Your table plays the Kontra expansion. The talon is already picked up; the first card has not been played. You are a defender holding: XVIII, XVI, XIII, X, VII, K
, K
, Q
, C
, J, 2, 8.
Do you Kontra?
Reveal answer
Answer
Kontra. Count it: 5 Taroks + 2 doubles for the big ones (XVIII and XVI) + 2 Kings = 9, sitting in a single hand across the table from the Declarer. That alone eats deep into what the Call needs to find, since the partnership now has one hand’s worth less of the deck’s best material to work with. This is exactly the read Kontra was built for: not a hunch, a count.