How to Total Points in Spades
Spades for real money is an entertaining card game in which teams earn points to compete with one another. The point values in spades are used to ultimately determine the winner of each game. Here is a closer look at how points are totaled in spades.
The Spades Game Score Sheet
You can make your own spades score sheet easily enough. All you need is a piece of lined or unlined paper and a pencil. Many players prefer to use a lined sheet of notepaper because this makes it easier to manage additions and subtractions that are made during each round of play.
Begin by drawing a line down the middle of the paper from top to bottom. On the left side of the line write Team A or the individual names of the team's members. On the right side of the line write Team B or the team member names. You can then draw a line below the team names from left to right.
What you are now looking at is a standard scoring sheet that is used for many types of card games. In spades this is the most practical way to total the score.
Marking the Bid
In each round of play the teams in a spades game must make a bid on their hand. The bid is the number of books that the team believes they can win during the round. There are thirteen total books in any spades round.
When the team announces their bid, the score keeper writes down that number on the team's side of the score sheet. The team that did not deal the cards is allowed to bid first in any given round. The second team's bid is recorded in the same way on its side of the score sheet.
This number is the basis of the points that will be earned or lost in a round of spades.
Scoring Winning and Losing Bids
Once the round has been concluded, the bids for each team are scored by adding a number to the original one. A team that succeeds in its winning bid receives that number multiplied by ten, plus the individual number of books that exceeded the original bid.
For example, the team makes an opening bid of 5 books. At the end of the round, the team has caught a total of 7 books. This team receives 5 x 10 for a total of 50, plus 2 for the extra two books. Thus, the final total is 52.
A losing spades bid is scored in exactly the opposite manner. The losing bid multiplied by ten is subtracted from the team's score.
In this example, the spades team makes an opening bid of 7 books. They do not reach this bid and only catch 6 books. The result is a point deduction of 70 points, or 7 x 10.
Winning the Spades Game With Points
A typical spades game is played to a total of 500 points. The first team to reach this amount of points is awarded the win in the game.
By mutual agreement players can also agree to play to a total of 350, 1,000, or any number that they want. An average time for a spades game that is played to a total of 500 points is 90 minutes.
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