Cthulhu D

The time to add conventions to your card is when you are having a repeated problem during sessions that could be solved by having an agreement/convention to deal with that problem. If you want to get better at the game, you need to engage in deliberate practice, not adding conventions imho, ymmv, etc.

Surely the +EV of opening in 4th is sharply down given the tendency of partner to be more aggressive in 2nd, though maybe this is offset by people opening more aggressively in 3rd

I'm currently playing it as a mixed raise (4 card support, less than invitational), which I have mixed feelings about, but it seems to work OK.

Ha, I was thinking the overcall structure makes it very easy - but we play it 5/4. I don't think the 5/5 version comes up nearly often enough to be worth playing.

It's all good, I'm being very silly.

But what if the 3-0 trumps are T98!! Jokes aside this is correct. My bottom line is on all of this, use some judgement and consider the broader hand, scoring method and state of the match when making these decisions. Conversely, if you have a 10 card trump fit, you need to at-least have a reason not to bid 4 imho.

The first thing is that it's possible to overstate the 'strength' of the law: It's just a guideline and you need to use your judgement. It's only 'correct' 35-40% of the time, but it's accurate +/- 1 trick a much larger percentage of the time, and you really, really want to make the 'correction' to work out if this is a case where your 9 card heart fit should bid 2, 3 or 4 because getting that right vs someone just bidding 3H every time is a big improvement! (to the tune of 2 IMPs a board!) So don't blindly bid to the level of the law! This is a rough rule of thumb and you absolutely need to use some additional judgement. The rationale is generally a combination of two things: A) if you have a 10 card heart fit or 11 card diamond fit the opponents have a 10 card fit somewhere else (probably). B) If you have very fitting shapely hands your offensive potential might be quite a bit higher than your raw HCP might indicate, and you might be very well able to make game via cross ruffing or something. For example x AQxxxx xxx Kx opposite Axxx KJxx x Axxx Will make if trumps are 2:1, two rounds of hearts, a spade, a two clubs, ruff three spades in north's hand and ruff two diamonds in Souths hand and that's a total of 21 HCP. Trumps are probably 2:1 so you absolutely want to be in it (and there are other chances as well e.g. if an opponent, ideally LHO, shows out on the first round of hearts, you can try and ruff three spades in dummy), but if the hands are: xxx AQxxxx x Kx opposite Axxx KJxx x Axxx It's got fewer chances because of the duplication of shortness (You can, with some luck, do a dummy reversal to make 10, but I think as a practical matter it will be hard), so if you're south it's probably right to try an inquiry rather than just blast 4H. Use that judgement!

I thought about exactly that hand, and my regular partnership would have opened in 1st or 3rd as the other hands have to include an 11 count with an ace or a king which meets our standards for an opening: and you probably even have heart length which makes opening light even better. For example: x KQJxx KJx Jx I'm going to open that in third without a moments thought. I'll much less happily open it in first, but it's got such an obviously great lead so I will. You have to really try to come out with a pair of hands in the opponents that won't open. Any 12 count is probably going to get opened, so you need a hand like this: xx KJx KQJx xxxx opposite: A Qxxxx xxx AJxx And I'd open the 2nd hand in third despite the terrible heart suit because of the tasty rebid. The problem is that the hands that will work are hands with 10 card spade fits, but those hands are all very likely to attract an opening from somewhere else.

I wonder if this is related to how you open in 2nd - I'm struggling to imagine a situation in which a 8-9 count makes game vs partners maximum passed hand and in which the opponents don't also open the bidding. Oppo has 21HCP and therefore someone is probably going to have opened?

would you open if the hearts and spades were swapped?

Why do you want to make premeptive bids in 4th? Who are you pre-empting?

That's what my regular partnership does as well. I think you want to includes hands that almost certainly don't want to be in game opposite a maximum passed hand, but do have a pretty reasonable shot of making 2M. Then it makes it hard for opponents to balance, as well as streamlines your invitational sequences.

It's probably better to play a 14-16 1NT as it still has much higher frequency than the 15-17 hand (like.. double), and it makes for a very smooth NT ladder, but you have to play transfer responses to short club. Alternatively, you can easily play the same pattern with 11-13: 11-13 opens 1NT, 14-16 accepts the transfer, 17-19 rebids 1NT and 20-21 bids 2NT. Either way, if you ignore pre-emptive value and focus on streamlining your bidding system, 11-13 as the lowest rung of your NT range has a lot to recommend it.

Inquiry's writeup is pretty good, what weve been playing with a few tweaks.

I think it's a lot easier because we play an unbalanced diamond and otherwise have a similar auction, but it's tricky because you've got lots of choices depending on how north evaluates his hand (Does he have extras? Does he say the spade suit is 'good' or focus on the club shortness?). I legimtimately think this is a 'minimum' because the unbalanced 1D obviously promises a stiff or a void so my unbalanced 13 count is pretty close to a minimum. If he has a minimum, he goes 1D-2S (Unbalanced Diamond - Inv+diamond raise or balanced GF with exactly 4 diamonds)) 2NT - 3C (I have a minimum - shortness ask) 3NT - ?? (Short clubs - and now you're home free though our RKCB uses more space than Cyberyeti's so I think there is going to be a bunch of cue bidding before RKCB is bid. But you're screwed if partner thinks he has extras and a the 4 card spade suit is good. Like say the J of S is in north hand for the sake of argument, then it goes 1D-2S 2NT-3S (Invitational+ - Extras with a 4 card good spade suit!) Now you get stuck where cyberyeti did. I don't agree we have extras though. If you had the Q of spades with the K you have extras though but then I think you are OK even if you have the extra club?

i think it's just people overcooking it at IMPs. Obviously easy to shout from the bleachers but it seems fairly clear in game 2 that north decided to bid his values twice (3C is some sort of good raise, and then he's elected to just bid game over a minimum noise by his partner). I don't know what the problem is in game 1. I'm not sure south really has the extras that 4S seems to promise, and his hand hasn't really improved after the 2H bid.

Taking them separately: With 2C it's because you believe the net benefits are more significant than the net negatives. Would be the same reason you do anything! I do it because I think having a weak 2D in your 2C results in less preemption and the benefits alternative use for 2D is substantial. With the 2nd option, you just bid 1S and see what opener does. If partner bids 1NT you've got tons of space to unfold the hand (we use 2C as a relay here which gives lots of space), and if partner shows his shape you've got the location of 9 cards in his hand and plenty of space to unwind the details. It finds all 4-4 fits, all 5-3 fits and the only time you past 1NT with a 4-3 or 5-2 major fit and less than game forcing strength is if opener is 4=5-(2-2) or 4=5-(3-1). The downside is

It's weird that this is heavily contested, because it seems obvious that 2S has the most pre-emptive value, and 2D gives the opponents the most space, but the least direction on where to go, and 2H gives people a clear direction and enough space to explore it at the two level. I really want to work out how to play 2C as a weak pre-empt because I think it would be super effective.

Why don't people play 1H-1NT as as inv or less with spades? It seems to solve the hands you most commonly have, let you get out in 1NT the highest % of the time, find all 4-4 fits, in return for making auctions with 5 spades and a game force a bit cramped, though not that cramped really. Rebids after 1H-1S are something like 1NT: Min balanced or diamonds - This bid is awkward, I hope you're playing a 14-16 NT! 2C: Clubs 2D: Hearts 2H: 4 spades 5 hearts 2S: Natural reverse and then it mostly works. I guess all the changes you're making to standard might be a bit ugly here, but it lets 1NT be not forcing under every circumstance. Then here you can get your hand across perfectly: 1H-1S-2H and responder knows 100% what's up and has plenty of time to stop gracefully. Also most hands go 1H-1S-1NT-pass out. If your jurisdiction allows it, you can also put the weak long diamonds hand into 2C and then just play 2D flannery if you want.

Oh yeah great point: that makes total sense as obviously you don't need 2NT as naturally when you are a passed hand.

Is it? Good Question I guess. Partnership bidding at bridge appears to define the cheapest cue as a raise, and the jump cue as the splinter. So I'm assuming something like: 3C/3D: Fit non jump 3H: Good raise 3S: Competitive 4H: Splinter 4S: Preemptive

If you play fit non jumps (and you should, probably), this seems like the obviously winning bid. Pard has everything he needs to know about whether to defend 3H, bid 3S or bid 4S at that point.

We actually play artifical super negatives so there are six cases: Opener is weaker and responder has a less than two queens Opener is strong and responder has less than two queens. Opener is a weak and responder has a hand that wouldn't invite opposite a weak 2D Opener is weak and responder has a hand that would invite opposite a weak 2D Opener is strong and responder has a hand that wouldn't invite opposite a weak 2D Opener is strong and responder has a hand that would invite opposite a weak 2D I don't think the super negatives are a particularly good idea, but I don't hate them and my regular partner and I play often play with two other guys who really like the super negatives so we play super negatives because partnership harmony. You can easily leave them out and play the traditional double negative approach. The way we handle this: 1) This never actually happens as the opponents have a 27 count minimum and generally have hands that warrant exploring slam. 100% of the time that this has happened the opponents have bid something. Our plan is it goes 2C-2H and then you try and bail out of the auction undoubled anywhere. If you're looking at a weak 2D and it's Non vul just pass: they are 100% for game so if you are somehow allowed to play here undoubled it will be a great score. Our agreement is to pass even if vul here but its never actually happened. You generally get out because mass confusion reigns after like, 2C-(extremely long hesitation) P-2H-P-P-?? or 2C-P-2H - (Extremely long hesitation, lots of questions about if 2H is forcing)?? 2) You just bid as you normally would opposite 2C-2H super negative. 3) It goes 2C-2D-All pass. You're playing the hand from the opposite side from the rest of the room, but that's fine generally. 4) Opener is weak and responder has a hand that would invite opposite a weak 2D. Here we just play as though opener had opened a weak 2D. 2NT is an artificial inquiry, other bids (except 2H, because thats the negative) are natural. 5) This just goes like a normal kokish auction, 2C-2D-Opener makes a rebid, away you go. 6) It's theoretically possible that you'd have a 2C opener and I have a strong hand, and we have agreements for dealing with that but it's never happened and is very, very unlikely. You'll probably end up having a rather awkward slam auction based on some practice sessions, but yeah it's never happened at the table. You're going to want a 14 count to invite probably, partner probably has a balanced 22 count, just don't make bids that can be passed lol. You just don't get 36 HCP combined hands often enough for it to be a problem, and with a significant % of the problem situations you can just punt a grand and probably make it because you have a combined 37-38 HCP.

Yeah weak with diamonds. You're almost always going to want to bid 2D waiting anyway (we play kokish). You lose the ~0.05-0.1% of the time partner has a positive response to 2C, and you gain modestly when you preempt (2.5% ISH of the time for us). You also lose in the 1.5% of the time you have a weak 2as the field gets a 2D opener Vs your 2C. You gain in the times you use the freed bid for a prempt (4.5ish % for us). The other small advantage is that opponents are less likely to preempt straight away. As the 2C bid is about 75% likely to be a weak 2 diamonds We played for a while that 2C could be weak diamonds or weak spades, but there where not enough attractive options for the freed up 2S bid to make it worth it.

It would be interesting if people discussed how they partition the opening bidding space into pre-empts vs constructive bids. For my main partnership the decision that unpins our bidding philosophy is that if you open the bidding you are better positioned than the opponents as long as there is enough information in that opening bid for partner to act intelligently. So we want to: A) maximise the frequency with which we open the bidding, preferably with a natural bid. B) we need to be able to get out at the lowest possible level when we realise that we don't have the balance of firepower. From those design principles you can see how we arrived at the partitioning of For me, 1C-1NT are exclusively constructive bids because they have relatively high frequency and there is enough space available to 'resolve' the many different hand types within those bids by clarifying intent on the subsequent round of the auction. Bids at the 2 level however, have less ability to 'resolve' if they are overloaded, so we favour high frequency pre-emptive methods. The difficulty is very strong hands that don't naturally fit into 1 level openings, so we have to give some space to them. That is managed by including almost all very strong hands in 2C, with 2NT holding 20-21 to ensure our NT ladder can smoothly unfold. Then we want high frequency pre-emptive bids - as a 2C strong only bid isn't exactly high frequency we've folded in a weak opener, and then play 2D as diamonds a major, 2H as both majors weak and 2S as a natural 2S opener. The 2D and 2H have maybe twice the frequency of a weak, and have the other advantage that often the opponents want to play in 'your' suit 2, which is extremely difficult to actually do e.g. vs the 2H opener.