Software Board-Games - Ultimate Bid Whist

Description:

There are many variations of the game of Bid Whist, Ultimate Bid Whist is one variation.
While classical Bid Whist is played with four players, this is a two handed version with a human player playing against a computer opponent. Each player is dealt 12 cards.
The Human player is allowed the first bid, or pass.
The player who wins the bid, also wins the six card 'kitty'.
The player then chooses six cards from either the kitty or their hand to 'throw away'. Bid Whist is played with both the jokers, if your playing uptown, the Big Joker is the highest card in the trump suite, followed by the Little Joker.
If your playing downtown, the Big Joker is the lowest card in the trump suite, followed by the Little Joker. The goal of Bid Whist is to obtain a score of +7 or force your opponent to score -7.
Points are made by bidding on the number of 'books' or winning hands you feel you will be able to turn above the first 6 books. For example, if you bid 3 uptown Hearts, your guessing that you can win 9 hands out of a total 13.
If you win the 9 hands, you gain 3 points, however, if you don't win the 9 hands you lose 3 points.
You win 1 additional point for each point over your bid, so if a player bids 3 and wins 10 hands, they win a total of 4 points. If a player has, for instance, more Heart cards than any other trump then it would be advantageous to bid in the Heart suite.
If a player has a lot of face cards then they would want to bid high, or uptown. A player also has the option of bidding No Trump suite.
This means that the player has many low (Ace, 1, 2, 3) or high (Ace, King, Queen) cards spread out over many suites.
With No Trump the bidding is doubled.
If a player bids 4, downtown, No Trump and wins 10 hands then 8 points will be added to their score.
Likewise if a player does not win 10 hands, their score will be subtracted by 8 points. The player who wins the bid automatically is given one point and becomes the lead player, and the other player must play whatever suite the lead player starts with.
Afterwards, the player who wins the hand gets to choose the lead suite, and the other player must play that suite. If you run out of cards in the suite the lead player has played, you have an option of putting out a card from another suite.
You can win the hand by playing a card from the trump suite, otherwise the lead player wins the hand.