• Are you feeling lucky?
• 7.18 Update Turns Your Luck Around
• Cribbage Counting
• Lucky Penny Sale
• How to have the luck of the Irish by being Spades savvy
• Did You Know?

Which DreamQuest Character learned to play cards during a Medical Convention in the United States?

1. Nicole
2. Ashuk
3. Marshall
4. Professor Plum

7.18 Update Turns Your Luck Around

We're excited about our upcoming update to our Windows games coming this month! The 7.18 version improves the overall play experience and makes your games more efficient and easier to view. Five Hundred players will enjoy some graphics changes, but for those tenacious Solitaire players, we have a real surprise. Within the PRACTICE menu button in the games, there is a cheat toggle that allows you to view all of your face down cards. So, go ahead, increase your luck and odds with a peek for a game or two. You know you deserve it. Now you can finally turn the tables on Wes and Amber. Even though the new release is only days away, if you act now and buy any of our games, we'll give you the update absolutely FREE! So why not check out your favorite Windows games like Championship Solitaire and get right into the fun?

DreamQuest is pleased to offer you a wonderful version of Mahjongg, like a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. Catch this bargain with one of our favorite games, and pick your way through sea drenched backgrounds of a Celtic year, scattered with jewels from the Emerald Isles.

This is the 10th, and designated last, hand of a tournament game. Whichever team is ahead after this hand will win the game. You are bidding 4th and the score is 498 (8 bags) for your team, and 448 (8 bags) for the opponents. What should you bid with the hand shown?

North: 2
West: 4	East: 4
South: (?) 4 5 10 4 7 8 3 5 6 J 4 7 10

Obviously, you need to either bid nil and try to outscore the opponents, or bid 1 and try to bag them, right? Well, sometimes the obvious can be deceiving.

Examine what happens if you make a "nutty" 2 bid in this situation.

If both teams make their bids, you will win 538/9 to 529/8

If the opponents set your bid, they will bag out, and you will win 458 to 430 something.

If the opponents bag your team, they will get set, and you will win 440 something to 368.

IF YOU BID 2 YOUR TEAM CAN NOT LOSE THE GAME!

I call this the Double Whammy Autowin Bid, and it is the most powerful bid in Spades.

By intentionally making a bid that you have absolutely no expectation of being able to make, the opponents are damned if they do, and damned if they don't.

When you make this bid, the opponents will just sit there trying to figure out what to do, when in fact there is nothing to do. There is no reason to even play the hand.

If you think about the score situation in the above example, you will see that the 2 bid wins the game NO MATTER WHAT CARDS YOU HAVE IN YOUR HAND!!! That means that you could make the bid without even looking at your cards. (Remember when I said something about the score being more important than your cards and you didn't believe me?)

The Double Whammy Autowin Bid is as good as bidding can get, and once you make one of these bids, the smile on your face will be your proof that it's true.

Remember, try to think of Spades as a game of risk and reward, rather than as a game of cards, and soon you will be a force to be reckoned with in the world of Spades.

Good luck and happy Gaming

Read the best in tips and techniques from expert Spades player
John Strichman author of How NOT to Lose at Spades.

Welcome to a new corner of our newsletter, devoted to you, our customers. Here you can forgo foraging through the FAQ pages, and simply read about one or two customer concerns each month. Now and then, we hope, to share some small aspect of our games to make your playing time more enjoyable. If there is any concern you think we need to address, please feel free to email us at .

Cribbage Counting for the Purists

Several of the new Cribbage gamers have asked us if you can score your own hands. While you cannot do so in the default settings of the game, there is a little option you can set within the game to score your own hands for Cribbage in the latest versions.

• Go to the MENU at the left hand corner of the game.
• Go to the SETTINGS menu
• Go to the HAND SCORING toggle switch
• MANUAL - means you can count your own points and enter them into the box. The computer will tell you if you are wrong.
• MUGGINGS - if you select this option, the computer will peg any points you fail to count.