The Schnapsen Log

Order from Chaos (solution)

Martin Tompa

The normal and safe way to proceed would be to pull trumps first. Let’s see what happens if you do that. What do you do after pulling trump? There’s no rush to cash ♦A, as you can do that any time you are on lead, and there’s no reason to make it easy for Lore to cash her ♦T. So after pulling trump, you should next lead ♠J to start setting up your ♠K. This puts Lore on lead in this position:

Lore: (31 points)
♠ —
♥ —
♣ A
♦ TK

You: (46 points)
♠ K
♥ —
♣ —
♦ AQ

With your trump gone, Lore is now free to cash her ♣A, bringing her total to 45 trick points, but then must cede the remaining two tricks to you.

You win 1 game point. That’s not bad, but perhaps there’s a way to win 2. Pulling trump at trick 6 is what allowed Lore to cash her ♣A. What if you were to lead ♠J rather than pulling trump? Now Lore would be on lead in the following position:

Lore: (31 points)
♠ —
♥ J
♣ A
♦ TK

You: (41 points)
♠ K
♥ Q
♣ —
♦ AQ

This time Lore cannot afford to play ♣A, because trumping that and cashing ♦A gives you enough points. (This smacks of a counterforce play.) Whatever else she leads, you cannot be stopped from winning the next two tricks with ♥Q and ♦A, and then cashing ♠K on the third. Those are the 3 tricks you needed in order to get enough points. But this time you score 2 game points.

What I find interesting about this deal is that you will win if you go about your tasks in almost any order, but there is only one order that allows you to win 2 game points. Because Lore has only 19 points at trick 6, it’s well worth searching for the right order to do business.

© 2012 Martin Tompa. All rights reserved.

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