How to play Callbreak

Names and family

Callbreak is also written Call Break, and is known as Lakdi or Lakadi (लकड़ी) too. In Haryana it goes by Minus, after the minus score that a missed call brings. In Bangladesh it is Call Bridge, and you may also hear Ghochi or Toos.

It is a close relative of the game Spades, with one big difference: there are no teams. All four players play alone.

The cards and the deal

You need exactly four players and one standard 52-card pack without jokers. In every suit the Ace ranks highest, then King, Queen, Jack, 10 and so on down to 2.

Agree on a first dealer, who deals the whole pack face down, one card at a time, clockwise, starting with the player on their left. Everyone gets 13 cards and nothing is left over. Look at your hand before the calling starts.

The deal moves one seat to the left each time, so in a five-deal match one player deals twice.

Bidding (the call)

Each player makes one call: the number of tricks they expect to win in this deal. The player on the dealer’s left calls first and the dealer calls last.

• There is one round of calling, out loud. Nobody passes, outbids or doubles: each player simply names their own number.
• The lowest call is 1 and the highest is 13. You cannot call zero.
• The calls do not need to add up to 13. If they total more, someone is bound to fall short. If they total less, everyone can succeed.
• If the four calls add up to less than 8, the cards are thrown in and the same dealer deals again.

Playing a trick

The player who called first leads to the first trick. After that, the winner of each trick leads the next, and play goes clockwise.

Spades are trumps in every deal. They are never chosen or announced, and any spade, even the 2, beats every card of the other suits. Spades may be led at any time: unlike in Spades, they never need to be “broken” first.

On your turn, check these rules in order:

1. Follow suit if you can. If you hold a card of the suit led, you must play one.
2. Beat it if you can. When following suit, you must play a card higher than the best card of that suit in the trick, if you have one. If not, play any card of the suit. This holds when spades are led, too.
3. Unless it is trumped. If a spade has already been played on a trick of another suit, you still follow suit, but you may play any card of it, since you cannot win.
4. No card of the suit led? Trump. If you have a spade that beats every spade already in the trick, you must play one of those spades.
5. Otherwise, free choice. With no card of the suit led and no spade that can win, play anything: a low spade or a card of another suit.

The highest spade in a trick wins it. If no spade was played, the highest card of the suit led wins. All 13 tricks are played, and only the number of tricks counts: no card scores points, and the last trick earns nothing extra.

An example. The King of Diamonds is led and you hold the Ace, 10 and 5 of Diamonds: you must play the Ace. The next player, holding only the Queen, Jack and 7, cannot beat the Ace, so any of those will do. If clubs are led later and you have no clubs but do hold spades, with no spade in the trick yet, you must trump.

Scoring

After the 13th trick, each player compares the tricks they won with their call.

• Made it: if you won at least as many tricks as you called, you score your call, plus 0.1 for each extra trick.
• Missed it: if you won fewer, you lose the amount you called, whatever you did win.

Scores always carry one decimal place, so a call of 3 made exactly is written 3.0.

Call	Tricks won	Score
1	1	+1.0
1	0	-1.0
3	3	+3.0
3	2	-3.0
4	6	+4.2
5	6	+5.1
8	13	+8.5
13	12	-13.0

An extra trick adds only 0.1, while falling one short costs the whole call. A call of 5 made exactly scores 5.0, but a cautious call of 3 with the same five tricks scores only 3.2.

Winning the match

A match is five deals. Keep a running total for each player; going below zero is normal. After the fifth deal, the highest total wins. There is no target score: the match simply ends after five deals.

If players tie for the highest total, all four play one more deal, and whichever tied player scores more in it wins. If they are still level, they share the win.

Variants

Tables differ on several points, so agree on them before you start.

• Direction. In Nepal and a few parts of India, deal and play go anticlockwise, and the player on the dealer’s right calls and leads first.
• No need to beat. Under the older Call Bridge rules you must follow suit but never have to play higher. This changes the strategy noticeably.
• Beating after a trump. Some tables keep the must-beat rule even once a trick has been trumped.
• Low spades. Some make you play a spade whenever you lack the suit led, even one too low to win. Others ban playing a lower spade on a trick that is already trumped, unless you hold nothing else. A rare version never forces you to trump at all.
• First lead. Some ban leading a spade to the first trick unless the leader holds only spades.
• Lowest call. Some set it at 2 instead of 1.
• More redeals. Some also redeal when a player has been dealt no spades at all, or no Jack, Queen, King or Ace.
• Missing suits. Some ask anyone dealt no cards of a suit to say so after the calls, purely as information.
• Call Bridge scoring. The traditional scoring from Bangladesh counts a call as made only if you take exactly that many tricks or one more. Two or more extra tricks count as a miss, and you lose your call. A successful call of 8 or more scores a flat 13, or 16 at some tables.
• Match length and ties. Some play a longer match of 10 deals, and some break a tie in favour of the best score in any single deal.

Quick reference

• Four players, no teams, 13 cards each, Ace high.
• Spades are always trumps and may be led at any time.
• One call each, starting on the dealer’s left, from 1 to 13. Calls adding up to less than 8 mean a redeal.
• Follow suit, and beat the best card of that suit if you can, unless the trick is already trumped.
• Without the suit led, play a spade that beats every spade in the trick if you have one. Otherwise, play anything.
• The highest spade wins, or else the highest card of the suit led. The winner leads next.
• Made your call: your call plus 0.1 per extra trick. Missed it: minus your call.
• Five deals, and the highest total wins.