What would make the game easier would be a warning bell or flashing light which goes off whenever an important stage in the play is reached. Something to nudge us and say `Your next card matters. Give it a little thought.' Take this hand from the Brighton Swiss Teams:
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East leads 
K, declarer winning.
A and a club ruff are followed by 
AK on which declarer throws a club, and a
spade ruff. Declarer now leads 9, and
partner ruffs in with the 
10. Just
then the alarm bell goes off. What card do you follow with as
West?
Well, obviously it doesn't matter. Declarer must be 1-1-6-5
and has no more club losers. Either we'll set the contract or
we won't, depending on whether or not partner has A.
But hang on...look at it from partner's point of view. She
doesn't know about the minor kings. It could easily be right to
prevent a second club ruff. No sooner was 10 out of my hand than the terrible truth dawned on me.
Sure enough, Cath switched to A and
declarer claimed the moment my K hit
the table. "Sorry," I said. "It might have helped if I'd played
Q." "Yes, it would," partner agreed,
which coming from Ms Jagger almost qualifies as a stinging
rebuke.
The key point is that holding KQ,
one would of course play the king, to show partner that we can
afford it. So playing the queen denies the king. By inference,
playing the 10 should deny the queen, and so declarer must have
it and it is imperative to draw trumps. Had I played Q, partner would have known there was no point
in drawing trumps. If only my alarm bell had been working.
Instead, the resounding clatter of crashing diamond honours
could be heard all round the tournament hall, as this
misdefence was duplicated many times.
Another trump trick might have disappeared on this board.
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I led 10, and two rounds of
diamonds followed. Declarer led 8
which I won and hoped for a misguess in trumps. In fact
declarer led 10 from hand and ran it,
and my dismay changed to bafflement when partner produced the
J.
So why is this hand of interest? Because, as Giles Woodruff pointed out, of what might have happened. It is the closest I've come to participating in a `Devil's Coup,' albeit in a somewhat passive rôle.
Declarer has the genuine chance of a doubleton QJ, but an attractive alternative, which works
as the cards lie, is to cash KQ, the
minor kings and ruff two clubs and a diamond to reach:
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South has already declined to ruff one spade, but when the
last spade is led, his best shot is to ruff with Q. But declarer knows there are four trumps
left and so should finesse against J.
The trump trick vanishes.
Of course, declarer can go wrong, in particular by attempting the coup the other way round, ruffing twice in the West hand. As the cards lie this will not work, but it would make a good hard luck story.
Curiously, I suspect the Devil's Coup may be easier to pull off as defenders in practice. If declarer has a weak trump holding Qxxx opposite Jxxx say, he won't usually draw trumps, and one can well imagine reaching the diagram with South as declarer. Of course the defenders have been spared the need to shorten their trumps, which makes the whole process simpler. It's not happened to me yet though - or maybe I never noticed it.