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Getting Started with zBridge

Welcome to zBridge! This guide will help you navigate the platform's features and make the most of your bridge sessions.

1. Getting Started: The Play Now Button

The Play Now button is the center of the action on your homepage. Clicking it will take you to the "Bridge Rooms" selection screen where you can choose your preferred style of play.

2. Exploring Game Rooms

🤖 Duplicate Bridge with Jethro

Solo duplicate bridge scored in matchpoints. You can choose between two sub-modes:

  • Leaderboard Mode: Competitive solo play (fixed at South). Hints are disabled. Every board is duplicate-scored and counts toward the Monthly Bot Leaderboard and Online Masterpoints (OMPs).
  • Practice Mode: A sandbox where you can play solo or multiplayer with friends, customize convention cards for NS and EW, configure custom PBN deals with constraints, and use bidding and play hints. Choose either Jethro or BBA for bidding and play.

🃏 Bridge Solitaire

Solo bridge scored in IMPs (team match style). You can choose between two sub-modes:

  • Leaderboard Mode: Solo at South against a 4-bot Closed Room, compared in IMPs. You can set both tables' convention cards. Your IMP difference counts toward the Solitaire Leaderboard.
  • Practice Mode: Played the same way, including the Closed Room and IMP comparison. Suggestions, undo, and custom hands are enabled, but results do not count toward the Solitaire leaderboard. Choose either Jethro or BBA for bidding and play at both tables.

👥 Social Rooms

Casual multiplayer bridge with other human players. Great for a relaxed game and meeting new people. Please try to stay until the end of a hand!

🏆 Rated Matches

Competitive play in structured 4-board sessions. Your performance affects your global rating, rank, and the Monthly Rated Leaderboard. Leaving mid-session is not permitted and carries a penalty.

🔬 Analysis Room

A powerful bridge laboratory for deep study. Set up specific deals with PBN or random cards, and explore Single Dummy and Double Dummy (DDS) solver results. Practice bidding in different convention systems using Jethro or BBA bidding options over random or custom deals.

📄 PBN Viewer

Open a .pbn hand record and replay its auction and play in the hand viewer, board by board. Files holding several boards are supported, and the reader accepts the variations different programs write (suit-first or rank-first cards, play order or player order, comments, claim markers), so a record exported from elsewhere still replays here.

3. Interactive Gameplay

  • Bidding Box: When it's your turn to call, a digital bidding box appears. Choose a level (1–7) and suit, or Pass, Double (X), and Redouble (XX).
  • Playing Cards: Click or tap a card in your hand to play it to the trick. The system enforces legal suit-following and trump rules automatically.
  • Claiming:
    • In Social & Rated games, if the outcome of a hand is certain, use the Claim button to propose taking the remaining tricks. Choose a standard claim statement or enter your own line of play; opponents see that statement and vote to accept or reject.
    • In Bot games, Jethro AI evaluates your claim algorithmically against the remaining cards and accepts or rejects it automatically.
  • Undo:
    • In Bot Practice Mode, Undo is instant for your bids and card plays, allowing you to freely experiment with different lines.
    • In Social & Rated games, you can request an Undo for a mistake, which requires unanimous approval from opponents for fairness.
    • (Undo is disabled in Leaderboard Mode to maintain leaderboard integrity.)
  • Show Last Trick: Missed what was played? Click the LAST TRICK button during card play to review the previous trick's cards.
  • Rotate Dummy & Swap Seats: When dummy is East or West, you can rotate the dummy layout for better visibility. If playing with bots where a bot is declarer and you are dummy, use the swap-seats button on South to rotate the table 180°.

💡 Bot Game Hints & Explanations

Playing with Jethro (the AI) offers unique learning tools:

  • Bid Explanations: In bot games, bid explanations are always active by default. On desktop, simply hover over any available bid in the bidding box to view its meaning and conventional requirements before making your call. In the auction table, you can click or tap any past bid to inspect its explanation and alert details at any time.
  • "Hint" Button (Bidding): In Bot Practice mode, click "Hint" in the bidding box to see Jethro's recommended bid for your current hand.
  • Play Hints: In Bot Practice mode, toggle the HINTS button on desktop (or the lightbulb icon on mobile) to display calculated trick badges on your cards to guide your play.

4. Learning & Customization

🎓 Interactive Tutorial

New to bridge or need a refresher? Our Interactive Tutorial provides guided, step-by-step lessons that walk you through the fundamentals of the game directly on the table.

⚙️ Jethro Conventions

Want to know exactly how your AI partner bids? Visit the Jethro Conventions room to view and configure the 2/1 Game Force conventions Jethro uses.

🃏 BBA Conventions

Choose and customize the bidding agreements used by BBA. Select a system such as SAYC, 2/1 Game Force, Polish Club, Meckwell, or Acol; save your preferred system and use it in BBA Practice games.

⚙️ Game Table Settings

Open Settings from the game table to choose card sorting, trump placement, dummy layout, declarer-at-bottom view, and sound effects. You can reset these preferences to their defaults at any time.

5. Post-Game Analysis & Replay

When a hand ends, the Hand Complete screen displays the final score and lets you review your game:

  • 📊 Play Analysis (Play Comparison Modal): In bot games, click "Play Analysis" to inspect your card play trick-by-trick against the Double Dummy Solver (DDS), compare your auction against Jethro's bidding, and view the full makeable contracts matrix (DD Table).
  • 🔍 Analysis Room: Click "Analysis Room" from the score modal to load the hand directly into the solver laboratory for interactive play and testing.
  • Duplicate Traveler Scores: Re-open any completed deal from Game Records to see the traveler scorecard and compare your matchpoint percentage against other players.

6. Social & Community Features

📊 Bidding Polls

Encountered a tough hand? Create a poll or vote and discuss challenging bidding problems submitted by the community right from the homepage.

✍️ Community Blog & News

Stay updated with the latest strategies and site news! Any registered user can also write their own articles by visiting the Blog and clicking "Write Article".

👥 Club Members & zBridge Chat

Browse the Club Members Directory, send friend requests, and direct message friends 1-on-1 with real-time unread notification badges.

🏆 Monthly Leaderboards & Archives

Track top players on the Bot Monthly Leaderboard, Solitaire Monthly Leaderboard, Social Monthly Leaderboard, and Rated Monthly Leaderboard. You can view current rankings or check past performance in the Leaderboard Archives.

7. Tracking Your Progress

Visit the Game Records section in the navigation menu to see your match history and analyze past deals. Your Profile shows your overall statistics, including your current rating, Online Masterpoints (OMPs), and rank icon.