Importance of the Queen of Spades in Hearts

Video Transcript

"When do you keep the queen? When do you pass the queen? And what you do with the queen if she's in your hand. We've already mentioned that the queen is the most important individual card in the game and often decides the difference between victory and defeat. Now let's look at holdings with the queen, when we're going to keep her, when we're going to pass her. If we have the queen dealt to us by herself, singleton, we're certainly going to get rid of her. There's no hope keeping that card in your hand. It will be driven out on the lead of spades because there's twelve other spades against you and the ace king probably have lots of cards with it. One card, not enough, not even close, same problem, you're not going to survive that suit either because in two leads of spades the queen will be driven right out. Doesn't matter what the guard card is, it can be a low one, that's even worse. Three cards, still insufficient, better, but insufficient, even if the suit was evenly divided, four, three, three, three, surely the person with the four spades will have enough length to drive it out of you. The only chance you have with this holding is if the ace of spades is here or here and maybe this person is leading, but we're talking about managing the queen in your hand when it's dealt to you, not when it's passed to you. Three guards are a little bit better. This one you have an opportunity to maybe get rid of it or to dump it on an off suit. You certainly don't have the freedom to be able to place it at will. However, let's look at this type of hand. We have the queen and three guards. Those are pretty good guards and you know why, because whoever leads spades, you have the chance to take the lead and shift suits. So, do you see the difference between these three, having those three with her or having those three with her? The deuce, three, four aren't going to stop anything. Any card will just soak them right up. Bigger guards mean better chances, and of course any four spades, even if you pick the four worst possible guards you could have. Why is that? Because if you have five spades in your hand that means for somebody to drive that out of you they have to have five spades. Again in Hearts the spade suit tends to divide more evenly because people aren't passing spades. So, managing the queen in your hand, now if the queen is passed to you, if the queen is passed to you, chances are you were dealt spades, very unusual to be dealt a void in suits in Hearts. Sure it can happen. You can be void in anything. You can be void in spades, but why would the queen not likely be passed to you if you didn't have any spades in your hand? Because that meant that all thirteen spades were out between the three hands. Surely somebody would've had the queen with three guards on it, I mean with four guards on it, and would've kept it. So if the queen is passed to you, the same rules apply, if you have two or three you're mission is going to be to dump her unless it means ending the game and coming in third place. You're not going to hold this thing. It's too dangerous. You want to get rid of her at first opportunity and if it happens to hit the guy that's in third place and he growls at you as he goes into fourth place, what are you supposed to do, take the queen and go out of the game and again you have a little bit more latitude if you have additional guards. So again, managing the queen, four guards, good stuff, three guards, difficult, high guard cards, very good and then you'll have a little bit more freedom. Sometimes you just have to get rid of her. Oftentimes you can work with another player and aim for a player. We'll talk about that later."