents showed, or forgetting to redo the sum after they showed them.
• Losing contracts chasing capot, or missing the capot the play offers.

Questions about pilotta strategy

What is the best strategy in pilotta?

Price your hand honestly, plan before the first card, keep control of the trumps, and count. Read your partner's bids and cards too.

Should you lead trumps when your side bought the contract?

Usually, yes: it draws their trumps, protects your other tricks and keeps control. Not when you hold all the top trumps, suspect partner lacks the Jack, or want your trumps for cutting.

When should a defender lead an Ace?

When you need to bank a trick before the bidders take control, above all against a possible capot. Otherwise, waiting for someone else to lead the suit often wins more.

What does wrapping the Nine mean?

Leading a strong trump so the opponent who plays just before your partner must play his Nine, and your partner's Jack takes it. It works because you must play a higher trump when you can.

Is there a standard signalling system in pilotta?

No: partnerships agree their own conventions. Some meanings are widely used, such as a first discard saying “no Ace here”, and signals outside the cards are not allowed.

When should you go for capot?

When the hand is strong and trying does not put the contract at risk. Declare it in the auction only when you are sure of all eight tricks.