The defence will be trying to thwart your plan. As soon as they realise what you’re doing, they’ll lead trumps. Another potential pitfall is that they might be able to overruff dummy. So if you can afford to, ruff high.

In these two examples, spades are trumps and you’ll be playing ♥ AK and ruffing ♥ 2. Should you ruff low or with ♠ Q?

In (a) the risk of the 4-1 spade split (in which case ruffing with ♠ Q will promote a defensive trump trick) is greater than East overruffing in hearts (which would occur on a 6-2 heart split, with West having not mentioned hearts in the bidding). Ruff low.

In (b) you can afford to ruff with ♠ Q which will only cost on a 5-0 spade split. Best, though, is to cash ♠ A first (which you can afford to do). If an opponent discards, you’ll have to ruff ♥ 2 with ♠ 3; assuming both follow to ♠ A, ruff ♥ 2 with ♠ Q.

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