gszes

ty for saving me some typing:)

That is where the problem lies-- say you hold A5432 543 A32 A3 (as opener and hear J2n) is this a 4s bid? if so you miss a pretty easy 7s.

Anytime I have a close decision and I would be on opening lead I look to see if I have a decent opening lead and if not I bid. Makes no difference IMPS or MP. I think this is a close call btn p x and 5h (slightly more tempted to x than p at MP). 5H

ok i am on bbo and will try to chat with jinksy before we begin

In case of emergency break glass

club 3 hoping to prevent rho from scoring up a major suit K. Sorry what was the question? NO.

We cannot shoot for the moon every hand because it simply is not SAFE (especially at imps). Raising to 3c here just seems way wrong as it can get us way in over our heads in so many ways. This hand has a lot of potential but if partner cannot bid over 2d (in a positive way) game is just plain anti% and maybe by a huge margin. This hand rates to play much better in diamonds than anywhere else (unless p rebids hearts or (clubs which I would then follow with a club raise)). Worrying about playing in the minors (especially at imps) is just wrong especially when we hold a max 2 loser suit of our own to bid. We will indeed miss a few games bidding 2d but overall we will be a ton happier and healthier than messing around with clubs or passing 1h. Bidding 2d has an extra advantage if p perhaps bids 2h 2n or 3n we can then introduce clubs and p will have a very good idea of our pattern and weakness. Messing around with clubs has a monstrous risk of completely losing our longest and strongest suit.

Sorry about stealing space for this but I just got this request from JEC and I will report back to JEC in about 20 min any successes/failures in recruiting:)))))))))))))))))

I will post similar in the regular sites as well and will inform JEC in about 30 min about any successes:)

LOTS of problems here. IMHO it began with the 3d bid rather than a neg x. Those dia sure look nice but we are eating up a ton of space with no clear direction. If we had begun with neg x we can always cue bid later but we need to find 3n (if p is min) if that is the right contract and then we can worry about slam later if we decide 3n is not right. There is a HUGE difference btn a GF 2d bid and GF 3d bid and that difference is exploration space. The opps partially jammed the bidding and then we further jammed the bidding. Here we sit at 4d and really have only a slight clue about what p actually has.

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Safest contract at a safe level. Many will fail to bid game at all and spades offers the most opportunity for an overtrick(s). I guessed 70-80 with only 3nt really getting the best of them. Of course if east avoids a heart lead due to the bidding I will drop my estimate to around 40% (what was that 1h bid anyway):)

How much more interesting would bridge decisions be if we still had 100 and 150 honors added to hands? but I digress:) PASS = 10 anything else gets a 3 or less and is masterminding especially with robot partners that cannot take a hint. So many ways to win defending against 2s and so many ways to lose NOT defending against 2s.

You misread the question. Both hands are responder after p opens a 15-17 1n and have identical 5521 distribution take it from there.

That is correct and SOTM is always a consideration late in any session - that is why I wanted to eliminate that bias.

Not an average 18 count (the aces and heart body make this closer to 19.5). I much prefer the GF 3c. 2N may sound better since we are semi balanced but with the opps owning at least 8 spades I would be a heck of a lot happier about 3n if p can bid it and we aren't even talking about our complete lack of dia power. 3c also happens to leaves 3n in the picture as well as 5c which can have play opposite many minimums and even 4h is not gone from the equation. Do not like the fact that 2n might cause us to miss far too many games and quite possibly steers us in the wrong direction.

hard to imagine any :aggressive: opening bid that would hate to play 2s opposite a limit raise type hand so I would play pass as at least a regular opener and since we are at the top of our invite I will hazard a 3s bid. No sense in punishing p for opening light even if 3s goes down it might be better than letting them play 2d. IMPS gotta try. pass 2d = 1 (better than 7n anyway)

pass On average, we do not rate to make 5c so the downside potential is quite large, I like to strain to bid when short in opps suits but the colors just put too much risk in play for me.

I'm pretty sure no one else wants to do this but I strongly favor 3s This bid is forcing but does not promise much power and it also shows a suit with insufficient quality to bid 4s (if weakish). P cannot suddenly go from non forcing to slam control(especially missing the club KQ). They might try and cue bid and we can then bid 5c. The 3s bid leaves many contracts and levels and p thinking we have 5 spades is not enough to get them to overrule any club contract we bid. There is a reason p opted for 3c rather than 2n or a reverse and we need to find out what that reason is. It may well be p is short in spades and could not get in a 2n rebid for fear we would repeat spades. In any meaningful sequence our conversion to clubs will let p know about our spade ace and slam interest.

I am not really sure we even belong in spades much less slam level. There is no ideal way to bid this hand (preempts work) I would have chosen x and if p manages 4h or 4s I will be a lot happier about pursuing slam. I have some concerns p will convert to penalty but those should be infrequent.

IMPS 15-17 NT both vul no SOTM considerations. We are comparing 2 responder hands NOINT p opens 1NT and the main point of the discussion is how should these two hands be evaluated by responder (weak invitational or game forcing). Technique for bidding is unimportant as that is usually decided when responder determines how the hand is evaluated. Hand 1 J6532 J8643 A4 3 Hand 2 JT953 JT952 A7 2 I think all those interested in learning about hand evaluation will enjoy reading this discussion. TY in advance for any/all comments.

The first step is to recognize that not all 17hcp 5h 6c hands are created equal. Take these two extreme examples: K KQJ43 K KQ5432 and void KQJT2 AK KJT932 The first hand needs to exercise a fair amount of caution. The two stiff kings are both of dubious value for either offense r defense and the length in the rounded suits means not much defense there either. That means x is a very poor idea with the first hand since we would hate for partner to convert our x to a penalty. I will admit that since 4h is our most likely game and 3h is a much better lead director I would start hand 1 with 3h over 2s and be ready to flee to 4c if 3hx. The second hand has vastly superior suit quality and should be willing to bid all the way to 5c expecting to make with very little help. This would also be a poor hand to x with because there is too much offensive potential. Having a system in place where 4c = clubs and hearts would be great here since deciding to bid 3c or 3h is a bad underbid. Even having 3s as michaels would be a benefit. If no special bid is available I would be much more tempted to start with 4h and almost be happy to flee to 5c if x (instead of fearing a huge negative score like I would with hand 1). While not everyone would agree with the way I would bid the point is there is a vast number of hand types where different bids would be appropriate always show the complete hand not just a generic description for better answers.

You can pull trumps but do not eliminate the side suits. The main idea is to lead toward your hand twice hoping rho began with AKx and cannot resist following with the AK the first two rounds. If you eliminate the side suits first rho has a vastly superior idea of what you have in your hand and will be much more inclined to play low. The strip and end play may save you from losing 4 spades (iandyre) but it will not help you avoid 3 spade losers since the "endplayed" opp can always give you a ruff and sluff and if you started with 3 spade losers you will finish with 3 spade losers.

I do not know the robot system so take any advice here with half a grain of salt. I would be very worried about lho starting to make some serious preemptive noise and IMHO IF we are playing inverted minors I much prefer getting that suit in (bidding 2c now) the bidding and worrying about a heart fit later because I do not want p pushing later with 3 card heart support. If we are forced to play at the 5+ level it may easily be right to do so in clubs rather than hearts anyway. If there is no serious preemptive action then we have plenty of time to explore for a 44 heart fit. If not playing inverted minors I would have to bid 1h and hope.

my 1 cent worth p 1h 1s* 1n (though I would bid 2d playing nfb) 2s**3c p*** 3d+ pass out * too much chance of game even opposite a passed hand to preempt at IMPS **pass is reasonable with this piece of cheese but hard to avoid support with support *** This hand keep on getting worse and worse anyone squeezing a 3s bid now has more chutzpah than I. +just too much risk we belong in diamonds to pass 3c