Cheats at Hearts!

[Kurt Lang]

Hi Manny,

It doesn't happen often, but I do catch the computer opponents cheating at Hearts. I just played a game where the west player led spades. The north and east players dumped hearts. I ended up taking the trick. Later in the same hand, the east player dumped the queen of spades on one of my leads.

I'm going to list a few other gripes next. Don't get me wrong, I still prefer these games over any other I've tried. There's just some noticeable things that irk me. Granted, a computer game is limited to the instructions given it, but I would think there'd be a way to fix them at least somewhat. So here it is.

No trouble with Solitaire. Nice randomness in the deal of the cards. Also for Spades. Believable dealing of the cards and play. Hearts and Euchre are another matter.

Hearts has the annoying habit of dealing the cards very predictably. I can almost tell you what the opponents are holding based on my hand. It's very easy to spot when you are being set up to be given the queen of spades on a given hand. Other things include if you are holding the three of clubs, the opponents automatically know not to lead clubs. Somehow they know that you have it and not one of the other players. Otherwise, they'll beat clubs to death until you eat the queen. That seems to be the main goal of the computer players. To make sure the human player loses. Even if it means taking points that will put them out instead of trying to stay in the game, as long as you're not in the lead. The main gripe being that the computer opponents play as three against one, instead of each for their own as real players would. But what the game needs more than anything else is better randomness of the deal.

Euchre has its predictable patterns, also. The game can really only be played at the Hard level. At Easy or Medium, the computer opponents make so many bad bids, you win by default almost every game. Usually without even having to bid. But on hard mode, it's very difficult, to almost impossible to win. Examples: 1) If you have a very strong hand in red or black, it's almost a 100% certainty the up card will be the opposite color or suit. The opponent then almost always takes the bid with an unstoppable hand in the opposite color. 2) The opponents have no problem most times sliding off suit leads past your hand when they have the bid. But you can rarely get an off suit lead by them without having it trumped. The main problem for Euchre being that the cards are dealt in the opponents favor the majority of the time. It's gets pretty old having to pass and just following the opponents lead. Better randomness of the deal would go a long ways to solving these problems.

This is all said simply as feedback and observation. Nothing personal intended. Thanks for listening.

[WalterArcher]

Cheating at Hearts has the annoying habit of giving very short predictably.The game can really be played at Hard. On easy or medium, the computer opponents are so bad bid, you win by default almost all battles.