dwar0123

Why wouldn't I call the director because an old lady paused for 10 seconds before following with the 2♥? Because it is far to likely that I am misreading a legit discouragement of ♥ as some type of suit preference signal that I think was informed by the hesitation. A hesitation that I would wager occurs on half the plays she makes at defense and is completely unreadable to her partner. This is literally the 3rd time I've stated this point, a point which you have yet to respond too. Because it isn't my job to make sure she follows every rule of bridge to the letter. And because a lot of the reason I play at local clubs is for the social atmosphere which I have no inclination to mar because I think I might have been damaged by a little old lady who paused for 10 seconds. And finally, I don't think shortening little old ladies to lol's is an insult, it is a common acronym that I was oblivious to until I started reading this forum. If everyone perceives it as an insult then I should probably stop using it.

You got a chip on your shoulder there? None of that is at all what I was suggesting but thanks for projecting your own biases upon my argument and coming to a completely wrong conclusion. Not at all ironic I assure you.

That is a rather peculiar way of looking at my argument which misses the entire point I was trying to make. Perhaps that is why you don't understand it. I will try again. In so far as one is bound by the rules to call the director when ever they suspect the opponents have been transmitting UI to each via breaks in tempo, I am suggesting that one errs on the side of caution. It is a judgement call after all and I find most people who are so worried about opponents transmitting UI are really just seeing their own worries projected upon players who play at a fairly inconsistent tempo to begin with. We are not unbiased observers and our biases do influence our perceptions.

When I run into situations like these, I always wonder if my own concern about the opponents getting in a quick ruff isn't coloring my perception of their mannerism such that I think there is UI going on when in fact I am just projecting my own worry. After all the 2♥ is a signal denying interest in hearts being continued, legally and dutifully received. Finding the suit to switch to probably wasn't that difficult. And when you switch into the opponents super strong side suit, it doesn't take a genius to figure out it is a likely stiff, regardless of how 'fast' you perceive that switch taking place. If there really is a problem, then calling the director and taking him aside is the best course of action but I would never do it vs lol's at a club game, that is just in poor taste.

2♥, gib understands michaels and the extra strength 3♦ would show over 2♠.

Easts 4♥ bid is a bug no? http://www.bridgebase.com/tools/handviewer.html?lin=pn|Dwar0123,~~M42snmej,~~M206b4dl,~~M4079rrt|st||md|2S26JH35KD359JKCQK%2CS4589H4AD248TC69J%2CS7TH78TQD67C34578%2C|rh||ah|Board%2060|sv|n|mb|p|mb|p|mb|2N|an|Two%20NT%20opener.%20Could%20have%205M.%20--%202-5%20C%3B%202-5%20D%3B%202-5%20H%3B%202-5%20S%3B%2020-21%20HCP%20|mb|p|mb|3C|an|Stayman%20--%2011-%20HCP%3B%205-12%20total%20points%20|mb|p|mb|3H|an|2-5%20C%3B%202-5%20D%3B%204-5%20H%3B%202-5%20S%3B%2020-21%20HCP%20|mb|p|mb|3N|an|3-%20H%3B%204%20S%3B%205-11%20HCP%3B%2012-%20total%20points%20|mb|p|mb|4H|an|2-5%20C%3B%202-5%20D%3B%205-%20H%3B%202-5%20S%3B%2020-21%20HCP%3B%20rebiddable%20H%3B%20two%20stops%20in%20H%20|mb|p|mb|p|mb|p|pc|S2|pc|S5|pc|S7|pc|SQ|pc|H2|pc|H3|pc|H4|pc|H7|pc|HT|pc|H6|pc|H5|pc|HA|pc|CJ|pc|C3|pc|C2|pc|CK|pc|HK|pc|D4|pc|H8|pc|HJ|pc|CQ|pc|C9|pc|C8|pc|CA|pc|H9|pc|D3|pc|DT|pc|HQ|pc|ST|pc|SA|pc|S6|pc|S8|pc|CT|pc|D5|pc|C6|pc|C7|pc|SK|pc|SJ|pc|S9|pc|D6|pc|S3|pc|D9|pc|S4|pc|C4|pc|D2|pc|D7|pc|DQ|pc|DK|pc|DJ|pc|D8|pc|C5|pc|DA|

At the table I would have led a heart. Edit: Sigh Thx gnasher, I think I will just goto bed.

The only way this could actually happen is if DC became the next Chernobyl.

They clearly have nothing to do with each other, only an irrational person would even think to ask the question. Further evidence at the actual point they were trying to make, which was a warning to others to not waste their time trying to have a rational debate with an irrational poster. A warning which I am obviously choosing to ignore at my own peril. For instance, as in this example, you ignored Cthulhu entire point and tried instead to make it about something that was so self evidently true that it is hard for many people to even understand how you can seriously be asking it. You can't prove AGW by pointing out flaws in one detractor, that's the absurd straw man argument you were trying to pretend Cthulhu was making. Don't pat yourself to hard on the back for having successfully disproved it, everyone else came into this discussion already knowing it was false.

We are all still trying to learn what content is appropriate for the new forum and I think this post comes fairly close. The added chances of the ruffing finesse were to much and thus I agree that making the spots worse would have been a good idea. I might have even added another ♥ to dummy just to make it an almost lock that it would work rather then requiring an unlikely split. That way when the reader see's it, they can post their response with a fair amount of certainty.

My distribution says 2nt. My diamond stopper says 2♠. I think I am going to listen to my distribution.

Pretty sure I got it, but never would I get it at the table.

You can't expect to always get a plus score, often your opponents just happen to have far more high card points. One of the goals with a preempt often isn't to get a plus score, it is to get a smaller negative score. Going down in 3♦ as in Mgoetze example is often better then letting your opponents play in ♠. Occasionally you hit partner with a great hand and can make it, that's even better, but going down can still be a good result for you.

I don't know their systems, but if they showed specifically the A♠ then I believe not showing the void is called for.

I don't believe it is a question of trusting partner; I believe it is taking advantage of an opportunity to keep the auction one level lower without sacrificing any useful information. Your partner already knows you have at most 1♠, you know your partner has the A♠. I doubt it is possible to create a hand for partner where knowing you have a void instead of a singleton would help him place the contract correctly. If you can create one I won't consider you rude. :P

Duh, I cant count, ya no sympathy for south.

So south was expecting them to obey the law of total tricks and bid 3♠? I actually have some sympathy with south but I am not a director, curious how this turns out.

That's great to hear, I don't play many robot tournies and was only going off what I read in this thread. If it is already not that much of an issue, so much the better.

I think south gave up on clubs to quickly, it would have taken very little to prod north into heading towards slam. If 3♠ asks for a stopper, I am not sure what else north can do but show it. I think you had an entire level of the auction to play with before trying to sign off in 3nt and south just skipped over it.

Well, it can't be called good bridge :) But then what can you expect when half the field are amateurs, of course bridge is still a competitive game and there is an advantage in doing such things so such things are naturally done. This analogy is perfectly inline with playing with robots, the problem is the same and the solution is the same. The amateurs(or robots) can hopefully improve over the years. This is qualitatively different then rotating the best hand, which is a systematic flaw with the rules of the tournament that can never be fixed rather then a transient flaw that hopefully fixes itself with time. Of course with pro-am's, there are always new amateurs, but the point of pro-am's isn't good bridge. Hopefully robots will eventually get good enough at bridge that players won't feel the need to bid 'poorly' to steal the hands.

It is enough in my opinion, but fair enough, to a large extent bridge is what we want it to be. A key point to consider though is that as far as I know this is the first sanctioned game that deviates from the norm in this regard. There is no precedent for this and hence I think just doing it is somewhat dangerous without thoughtful discussion and debate. Is it still bridge if we give the 2nd best hand to the human players partner? Where do we draw the line? We have never had to draw this line before and I am doubtful it is in bridge best interest to start moving this line about. And don't forget the extra information regarding the distribution of high card points, I imagine that can have a fairly large impact on how hands play out. I think once the arguments are fully understood on the subject the majority of players would rather not see artificial hand rotations. If I am wrong I can live with it, I won't like it but right now it doesn't seem like enough discussion has been done about it.

Would you care to elaborate? I am not above admitting I am wrong, but just calling it nonsense is exceedingly unhelpful. He doubled and then pulled his partner's 4♠ to 5♣. My understanding of doubling and bidding is that it shows around 18 points, doing it at the 5 level vulnerable I would expect at least 20 and some extra distribution to boot.

Looks to me like a reasonable slam that went down, I probably would agree to not show the void after the ace of spades is known but I still can't fault anyone here for getting to 6♥

Because west showed a powerful 20+ point hand and this is easts way of saying that I am flat and don't have much offensive help for you so perhaps we should defend. That is where the blame belongs, west doesn't have the hand he showed. I have more sympathy for 5♣, which at least shows a distributional hand rather then a powerful hand but I would still pass.

This is actually very interesting to me. In my own head, I didn't think I resorted to empty name calling, I don't think I actually called anyone a name. But I have read enough of these forums to know that you are generally a fair and impartial moderate and would really like to know how I crossed the line with you. I don't think Obama's original comment was politically divisive and I have yet hear anyone articulate an actually explanation of how it is. Calling someone out for being politically divisive, is in and of itself politically divisive and doing that when the original person wasn't being politically divisive requires a fairly twisted thought process, hence my comment. As we all know, politicians will do seedy things to get ahead, both sides, no doubt. What I found funny is that in this case, Newt and Santorum choose a position that appeals to such a minority of people that it can't be politically advantageous. Hence the action seems insane to me, as it defeats their own motives as I understand them. I know your not above cutting people down, you referred to both sides as being a rerun of dumb and dumber, I am curious how I crossed the line. Well, many people don't even think the incident really has anything to do with the law. Of those that believe the law actually excuses Zimmerman(legally), I think the vast majority will want the law repealed. Of those that think the law doesn't apply and Zimmerman is just a murderer with the police coming up with some absurd legal defense, I think you are right and that many won't want the law repealed. How this actually all plays out is something worth watching.