Breakdown of Wir spielten zusammen und planten einen Streich.
ein
a, an (eine)
und
and
spielen
to play
wir
we
zusammen
together
planen
to plan
der Streich
the prank
Questions & Answers about Wir spielten zusammen und planten einen Streich.
How do you form the simple past (Präteritum) for spielten and planten?
Both spielen (to play) and planen (to plan) are regular (weak) verbs. To make them past tense for wir (we), you take the stem (spiel-, plan-), add the past tense marker -te-, and then add the usual plural ending -n. This gives us spielten and planten.
Why is the word wir missing after und?
Just like in English, if two verbs connected by und (and) share the exact same subject, you don't need to repeat it. You can say Wir spielten ... und wir planten, but dropping the second wir sounds much more natural.
Why is it einen Streich instead of ein Streich?
The word for prank is a masculine noun, der Streich. Because the prank is the direct object of the sentence (the thing being planned), it takes the accusative case. For masculine nouns, ein changes to einen in the accusative.
Would a German actually say this sentence in everyday conversation?
Probably not. In spoken German, people usually use the spoken past tense (Perfekt) for regular verbs: Wir haben zusammen gespielt und einen Streich geplant. The simple past (Präteritum) forms like spielten and planten are mostly used in written German, like in books, stories, or news.
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