better player will always win, if not every hand at least most hands, independently of which cards the players randomly received in the initial deal. Few other card games for two people are as difficult to master as German Whist played with foreplay and endgame. The score count always begins at the 7th trick taken in the endgame. For instance in a high game 10 vs 3 cards gives 4 points to the one who took 10 tricks. If it was a low game, the 4 points goes to the other player. Strategy The strategy for the two variants, in the first stage, is slightly different. In the first variant the player must balance winning the current trick against the probability of winning future tricks. In the second variant the player must try to assemble the best possible hand for the endgame. This is however not as simple as it might appear. Assume hearts is trump and you begin the foreplay. You have four low hearts in your hand, but also several high-value spades, and the top card of the deck is the two of clubs. Now despite a "worthless" card to play for, playing one's highest trump might reveal the trump situation on the opponent's hand, and you will indeed reduce the numbers of trumps (which is not your strong suit), and finally, if the opponent plays a lower trump you will know that the opponent may have a large number of trumps (which is not the case if the opponent needs to play another suit) finally by "winning" the two of clubs, you will keep the advantage of deciding which suit is played next. In general it is a good idea to attempt to keep the lead, but not always at any cost. Playing a card of same value as the card to play for is often good, when it comes to middle-value cards, such as 7 to 10, but even more important is to choose the suit wisely. It is also important remember that when the ace is gone, the king becomes the highest value card, and if the three top value cards in a suit are gone, then the jack is the highest card in that suit, etc. Also the lowest cards are important to know, especially when the play is low. The real "key" is however to know which suit to play, in order also