New Contract

Last week Manhattan's Whist Club, lawmaking body for U. S. contract bridge players, posted a new scoring system to replace the one in use since 1932. Result of studies by the Whist Club, London's Portland Club, the Commission Franc,aise du Bridge of Paris and many a bridge expert, the new code is effective all over the world after March 31. Important changes:

Tricks

In no-trump the first trick scores 40, all others 30. Thus it is now possible to score a game (100 points) in three hands of one no-trump each--impossible under the old method of scoring odd tricks at 30, even ones at 40.

Bonuses

A little slam remains as before (500 points non-vulnerable, 1,000 points vulnerable). Grand slam bonuses are reduced: from 2,250 to 1,500 when vulnerable; from 1,500 to 1,000 when non-vulnerable.* For tricks over the contract, the bonuses are unchanged.

Penalties

Non-vulnerable, undoubled: 50 for each undertrick.

Non-vulnerable, doubled: 100 for the first undertrick, 200 for all others.

Vulnerable, undoubled: 100 for each undertrick.

Vulnerable, doubled: first undertrick 200, all others 300.

Under the 1932 laws, the game's maximum penalty--for 13 down, vulnerable and redoubled--was 20,800 points. Under the new code the penalty in the same situation is 7,600 points. On the vulnerable side the reduction in penalties from the 1932 sliding scale (100 for the first undoubled undertrick, 150 for the second, etc. etc.), will doubtless cause lusty overbidding to save rubber.

A handy rule of thumb for the new scoring: to compute non-vulnerable doubled penalties, multiply the number of undertricks by 200, subtract 100; for vulnerable doubled penalties, multiply by 300, subtract 100.

Said Chairman Harold Stirling Vanderbilt of the Whist Club's Committee on Rules: "These new figures are not as nearly in accord with the laws of chance as were the old, but the change was made to protect the pocketbook of the loser."

In the new code the number of rules is reduced from 65 to 39. After March 31, "dummy" will be an obsolete term, to be replaced by "declarer's partner." Furthermore, that partner will for the first time be permitted to speak up, not only to call attention to a "defender's" irregularity, but also to discuss questions of "fact or law," reply to "proper questions." Theoretically, the new rules make possible a bid of eight: when a player makes an insufficient bid--such as seven diamonds to overcall seven hearts--his opponents may insist that he make his bid sufficient for the overcall.

* In contract a side is "vulnerable" when it has won one of the two games necessary for "rubber."

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