Calling Aces

In Play500.com Bryce Francis says: The basic idea behind any call is to get the most points out of the pair of hands involved in that call. You must COMMUNICATE!!!. Communication must be POSITIVE. This method of calling requires calling the aces first, and your suit strengths later. Each caller must call the lowest ACE, or the joker when it is his turn to call and he or she has no aces to call. If the first caller holds the ace of spades, his first call is six spades, even if that is the only black card in his hand. A first call of six spades says to all players that that player has the ace of spades. It gives no indication of any other card in the hand. It certainly cannot be taken to indicate a strength in spades. It is just the ace.

This certainly applies to ATF500. The only modification I would make for Classic 500 is that IF you have 2 aces then call what would be your off-suit ace in preference to your trump ace. The idea of ace calling is to give your partnership an extra trick by identifying an off-suit strength.

If you have no aces then go straight to seven if you have a good hand or if the scoreline dictates a bid. Calling strength at 6 because your hand is weak just muddies the water. The exception is calling 6 strength when your team is very near the back door. I use minus 350 as my guide as to when to call strength at 6 instead of 7.